Let arts festival begin and give left brain a rest

The wait is over.

It’s been two long years since the Arts Festival Dunedin team last lured some of the world’s great creative types to our fair city.

The team has attracted more and their talent is needed more than ever.

For the next 10 days we can relax the left side of our brains,  forget local government elections and focus on a spectrum of emotions ranging from joy to fear.

The festival this year features plenty of comedy, including Arthur Meek’s show about his alter ego Richard Meros convincing Hillary Clinton to take him on as a  lover.

I can only imagine the frenzy the first presidential debate put Meek in — has any one woman ever looked more alluring in a scarlet pantsuit?

The programme this year includes plenty for children.

As the festival falls in the school holidays, there is no excuse for keeping the children indoors — get them outside saving a whale or crawling with a massive caterpillar.

The noise levels in the city will increase as casts and crews do their final rehearsals.

The rehearsals include those for two shows to be performed  at the Fortune Theatre on the same days this week.

The show upstairs is set in the seedy slums of gold rush era Dunedin, the show downstairs is a dusty den full of shifting memories and bananas.

The crews agreed on the hours each production could rehearse at full noise to remain hospitable neighbours.

Each day more crews will arrive from the around the world, adding more beautiful noise to our city.

Make sure you buy your tickets to the shows to avoid disappointment; the three performances at Olveston and the Dylan Thomas play Under Milk Wood at the Fortune Theatre have already sold out.

How much festival do you think you can handle?

Do you have the nerve to disappear into a world of a missing high school pupil or link arms with a courtesan in 19th-century Paris?

Never fear, indulge yourself and if it all gets  too much and you need to slow your heartbeat, check out the Dhargyey Buddhist Centre, where an intricate artwork made from  naturally coloured fine sands imported from India is being created,  only to be destroyed when the festival is over.

We should show similar devotion to this festival.

It’ll do us good. 

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