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This is a special celebratory re-launched production post-covid and built into the World Pride celebrations and as such it is a very short season. Marked also by Shaun himself announcing the new philanthropic partnerships, every dollar donated will be quadrupled. So, encouraging to set them up before heading overseas to festivals and a European invitation. 

A collaboration between one of Australia’s most highly acclaimed contemporary dance companies – led by award-winning director/choreographer Shaun Parker, and internationally acclaimed LA/ Sofia-based Bulgarian singer/ songwriter/ Queer performance artist Ivo Dimchev, KING is performed by a cast of ten of Australia’s most exciting young dancers, with Dimchev adding his on-stage magic in the role of a soulful cabaret crooner, performing his seductive original score.

Dance theatre is so often void of a clear dance narrative and yet with Shaun Parker’s KING this is not so. Held aloft by the haunting voice of Ivo Dimchev (vocalist and Composer) this glorious counter-tenor, the cabaret setting is woven between a cocktail garden party that moves to become the jungle of our society. The men in monkey suits appear as if in some elite cocktail party. Those monkey suits later bare the undercover resemblance to the invocation of the tortured maleness that must witness both the fight and the gentle love and yet savagery of masculine power play. 

Parker’s choreography has, at the core, a playful feel although there is much evidence of tight choreography and timing, the developing relationships and indeed characters lend much to the audience engagement. The movement begins with a spatial investigation of rumbling roleplay as the King watches on. Set in the ‘garden’ that was most powerful as the men dissolve between the branches and a shuddering reminiscence of “Lord of the Flies” plays out behind the foliage.

Less effective was the intentional disruption to reveal the rude and raw King unclothed as he came back to the show through the front of house. I felt the point was lost on the audience as the magic of theatrical effects was broken by the house lights coming up. Nonetheless his figure regal then becomes its most vulnerable in his birthday suit.

Primitive and emboldened by a brooding masculinity of tribe on tribe. Ivo sings of killing the man one loves – his lyrics both resonate and are lost in his lounge singer style. He masterfully manages both his microphone technique as well as the keyboard becoming like  a classical guitar.

The singer is also a watcher and his engagement within and outside the drama of the performers was so engaging and, at the same time, kept us all enthralled by the journeyman KING. His performance, content, and quality support the narrative, and is masterfully what holds everything together. 

Shaun Parker Company’s KING played the Seymour Centre for a very short season between the 28th February, 2023 and the 4th March 2023.

Production photography by Prudence Upton