The Dust Palace finds home in dedicated hub
This audio is not downloadable due to copyright restrictions.
The country's leading circus theatre company, The Dust Palace, has two reasons to celebrate.
They're about to open and tour their new show Haus of Yolo and secondly, following a new partnership with the local council, The Dust Palace has now moved into a new venue in Ellerslie, Tamaki Makaurau.
The former theatre will be a dedicated hub for circus arts, cabaret and live performance; serving both artists and the surrounding community.
Eve Gordon spoke to Culture 101's Perlina Lau about the benefits of having the new space for artists and performers.
Haus of Yolo will open at 138 Main Highway, Ellerslie from the 15th to the 18th of May before heading to Kerikeri, Hastings and Canada.
Hashtags

Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles


Scoop
an hour ago
- Scoop
Devastating Fire Destroys The Dust Palace's Stored Circus Equipment And Theatre Assets
Press Release – The Dust Palace The damage is catastrophic, says Grae Burton, Chair of The Dust Palace Trust. This is more than just equipmentthis is the creative heartbeat of years of mahi, training, and generosity from our community. Auckland, NZ – A massive fire in the early hours of Sunday morning June 9th has completely destroyed the storage facility housing all of The Dust Palace's circus props, aerial equipment, costumes, and recently donated theatre seating. The fire broke out in a commercial warehouse on Maurice Road in Penrose just before 1am on June 8, with over 50 firefighters responding to the blaze. Among the tenants of the facility was The Dust Palace Trust, a renowned circus and performing arts organisation known for its community engagement, national touring productions, and kaupapa Māori-led education programmes. The fire resulted in the total loss of more than 15 years of creative material, including hand-crafted set pieces, specialist circus gear, and the full inventory of aerial rigging equipment. Also lost were newly donated theatre seats used in the recent production of Haus of YOLO at Ellerslie Arts—seats that were destined to support the creation of affordable performance spaces. 'The damage is catastrophic,' says Grae Burton, Chair of The Dust Palace Trust. 'This is more than just equipment—this is the creative heartbeat of years of mahi, training, and generosity from our community.' The Trust has launched a Givealittle page to raise funds to rebuild and recover. Donations will go toward replacing essential equipment so that upcoming shows, community classes, and youth outreach can continue as planned.

RNZ News
3 hours ago
- RNZ News
Rotorua school girl juggles rehersals, roadtrips in Annie role
11 year old Rotorua schoolgirl Gracie Bradley has won the lead role in Auckland Theatre company's production of Annie. She's one of three young starlets filling the role. Now she is juggling school and commuting to Auckland for rehearsals at least three times a week before the show opens later this month at the Bruce Mason theatre. Gracie Bradley spoke to Lisa Owen.


Otago Daily Times
4 hours ago
- Otago Daily Times
Digital whodunnit for the TikTok generation
A New Zealand-produced, 18-part series shines the spotlight on the dangers and growing epidemic of image-based abuse and bullying. The Sender is about a group of prefects who have a final night of debauchery at a bach before taking on their roles and responsibilities in their final year of school. But as the night unravels, anonymous messages hit their phones with secrets and scandals threatening their carefully crafted personas. The series has been shot specifically for social media with the 18 episodes dropping on Instagram and TikTok. The aim was to make a series that resonated with a Gen Z audience, producer Jessica Todd told Culture 101 and getting to grips with that demographic's slang was part of the research process, she says. 'Whilst like Gen Z obviously speak very differently to millennials and everybody else, I think it's also important to remember they're just smart audiences like the rest of us. 'And so from the baseline of starting to write and think about the storyline and think about how we wanted it to sound, we were like, okay, it really needs to sound authentic to Gen Z, and we are not Gen Z, so we're going to need to do a bit of research and figure that out and become acclimatised with the lingo and what's cool and what's not.' Ultimately the story had to be strong enough to carry any audience, she says. 'It's just like any other project. It was just research and connecting with the actual audience and I think also just not pushing it too far out, like I feel some other shows that are trying to connect with a certain audience maybe go too far into the slang or vernacular. 'And we were like, it also just needs to be funny and good.' The fact The Sender is a digital only production presented its own challenges, director Liv McClymont says. 'Gen Z are watching all of their content on platforms like Tiktok, Instagram reels and YouTube shorts, and they're all vertical platforms. 'So we have to write for those specific platforms and what they will allow us to do, because they can be quite restrictive about what we can show, there's certain things that you just cannot put on social media, I think blood, for instance, that is a big no-no.' It also had to be shot in portrait mode, she says. 'We have six lead cast members and how are we going to fit all of them in one frame? It feels impossible, but we managed to do it with some very tricky blocking.' Getting depth in each shot also required some deft framing, she says. 'We wanted to make sure that we had as much depth in every frame so that we could make it feel cinematic, even though we were in this portrait mode.' Often the characters had to be stacked in unusual configurations to get them in shot, she says. 'We get two people sitting on the couch, and then another two people sitting behind them further back on the couch, and then another person standing behind the couch, and then all of a sudden, we've somehow, through height and dimension, got five people in one frame.' The plotting had to be tight to engage with an audience whose attentions needs to be captured quickly, Todd says. 'We knew that we had to start every single episode with something punchy or interesting or absurd or dramatic, and end every episode with hopefully a decent enough cliffhanger to make you want to scroll onto the next one.' The feedback has been positive, she says. 'They're really loving it, and I think are excited that there's a show for them that speaks to the world they live in, the issues that they're going through.'