KEY POINTS:
Auckland city's big culture bash is back in March and there's something for everyone - from R18 burlesque and circus acts to free street parties.
The programme for the Auckland Festival 2009 was announced last night and the two and a half week celebration of theatre, dance
and music kicks off on March 5.
The heart of the festival once again will be Red Square, located this time in and around the Aotea Centre instead of Britomart, and will be home to the Festival Club, the Festival Bar, and the Famous Spiegeltent (to be erected in Aotea Square).
And the naughty highlight of the last festival is returning for the event. La Clique - a mash-up of cabaret, burlesque and the circus - is on again at the Famous Spiegeltent.
The 2007 season of the R18 show sold out straightaway. Not surprising considering it had everything from a guy in wet jeans performing superhuman feats with a bathtub, to sword-swallowing beauty Miss Behave, and naked rope dangler Azaria Universe.
The La Clique line-up for next year is yet to be confirmed but you'll have to be in quick for tickets to see what these freakish performers come up with this time.
Elsewhere, the main highlights are the world premiere of Black Grace Dance Company's Gathering Clouds - Peace, Poverty, Dreams & The Pacific; the Circus Oz 30th Birthday Bash, a new show from the company that inspired Cirque du Soleil; and an adaptation of Venus & Adonis by renowned Australian theatre company Bell Shakespeare.
The festival's major New Zealand commissioned work for 2009 is by directing team Kate Parker and Julie Nolans who have adapted wordless graphic novel The Arrival by illustrator and children's book author Shaun Tan.
Two other major theatre highlights include The Andersen Project, a modern-day fairytale written to commemorate the 200th anniversary of Dutch writer Hans Christian Andersen's birth, and ambitious, multidimensional Japanese show Nostalgia.
The Andersen Project was created by Canadian writer and director Robert Lepage who is renowned in theatre circles but who also, in the words of musician Peter Gabriel, makes "theatre for people who don't like theatre".
Nostalgia, put on by the Osaka-based Ishinha, blends dance, theatre and music to tell the stories of Japanese immigrants to South America at the dawn of the 20th century.
But wait, there's more.
On March 7, part of Queen St will be closed off for the Queen St Sing Sing, a free event with performances from singers, musicians, and dancers from around the Oceania region. "Sing sing" is a Papua New Guinea term meaning "music party".
The Festival Club, in Red Square, hosts the contemporary music programme with three shows every night starting at twilight and finishing in the early hours of the morning.
Headlining acts include musical comedian, Tim Minchin; saucy Irish/French singer and seductress Camille O'Sullivan; and local programming includes an audio visual show featuring Len Lye's kinetic sculptures and The Dogs of Auckland, a jazz-influenced homage to Auckland's dogs.
There will be a weekend dedicated to arts and culture for Auckland families, with highlights including performances of Peter And The Wolf by the NZSO and storytime in the Spiegeltent.
Tickets for all festival events go on sale to the public from the-edge.co.nz on November 19 (following a preferential booking period for Friends of the Festival).
For more information, go to aucklandfestival.co.nz.