Havoc in the Garden

Havoc in the Garden is a new play from acclaimed British writer Lennie James and Massive Company, the team behind The Sons of Charlie Paora.

Sometimes it’s the first place I run … and sometimes it’s the last place on earth – My family. Sometimes it is your only truth … and sometimes it’s your biggest lie.

Havoc in the Garden, a new play from acclaimed British writer Lennie James and Massive Company (Whero’s New Net, The Girls Show), is another collaboration from the hugely successful team that produced The Sons of Charlie Paora, the 2002 hit that toured nationally and internationally, including a season at the Royal Court Theatre in London.

Directed by Sam Scott, Havoc in the Garden stars an exciting multi-cultural cast of New Zealand’s emerging and established theatre practitioners and features music and sound designed by accomplished musician Tama Waipara.

A play about families – about the lies that parents tell, and children reveal; what holds families together and what tears them apart – Havoc in the Garden unfolds in a small neighbourhood of five houses on an Auckland hillside where an act of violence and rage is about to shatter the community. In the ensuing police siege, five families are forced to confront the truths they have kept buried.

“[The Sons of Charlie Paora] is generous and strange and resounding and rare.”
- The Observer (UK)

“Massive Company has a distinctive, unique brand of theatre … the freshest, liveliest show in town.”
- Metro Magazine (NZ)

“Truly Remarkable”
- The Observer, UK (on The Sons of Charlie Paora)