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Through a skilful blend of comedy, music and storytelling, Michael Giglio emulates the bards of the Middle Ages by having the audience laugh through the pain of the contemporary live music scene. Luke Mesterovic reviews That's Me in the Corner at Erskineville Town Hall for Sydney Fringe 2026, ahead of its return to the Pottery Lane Performance Space in Lane Cove on 24 and 26 September.

The success of Peter Pan: After Dark proves Sydney's long history with burlesque has not expired. Sundae Blaze's world premiere — a mix of burlesque, circus and fire performers reimagining a childhood story as an R18+ palooza — plays Fool's Paradise at the Entertainment Quarter as part of Sydney Fringe 2026. Reviewed by Sascha Zenari.

Kady Robinson's *Stage Soldiers*, at PYT Fairfield for Sydney Fringe 2026, sits somewhere between confessional theatre, stand-up and song cycle — a solo show about growing up trans with the military as a familial backdrop. Nathaniel Crossinggum asks who confessional transgender theatre is really for, and what happens when the wound is made by the enforcing end of Australia's empire.

Part homage to the Indiana Jones golden era, part old-school live-action computer game, part comic nonsense, Yarno Rohling has built a puzzle-box comedy show — Arizona Myers and the Ominous Hand! — at the Factory Theatre for Sydney Fringe 2026, complete with sound effects, screen visuals, one screaming Belgian police puppet, and heavy stage participation from audience members. Charlie Prendergast finds a wholesomely offbeat invitation back to good, silly fun.

Jarred Keane reviews Giuseppe's Love Quest, Jeromaia Detto's offbeat, sincere clown show at Erskineville Town Hall for Sydney Fringe 2026 — an hour of gags, callbacks and consenting audience participation that isn't a gimmick but the point, and a reminder that love, in Detto's hands, is joy.

Jay Yamaki's Anyway, she died is a new stand-up comedy show that takes grief, makes it silly, and delivers silliness with an equal measure of nihilism. Reviewed by Eugene Blazejowski Walsh at Dawn's Caravan, Newtown Hotel, as part of Sydney Fringe 2026 — a first stand-up show for the reviewer, and a rare hour where an artist turns lost trains of thought into the biggest laughs of the night.

In Sebastian Gray's Distortion at the Actor's Pulse Playhouse for Sydney Fringe 2026, a horror‑thriller about looksmaxxing and internet beauty standards strands its audience alongside an OnlyFans model recovering from a concussion in the room of a lone tech‑tinkerer. Jack Mitchell finds a play that rewards leaning in — where set, sound, and Gray's twitchy performance keep multiple kinds of distortion in the air.

If the only two certainties in this life are death and taxes, then <em>The Man</em> is a grim reminder that they are more glued together than we could possibly understand. Lola Kate Carlton reviews JB Theatre Co's Australian premiere of Olivier-winning writer James Graham's one-man show, directed by Jo Bradley and starring Mike Howlett, at Pottery Lane Performance Space for Sydney Fringe 2026.

Three emerging Colombian-Australian artists — Guillermo Robayo Gómez, Dica and Daniela Zambrano — reach back through smoke, song and ancestry in Dancing with the Roots, an intimate and experimental exploration of identity and belonging at Sydney Fringe 2026. Kate Gaul finds a heartfelt, ambitious work whose youth is its great strength — a must-see.

Eugene Blazejowski Walsh reviews Holy Order of the Confusion Sound, an evening of ‘ceremonial folk punk’ from Veronica Lacuna, Sophie Moore, and Chris Stabback in the basement of the Petersham Bowling Club for Sydney Fringe 2026 — a three-hour tightrope walk between spectacular songwriting and theatrical gimmickry, strongest when those two elements remain in balance.

Valerie Chidiac reviews Claire Collective Company's Epicaricacy, written by and starring Samantha Dewar and directed by Shakira Cheers, at The Actors Pulse Playhouse for Sydney Fringe 2026. A trio of friends in their early twenties — Savannah, Leah and Addy — are pulled apart by peer pressure, substance use, sexual violence and one destabilising Guy. Chidiac finds a piercing study of friendship breakups and gaslighting that centres the trio rather than its interloper.

Sydney Japanese Dance's world premiere Snow, Moon, and Flowers (雪月花) opens a window onto a largely unacknowledged chapter of Australian history, weaving Japanese classical dance, live music, and spoken narrative into a triptych of remembrance. Reviewed at Sydney Fringe Festival on 2 September 2026 by Eugene Blazejowski Walsh — a focused act of remembrance that extends the cherry blossom branch to its audience as an invitation to cultural learning and historical reckoning.

Saltwater Girls is for the Catholic girls with a bottomless pit of guilt. It is for those navigating their queerness in an environment where it is to be mocked by peers, a source of discrimination, or something to be surveilled. It’s for anyone who feels like they are yet to or still in the process of figuring how they present themselves to the world. It’s also for anyone who regularly listens to ‘Forgiven’ by Alanis Morissette. Valerie Chidiac reviews Lana Filies’ solo show at Erskineville Town Hall for Sydney Fringe 2026.

Zoë Jensen's Zoe's Killer Instinct is an extended meditation on power dynamics, misogyny, and what it takes to have that 'killer instinct' — both on and off the stage. Co-created with husband Michael McStay, the darkly comedic cabaret has charming performances and striking costuming, but backs away from the dark themes it addresses and leaves something to be desired. Reviewed by Charlotte Smee.

Flautist Melanie Walters' solo recital Storyteller at Erskineville Town Hall, part of Sydney Fringe Festival 2026 (1–5 September), weaves contemporary flute works through folktales, poetry and horror films. Angelique Ford finds a virtuosic performer who doesn't just interpret her material but steps inside it — an engaging and technically impressive hour well worth your time.

The Gaius Gracchus Society staged Sophocles' Antigone at the Chau Chak Wing Museum, University of Sydney, on 1–2 May 2026. Anastasia Dale finds a production torn between contemporary Australian delivery and classical gravitas — one whose chorus, music, and Madeleine Charters' spellbinding Tiresias point to the show it could have been.

Aubrey Wang reviews lacuna by Eric Jiang at Belvoir Downstairs, Griffin Lookout 2026. A freelance psychopomp harvests the memories of the living on contract to the goddess of oblivion. An Orphic English-Cantonese three-hander about queer and diaspora grief, and the gig economy of forgetting.

The Whisper by Carl Caulfield at the Civic Playhouse, Newcastle, UpStage 2026 — a haunted-lodger premise redeemed by idiomatically Australian writing and Matthew McFarlane's magnificent, unsentimental grandfather.

Grow is much more than a high-concept premise; it is a journey that blooms through an exploration of belonging, identity, personal fulfilment, and the choices of adulthood. Melanie Schaffer reviews the Segal Centre's new Canadian musical from the creative team behind Come From Away, running at the Sylvan Adams Theatre May 24 – June 14, 2026.

Flip Flop is an improvised game show where the audience doesn't just watch the competition; they have the power to decide who wins or loses. Melanie Schaffer reviews Shanthony Exum's raucous, audience-driven format at Petit Campus during the Montréal Fringe Festival 2026.

Public displays of affection! Mass shootings! Drugs, deities — it's the first day of college, and real-life Prof. G explains why you can't send naughty photos to your classmates and how to outrun the criminology students.

Y'all heard of sex while camping? I heard it's fucking in tents. Le Cimetière des voitures by Fernando Arrabal, adapted by Prod. Cours des choses, Montreal Fringe 2026

Seven zoomers in thrifted Y2K separates spend forty minutes trying to hold together miscarriage, abortion, police misconduct, infidelity, and one on-stage stabbing with an ice pick.

Give these people a blank check. The puppet is well-made, the manipulation is immaculate, the operators are visible characters instead of erased functions. Puppetry gives the light and sound design team new frontiers.

Aubrey Naur reviews Syd Hamidreza Hosseini’s Viraf 2.0 at Théâtre VME / Mile End Improv for Montréal Fringe 2026 — The Hive Theatre’s techno-séance for a cousin named Majid, who entered a coma on the sixth day of the war between Israel and Iran and died sixty-four days later, not from the bombs but from a motorcycle accident. A relic, not a chatbot.

Stephen Daytime reviews Isaac Kessler’s 1-Man No-Show, winner of Best Clown Show at Montréal Fringe 2026 — an anti-serious fever-dream that permits no boredom. A striptease where the bazongas are jokes, a country auctioneer badgering the audience through wanky meta-layers, and a performer you’d pay to read you a telephone book. 4.5 stars, with pasties still hiding something.

Aubrey Wang critique Minuit Portant par APARTÉ&Co (Johanna Simon et Sarah Roy) au Studio Jean-Valcourt pour le Festival Fringe de Montréal 2026. Deux corps corsetés, un canapé en damas victorien, et le patriarcat pris pour parasite. Une thèse sur l’exo-patriarchie comme cordyceps du corps féminin.

Philip Sawaia reviews Marshall Kahente Diabo’s Dolycule (directed by Bri Bedard) at Mile End Improv Theatre for Montréal Fringe 2026 — a dance solo about polyamory, told through three sheddings: the white gown, the clown pants, and the body itself.

Philip Sawaia reviews Gada Jane’s Becoming Psychic at Montréal Fringe 2026 — the rare psychic story told by someone actually asking whether she’s psychic. Curious, skeptical, and humane; the text still deserves a review or two.

Stephen Daytime's Minotaur at Montréal Fringe 2026 reclaims bouffon from the right — an attack on toxic masculinity in form and not just content.

C'est l'hiver, il neige. Dans une auberge délabrée, un homme discute avec son glockenspiel. L'auberge n'est pas terminée, il manque encore le toit... Ce grand homme au cœur d'enfant passe l'entièreté de son temps seul dans cet espace incomplet. Est-ce que l'arrivée d'une candide étrangère pourra remplir ce vide?

An intimate, postmodern two-hander that turns deconstructed wedding gowns and breath-synced blindness into one of Fringe’s most rigorously made pieces of dance theatre.

Review of Matthew Gasda's new play The Last Days of Downtown (CTR, April 2026), read as a contemporary adaptation of Euripides' Bacchae.

A four-star review of Ruby Blinkhorn's Cadaver Synod at KXT on Broadway, directed by Mathew Lee. A queer revisionist take on a Vatican scandal that dazzles with wit and craft, even as its final act stumbles.