JOSIPA DRAISMA

SHAPESHIFTER - written and performed by Josipa Draisma

 

One woman. Three characters. A blissful turducken of idiocy.

 

What do a snuggie, a spatula and a bucket have in common?

Nothing.

 

Enter THE SHAPESHIFTER:  as mysterious as a midnight shadow at midnight, as undulatingly changeable as a train timetable, as utterly admirable as a sock hanging off the end of your foot.

 

Follow the SHAPESHIFTER from person, to thing, to other thing, to other person as she sheds skin after skin like some kind of idiotic crab-snake.

 

Part monologue, song and clown, SHAPESHIFTER is a deep fall into the rabbit hole of the mundane and often ridiculous minutia of our lives.

 

Josipa Draisma is joyous, loveable and eccentric.

 

As the SHAPESHIFTER, Josipa shifts like a chameleon into a series of absurd characters, inviting the audience to revel in pure unadulterated stupidity with a touch of pathos.  From the exhausted crumping of the pop goddess mega star, via the gibberish guilt trips of the emotionally manipulative Mediterranean Mama, to the lunchbox of the Caped Crusader, Josipa ever seeks the boundaries of playfulness and sheer idiocy.

 

Part monologue, song, and improvisation, Josipa as the SHAPESHIFTER breaks any pre-conceived expectations of how a female actor should look or behave and engages with a part of herself that is emphatically and unapologetically anarchic, UNfashionable, cheeky and silly.

 

Through SHAPESHIFTER, Josipa demonstrates that there is much joy and humour to be found in a state of vulnerable stupidity and finds it profoundly liberating and empowering as both a woman and a performer. By enjoying her own pure stupidity, Josipa hopes that her audiences will connect with their own joyous idiocy, and realize that it’s okay to be the loveable fools we all are.

 

PRODUCTION HISTORY

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2016 Sydney Comedy Festival plus encore show 

2016 Adelaide Fringe Festival, Gluttony and Tandanya Cafe

2016 Grr Nights for Fringe World, Blue Room Summer Nights

2017 The Temperance Society Bar, Sydney

2015 Sydney Fringe Comedy Festival

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REVIEWS

 

"In Shapeshifter, Draisma displays her talent for character-based clowning, as she wordlessly creates absurd scenarios along with her audience. We have no choice but to abandon ourselves to the crazy "– Great Scott Media

 

"Particularly charming is a lunchbox-enjoying Batman whose action sequences require an audience-produced party whistle theme song. This bit culminated in an all-out battle, with the crowd exhorted to pelt soft toys at Batman as he bravely defends himself "– Great Scott Media

 

"Passionate and committed" – The Advertiser

 

"Draisma is the genuine article who does not cloak herself with wit and sarcasm. It is theatre for the adventurous - Sydney Arts Guide Shapeshifter was certainly a lot of offbeat fun"– Great Scott Media

 

"I have not been so powerfully serenaded in my life, and although the joke was that the performer is inherently unloveable, I have to admit that she won a bit of my heart with those vocals. Truly stunning." – Great Scott Media

 

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