New Owner

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https://www.artscentremelbourne.com.au/whats-on/2026/kids-and-families/new-owner

Date Reviewed: 17/07/2026

New Owner is the creative masterpiece from puppeteers Arielle Gray and Tim Watts of Perth-based theatre collective The Last Great Hunt. Refined over ten years the show has toured internationally and is nothing short of pure imagination, engaging innovative theatre and passionate storytelling through the eyes of Bart, the beloved shelter dog, brought to life by Watts.

Nominated for Best Presentation for Children at the 2017 Helpmann Awards and a winner of the 2019 Dora Award for Theatre for Young Audiences, New Owner is a story of love, loss and new beginnings. The play opens on a projected backdrop of an animal shelter, screens unveiling Bart, tail wagging, hopeful for a new owner. This is juxtaposed with Mabel, an elderly widow searching for companionship of her own. Their worlds combine, and for a while, everything is warm  until a storm one day tears their lives apart, leaving Bart to fend for himself on the city streets.

Combining masterful puppetry, live action, animation and a dynamic soundtrack, Gray and Watts build a world that is visually captivating. The story is sharpened rather than softened by the innocence of Bart's perspective which is precisely what makes it land so hard for adults while still enjoyable for children. Whilst some scenes are eerie and slightly scary for younger children, adults are engrossed wondering what will happen next, surely Bart is going to survive we think, but how?  It is this world building and suspense that is a forte of the production.

The level of craft is staggering. Every detail has been considered, down to Mabel's mismatched shoes, a small, devastating signal of cognitive decline that most children won't register and most adults won't forget. The animation is layered over live action with impeccable timing, shifting camera angles that plunge the audience from within a bin scavenging for food, to a rooftop, to the sea, all within moments.

And for all its twists and turns, New Owner never loses sight of joy. It is laced with simple, delightful moments of dog-like mischief and mannerism — the snuffle for food, the settling in for sleep — observed so precisely that you genuinely forget Gray and Watts are there at all with tails and physical puppets moving in their hands.

Ultimately, New Owner is storytelling at its finest: human, gripping and tugs at the heart strings, made all the more powerful by the innocence of the world told through man's best friend. 

Reviewed by Sandra Lee