“THE LADY AND THE TIGER”
Tristan Meecham and Olivia Ilic
8 June → 8 June 2012

West Space and Aphids presents THE LADY AND THE TIGER
A Ridiculous Performance by Tristan Meecham and Olivia Ilic.

Would you rather be water or cheese? Would you rather sit on a pineapple or a turnip? Would you rather eat your mother or your father? Would you rather the Lady or the Tiger?

The semi-barbaric king of an ancient land used an unusual form of punishment for offenders in his kingdom. The offender would be placed in an arena where his only way out would be to go through one of two doors. Behind one door was a beautiful woman chosen by the king and behind the other was a fierce tiger. The offender was then asked to pick one of the doors without knowing what was behind it. If he picked the door with the woman behind it, then he was declared innocent but was also required to marry the woman. If he picked the door with the tiger behind it, though, then he was deemed guilty and the tiger would rip him to pieces.

One day the king found that his daughter, the princess, had taken a lover far beneath her station. The king could not allow this and so he threw the offender in prison and set a date for his trial in the arena. On the day of his trial the suitor looked to the princess for some indication of which door to pick. The princess did in fact, know which door concealed the woman and which one the tiger, but was faced with a conundrum—if she indicated the door with the tiger, then the man she loved would be killed on the spot; however, if she indicated the door with the lady, her lover would be forced to marry another woman, a woman that the princess hated and believed had flirted with her lover. Finally she did indicate a door, which the suitor then opened. And so I leave it with all of you: Which came out of the opened door – the lady, or the tiger?

Inspired by the fable, THE LADY AND THE TIGER is a performance event that thrusts two performers on the horns of a dilemma for an entire evening. Watch as they constantly wrestle with two equally unpleasant options, and have to make an honest meal of it all!

Created with the assistance of the Australia Government through the Australia Council for the Arts their arts funding and advisory body.

PERFORMANCE TIME: FRIDAY 8th of JUNE 6pm- 11pm

aphids.net

Tristan Meecham is an artist, producer, and theatre maker who works with the grand and the ridiculous. He created the large-scale event FUN RUN which premièred at the 2010 Next Wave Festival and travelled to the 2011 Darwin Festival. Tristan is currently developing the second of his large-scale spectacles FIGHT DANCE FIGHT as well as an interactive performance work GAMESHOW, for the Brisbane Powerhouse. His performance work is produced by INSITE ARTS (www.insitearts.com.au). Tristan is an Artistic Associate with Aphids (www.aphids.net). In 2012, he will tour Australia with the Aphids’ work, Thrashing Without Looking, via Mobile States. Tristan completed a Bachelor of Dramatic Arts (Acting) at the VCA and a Bachelor of Visual Arts at QUT. At VCA, he was awarded the inaugural Richard Pratt Scholarship for Outstanding Acting Student. He works as a voice over artist, teacher and actor in both theatre and TV.

Olivia Ilic is a trans-media producer and cross-platform director who hails from a performance background. As the Artistic Director of X:MACHINE Productions, Olivia has conceived, directed and produced the webseries, Queer As Fxxk, The FaceSpace Project, as well as interactive performance projects Serial Blogger (Next Wave Festival 2008) and Senseless (Melbourne Fringe Festival 2007) both nominated for Green Room Awards for film, sound and set design. Olivia also performed in and produced Straight to the Art, an interactive screen installation which screened at Federation Square in 2009. In 2008, Olivia travelled to Europe on an Ian Potter Grant, to work with Serbian collective Doplegenger to create an international collaboration in performance, mockumentary film and online communications. She has also studied and taught performance in Japan, Latvia and the Ukraine and is a Post-Graduate of the VCA.

This project is part of Time Has Come Today, a special season of experimental live art, audiovisual and performance projects at West Space. West Space would like to gratefully acknowledgethe support of the Australian Government through the Australia Council for the Arts, its arts funding and advisory body, for their support of this project.