Puzzles and Plays
Silly season is a puzzler’s peak season, with quizzes, crosswords and other diversions in high demand. For those who enjoy an Astlesque challenge, look out for:
WHODINI – a new riddle-laced crossword to appear pre-Christmas in the Sunday Age. (A large grid, with a pop-cultural flavour, Whodini is slated to appear as part of a monthly puzzle supplement within M Magazine. No pushover, blending trivia with wordplay, Whodini offers successful solvers a chance to score some decent prizes from the Fairfax coffers.)
20 QUESTIONS – Sunday Life magazine – in both NSW and Vic – has just finished typesetting a bent quiz focusing on 2007. True to my perversity, no one question answers an orthodox description. Rather I’ve toyed with anagrams, acronyms, double-meanings and other lateral links to fresh news stories. No prizes with this one – appearing in early January – but unlimited kudos if you can navigate the whole unscathed.
AXE – not a puzzle, but a play, set to run four nights at the Melbourne Theatre Company under the brolly of the Short & Sweet Play Festival. (Dates are Wed 19/12 thru to Sat 22/12, at 8pm.)
Shaped and sharpened by director Gorkem Acaroglu, Axe has been thru two intense rehearsal weeks, and looks ready to swing. I won’t give too much away, but the production is bound to splinter the perception that any short play is a boom-tish sketch – and theatre events such as Short & Sweet are basically Tropfest in 3-D. If that’s the stereotype, then all I can say is timberrr.
(By the way, I’ve seen that stereotype reduced to smithereens on any given Short & Sweet night throughout December, from Top 30 candidates to the wonders of Wildcard Saturday. And this final week will be no different. Safe to say, Axe is not the only cutting-edge piece in the wings.)
So much for the silly-season update. If puzzling is your poison, then stumble across the first two. If plays win the day, come down.