Apollo leap
Brad Knewstubb, Kip Chapman and Rachel Forman.
“We’d hope to be there by 2012. These things take a long, long, time,” says Knewstubb.
For the new season Downstage harks back to the 70s as it houses a replica of NASA’s Mission Control centre complete with retro computers and giant video screens. Everyone in the audience gets a chance to “push buttons”.
A 2007 trip to Florida’s Kennedy Space Centre inspired the production after frustrations at not being able to push any console ‘buttons’ because it was roped off.
This time it’s “significantly different” from the 2008 Bats Theatre premiere – more along the lines of the New Zealand International Arts Festival. New actors include Jack Shadbolt and Sam Berkley – astronauts – and Aaron Cortesi as an American news anchor.
People crowded at Downstage Theatre last week for a photo-shoot of themselves wearing astronaut suits: and our film reviewer was one of two who raved about how the suits made them feel like men.
Knewstubb credits the significance of man landing on the moon with the interest in the show, which has since gone to Australia and is next heading to Brisbane and Sydney.
“I think that’s what a lot of people get off on is that it’s still one of the more important things that mankind has ever done. We’ve never really done anything that important since.”
Apollo 13, Downstage, October 30-December 18.
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