Things to do in Melbourne in December

Upcoming drag king and queens get the chance to practise their shows and refine their acts every Thursday night at Melbourne's favourite LGBTQIA+ venue (as voted by Time Out readers), Sircuit. Bio queens, drag queens, trash queens and drag kings all perform, and the event is hosted by famed drag queen Missy La ’Minx. It's a chance for up-and-coming performers to get experience, and for audiences of course it's a night of fantastic drag.  The bar offers $5 pints from 7pm until 10pm, and entry is free. 

Did you know Bon Jovi formed 35 years ago? The hair rockers have been performing just about nonstop since 1983 and never say goodbye. And they are returning to Australia in December in support of their latest album, This House is Not for Sale.  They were last here in 2013, though without founding guitarist Richie Sambora, quit the band in a huff during the Canadian leg of the tour. Sounds like bad medicine to us. He was replaced with Phil X, who will be performing during this tour and is now an official member of the band.   In 2013 Bon Jovi played Etihad Stadium (soon to be Marvel Stadium), which has a capacity of about 50,000 people. This time they're kicking it up a notch, playing the world-famous Melbourne Cricket Ground, which can hold 100,000. The 2013 setlist included plenty of bangers, including of course 'You Give Love a Bad Name', 'Bad Medicine', 'Livin' on a Prayer' and 'Lost Highway'. Fingers crossed this show will be just as rocking. Keep the faith. 

The world’s youngest Nobel Peace Prize winner and famous equal rights and education activist, Malala Yousafzai, is coming to Melbourne to tell her story at the Melbourne Convention and Exhibition Centre on December 11. Malala began her campaign for the rights of girls to receive an education aged 11, blogging about life under the Taliban in Pakistan. She survived a murder attempt by the Taliban at just 15 years old and now, a student at Oxford University, Malala continues to fight for the education of all children, all over the world. The talk is hosted by the Growth Faculty, which has included high-profile events with former US presidential candidate Hillary Clinton, and tickets usually range in the hundreds. You can see and hear from Malala from $99–$395. 

The Cake Bake and Sweets Show is a weekend for keen bakers, pastry cooks and cake decorators to share their talents and treats. The Melbourne Convention and Exhibition Centre will be buzzing with live demonstrations by celebrity chefs showcasing their signature desserts using state-of-the-art baking technology. Incredible professional bakers will teach visitors how to recreate some absolutely jaw-dropping sweets, with techniques such as fondant rolling, cake painting and creating edible figurines. At Kids in the Kitchen, budding bakers can also pick up a trick or two.  If you're less of a baker and more of an eater, you will be able to shop for your favourite treats to take home. 

What’s better than gorging yourself on scones, finger sandwiches and Champagne at a regular high tea? Gorging yourself on piles and piles of cheese at the Westin’s un-brie-lievable new High Cheese event. Westin executive chef Michael Greenlaw has teamed up with Anthony Demia from Maker and Monger for the event, which will bring a series of cheeses together in both sweet and savoury dishes. Running throughout winter, High Cheese will swap out the traditional scones and cream for scones with creamed Giorgio Cravero reggiano (which, no big deal, is the best reggiano affineur, or cheese ager, in the world). There will also be tiramisu with a cheesy twist, cannoli with a ricotta filling, fresh figs stuffed with gorgonzola and drizzled with honeycomb, the rare Carles Roquefort with cognac and pain d’épices and even a Holy Goat organic strawberry and thyme mille-feuille. The coup de gras (pun intended) will be a whole baked Normandy camembert served with mini baguettes that you can rip apart and dip into the cheese, like your very own cheese fondue. Holy cheesus. The Westin's High Cheese is priced at $70 per person and is available every day from 4pm. Guests can also match their cheese with wine by the glass, with varieties available from the likes of Ten Minutes by Tractor, Shaw and Smith and Penfolds.

Start saving your pennies now because the Big Design Market is back for another year. Across three days you can check out more than 230 local, national and international designers spruiking everything from homewares, fashion and cosmetics to tech accessories, furniture and kids products. And since it’s happening right before Christmas it’s a great chance to pick up some presents to make your Christmas morning extra merry. Big Design Market highlights Magpie Goose Hailing from the Northern Territory, Magpie Goose is a socially-conscious fashion line that generates jobs for Indigenous people living in remote communities. Their clothes are designed and then printed by these communities before being sold in NT galleries. Kester Black Anna Ross’s Kester Black line produces cruelty free and ethical nail polishes and skincare products. Her products are accredited by the Vegan Society, Choose Cruelty Free, International Cruelty Free, Australian Made and B Corporation – plus they look pretty luxe too. Georgia Perry As a graphic designer Georgia Perry has worked for the likes of Kit Kat, Clinique and the New York Times Magazine. But as an accessories designer Perry is known for her colourful, pop-chic jewellery, bags, pins, stationery and more. Marc Martin Marc Martin is a name that might already be familiar to Melbourne families as Martin is a picture book author as well as an artist and illustrator. He creates lush, bold illustrations that have touch of geometric abstraction

It’s unlikely that any photographer boasts a portfolio like Australian artist Polly Borland’s. It’s as chock full with celebrities as it is with fetishists – Borland spent five years documenting the surreal lives of adults who get their kicks by dressing up as infants. But it’s the wild diversity of her work that is perhaps its most distinctive quality. In Polyverse, the upcoming showcase of her new and recent work at the NGV, another facet of Borland’s photography will be on display. These otherworldly images feature human subjects distorted with stockings, gags and lumps of padding; smeared with make-up; bodies straining and restrained in poses that are both sexually charged and monstrous. It’s a collection that toes a fine yet powerful line between shock and awe. You could be forgiven for assuming the various phases of her output – spanning mainstream fashion editorials to avant garde tapestries – were created by different artists. And yet there is a unifying thread that binds her canon together. Borland’s images often hide a dual personality, albeit on a sometimes inscrutable level. Emotional extremes are superimposed, challenging the viewer to make sense of an underlying contradiction. “I think that’s partly the success of my work, but it’s also partly its downfall too,” Borland says of the duality found her shots. “When you’re conveying insights or ideas or other ways of seeing things, you’re giving the viewer another way of looking at the world. But I think what y

Move over My Fair Lady: the next vintage production coming to Australia is the original Evita, with Australian pop princess Tina Arena starring as Eva Perón. Opera Australia and John Frost are collaborating to revive the 1978 West End production of Tim Rice and Andrew Lloyd Webber’s blockbuster musical, directed by Tony Award-gobbling musical theatre veteran Harold Prince. Appearing alongside Arena is a starry international cast: as Juan Peron is Brazilian operatic baritone Paulo Szot, who won a Tony Award for his performance in the 2008 Broadway revival of South Pacific. London-based Australian performer Kurt Kansley will play Che, the narrator, while Wicked star Jemma Rix will play Evita at some performances. (It's traditional that there's an 'alternate Eva' scheduled for certain performances each week given the almighty vocal challenges of the role.) Conceived as a concept album in 1976, Evita tells the story of Argentine political figure Eva Perón, who when she died at 33 from cancer had become one of the most powerful women in Latin America – and thereafter was afforded an almost saintly status. Following its 1978 premiere on the West End (with Elaine Paige in the title role), the musical went on to win the Olivier Award for best musical and transferred to Broadway (where Patti LuPone took on the role), where it was the first British musical to win the Tony Award for best musical. In 1996, Madonna starred in the film adaptation of the musical. The Australian revival

The National Gallery of Victoria is bringing a world-first exhibition of works by MC Escher to Melbourne this summer. Between Two Worlds | Escher X nendo will feature more than 160 prints and drawings from the renowned Dutch artist as well as an immersive Escher-inspired environment created by Japanese design studio Nendo. We can't wait to see how they'll respond to Escher's most iconic image: the physically impossible, Hogwarts-esque staircases. Escher rose to prominence in the 20th-century art world for his mind-bending and mathematically complex works like ‘Hand with Reflecting Sphere’, ‘Relativity’ and ‘Balcony’. Though he considered himself to have little mathematical ability his art has become iconic for its seamless tessellation, warped perspectives and impossible objects – like endless, connected staircases and mirrored self-portraits. The works are on loan from the Gemeentemuseum in the Hague and will be joined by an immersive experience created by Nendo design studio. By manipulating geometry, space and perception like Escher, Nendo will create a never-before-seen exhibit that will bring the artist’s work to life. Cathy Leahy, the NGV's senior curator of prints and drawings says that Nendo is using Escher's playfulness to create the world-first experience. "Escher works with positive and negative space a lot and shapes transforming from one element to another. Nendo have created this space that you walk through that has some of those elements." Between Two Worl

The famous weekly Fed Square book market shut up shop in 2017, much to the despair of Melbourne's bibliophile community. But the closure was only a temporary one, with the free market reopening at Abbotsford Convent in 2018. Whether you eat, sleep and breath books or are just curious, the market has a vast selection of new and second-hand titles to browse from. From sci fi to non-fiction, the Melbourne Book Market has every genre presented by a revolving cast of veteran Melbourne booksellers. Tweed jackets are encouraged, but not compulsory. After deciding on your next bedtime read take some time to stroll around the convent's picture-book perfect gardens or fill up with a pay-what-you-feel meal at Lentil As Anything. For more information on the next market visit the Abbotsford Convent website or the Melbourne Book Market Facebook page.  

Established in 1979 and held on the first Sunday of every month, the Hawthorn Craft Market has evolved into the Hawthorn Makers Market after almost 40 years as one of Melbourne's most loved markets. This monthly market is a true all-rounder. It's renowned for the quality of its handcrafted jewellery, cards, accessories and homewares, but is also known for selling handy items for the garden, as well as homebaked treats. Head along to Hawthorn Arts Centre from 10am to 3pm to peruse more than 70 stallholders.

Arts Centre Melbourne isn't only great for the odd show or even for a meal and a tipple at The Barre, every Sunday the grounds of the arts precinct's hub comes alive with market stalls selling everything from handmade leather wallet to locally made art by the city's designers and small business owners.  Situated a short walk away from Flinders Street Station, everything on offer at the market has been locally made, and the market also features a great range of food stalls if you want to shake up your Sunday brunch. Head over to the Arslan gozleme stall for some Turkish pastry layered with delicious spicy lamb or cheese and spinach, or make a stop at the poffertjes stall for some  Dutch pancakes.

The volunteer-run Veg Out Community Garden's farmers' market, open the first Saturday of each month, overflows with local organic produce, jams and preserves, handmade bread and sundry delights to fill up your basket. This blue-eyed bloke's name is Rod Blake, but his customers know him as Blakey. On any given Veg Out Saturday market, you'll find him swapping stories with a young couple while weighing bendy zucchinis, or talking footy with the 10-year-old son of a long-term customer. "Nearly everything here – kale, capsicum, gem squash – were all picked yesterday," explains Blakey. Along with his wife Meg, Blakey's been growing organic produce at their Grampians farm for over two decades, ever since he parted ways with pesticides ("nasties!"). At 10am, the Bellellen Grampians Organics stall is buzzing over the sound of a busker playing acoustic guitar. Stocks are depleting, but the two never falter in their back-and-forth energy and banter, despite getting up at 1am. "I'm staying in Melbourne tonight because I've got a little party to go to!"

Each Saturday and Sunday the Rose Street Market gathers some of Melbourne's most exciting artists and designers to display their wares and talk all things handmade. Weave your way through the crowds and duck into the warehouse to check out the handmade fashion, food and curios for sale. The artists are usually on hand to compare crochet needles and discuss their work, so drop in for a squiz, a chat and a haircut from the resident hairdresser.

Upcoming drag king and queens get the chance to practise their shows and refine their acts every Thursday night at Melbourne's favourite LGBTQIA+ venue (as voted by Time Out readers), Sircuit. Bio queens, drag queens, trash queens and drag kings all perform, and the event is hosted by famed drag queen Missy La ’Minx. It's a chance for up-and-coming performers to get experience, and for audiences of course it's a night of fantastic drag.  The bar offers $5 pints from 7pm until 10pm, and entry is free. 

The relaxed Creswick Market happens on the third Saturday of every month. An easy 20-minute drive from either Ballarat or Daylesford, the Creswick Market has everything from local arts and crafts to handmade delicacies, fresh produce, jewellery and clothes. To keep the littlies entertained there’s kids' entertainment and a playground, and for you there’s live music and more than 90 stalls to peruse. Dogs welcome.

The wee central goldfields town of Talbot hosts its monthly farmers' market on the third Sunday of each month. You might not have heard about much about it, but Talbot was actually one of the first regional towns in Victoria to start running farmers' markets all the way back in 2004. More than a decade on and the market still has its charm. The 80-plus stalls are held in the town’s heritage precinct, and you’ll be able to pick up everything from terrific local produce to artisan bread, cheese, meat and oils. There are also plants, seedlings and fresh flowers as well as live chooks to add to your flock. For the best selection of fresh food arrive early – it sells fast.

If all you sell is raspberries (or olives, or rhubarb, or honey), then you've got to have a pretty strong passion for them. Every third Saturday of the month, enthusiasm for high quality local produce runs like electricity at this Port Melbourne arts space, and your tastebuds will feel it too.Grab a fresh, crusty baguette to go with your market haul salad for later, stock up on seasonal produce and a treat or two for afternoon tea (handmade chocolate biscuits, anyone?).The Gasworks Farmers' Market is plastic free so make sure to bring your reusable bags, baskets and coffee cups. 

The first Sunday of every month in Castlemaine is Artists Market day. From 9am to 2pm the town’s Western Reserve on Forest Street hums as the shoppers descend looking for locally made treasures. The market boasts more than 60 different stallholders selling everything from handmade leather goods to designer clothing. In addition to the beautifully made products the market also has live music, entertainment, food stalls and fair trade organic coffee.

The Cake Bake and Sweets Show is a weekend for keen bakers, pastry cooks and cake decorators to share their talents and treats. The Melbourne Convention and Exhibition Centre will be buzzing with live demonstrations by celebrity chefs showcasing their signature desserts using state-of-the-art baking technology. Incredible professional bakers will teach visitors how to recreate some absolutely jaw-dropping sweets, with techniques such as fondant rolling, cake painting and creating edible figurines. At Kids in the Kitchen, budding bakers can also pick up a trick or two.  If you're less of a baker and more of an eater, you will be able to shop for your favourite treats to take home. 

If you’ve got a while to go before payday but you’re craving some fine food then let us introduce you to Burma Lane’s Cheap Date Mondays.  Every Monday Burma Lane do two-for-one ‘feed me’ banquets. That means you get enough food for you and a mate on Burma Lane’s $39 or $50 lunch menus, or on their $69 or $85 dinner menus. It’s one of the best ways to indulge in fun modern Asian dishes without blowing your budget. Start your week right with a cheap dinner date at Burma Lane. To take advantage of this economical offer make sure you mention it at the time of booking.

Ever wanted to know how they make everything beautiful at the ballet? This tour is for the ultimate ballet lover or just a committed theatre fan who wants to learn the secrets of how a major production springs to life on stage. The tours are limited to 12 people, who'll be picked up from Southbank and taken to the Australian Ballet's 10,000 square-metre custom-designed production centre in Altona. There you'll discover the sets for more than 90 productions and 30,000 costumes. The archive dates back 50 years, and your guide will show you how a production is moved from the production centre to the stage.

Move over My Fair Lady: the next vintage production coming to Australia is the original Evita, with Australian pop princess Tina Arena starring as Eva Perón. Opera Australia and John Frost are collaborating to revive the 1978 West End production of Tim Rice and Andrew Lloyd Webber’s blockbuster musical, directed by Tony Award-gobbling musical theatre veteran Harold Prince. Appearing alongside Arena is a starry international cast: as Juan Peron is Brazilian operatic baritone Paulo Szot, who won a Tony Award for his performance in the 2008 Broadway revival of South Pacific. London-based Australian performer Kurt Kansley will play Che, the narrator, while Wicked star Jemma Rix will play Evita at some performances. (It's traditional that there's an 'alternate Eva' scheduled for certain performances each week given the almighty vocal challenges of the role.) Conceived as a concept album in 1976, Evita tells the story of Argentine political figure Eva Perón, who when she died at 33 from cancer had become one of the most powerful women in Latin America – and thereafter was afforded an almost saintly status. Following its 1978 premiere on the West End (with Elaine Paige in the title role), the musical went on to win the Olivier Award for best musical and transferred to Broadway (where Patti LuPone took on the role), where it was the first British musical to win the Tony Award for best musical. In 1996, Madonna starred in the film adaptation of the musical. The Australian revival

Last year Australian audiences got a taste for the hottest comedy sensation on the West End in The Play That Goes Wrong, a raucous farce that's thankfully far more imaginative than its title. The slapstick spoof follows the members of the Cornley Polytechnic Drama Society as they try to hold everything together at one disastrous performance of a murder mystery. The play itself started out in a small pub theatre in London before going on to play sold out season after sold out season in bigger and bigger venues. It eventually played Broadway and a successful Australian tour. But the team behind it, Mischief Theatre Company, didn't stop at just one play, and their follow-up, Peter Pan Goes Wrong is headed to Australia for a tour that takes in Melbourne, Adelaide, Canberra, Sydney and Perth. It features all the same characters from the Cornely Polytechnic Drama Society as they try to bring the magic of Neverland to life on stage. If you want to know how it goes, there's a pretty significant clue in the title. Time Out London wrote in a four-star review:  "If you saw The Play That Goes Wrong, there are few surprises here. It’s an ingeniously simple premise: drop an audience into a fourth-wall-breaking performance of a show that falls apart spectacularly from the first scene. Here, that’s an adaptation of JM Barrie’s Peter Pan, directed and starring the pompous Chris, who – in spite of his amusingly seasonal, pissed-off insistence that this is ‘not’ a panto – is properly boo-hi

Melbourne, school is back in session and now it’s time to learn how to rock. The musical version of Jack Black’s hit 2003 movie School of Rock will open at the Her Majesty’s Theatre in October, fresh from successful seasons on Broadway and the West End, where it’s still running. Just as in the movie, Dewey Flynn is a struggling muso who fakes his way into a prestigious private school classroom to earn a little extra cash as a substitute teacher. But he soon finds himself as an unlikely mentor for these high achieving kids who need someone to look out for them. And he also turns the group into a kick-ass rock band. It’s the prodigiously talented kids who make the show and are blowing away audiences in New York and London by playing live music night after night. The show has a score of songs from the movie and new tunes by the godfather of British musical theatre Andrew Lloyd Webber. He might be the guy who wrote Cats, but he also started his career by writing one of the best rock musicals ever, Jesus Christ Superstar, so he knows his way around an electric guitar. His other unlikely collaborators are lyricist Glenn Slater and Downton Abbey creator Julian Fellowes, who has adapted the movie script for the stage. In a four-star review, Time Out New York wrote: “This is one tight, well-built show: underscoring the emotional arcs (Dewey as both surrogate kid and parent; the students’ yearning to be heard); gently juicing the romantic subplot between Dewey and buttoned-up sch

Start saving your pennies now because the Big Design Market is back for another year. Across three days you can check out more than 230 local, national and international designers spruiking everything from homewares, fashion and cosmetics to tech accessories, furniture and kids products. And since it’s happening right before Christmas it’s a great chance to pick up some presents to make your Christmas morning extra merry. Big Design Market highlights Magpie Goose Hailing from the Northern Territory, Magpie Goose is a socially-conscious fashion line that generates jobs for Indigenous people living in remote communities. Their clothes are designed and then printed by these communities before being sold in NT galleries. Kester Black Anna Ross’s Kester Black line produces cruelty free and ethical nail polishes and skincare products. Her products are accredited by the Vegan Society, Choose Cruelty Free, International Cruelty Free, Australian Made and B Corporation – plus they look pretty luxe too. Georgia Perry As a graphic designer Georgia Perry has worked for the likes of Kit Kat, Clinique and the New York Times Magazine. But as an accessories designer Perry is known for her colourful, pop-chic jewellery, bags, pins, stationery and more. Marc Martin Marc Martin is a name that might already be familiar to Melbourne families as Martin is a picture book author as well as an artist and illustrator. He creates lush, bold illustrations that have touch of geometric abstraction

It’s unlikely that any photographer boasts a portfolio like Australian artist Polly Borland’s. It’s as chock full with celebrities as it is with fetishists – Borland spent five years documenting the surreal lives of adults who get their kicks by dressing up as infants. But it’s the wild diversity of her work that is perhaps its most distinctive quality. In Polyverse, the upcoming showcase of her new and recent work at the NGV, another facet of Borland’s photography will be on display. These otherworldly images feature human subjects distorted with stockings, gags and lumps of padding; smeared with make-up; bodies straining and restrained in poses that are both sexually charged and monstrous. It’s a collection that toes a fine yet powerful line between shock and awe. You could be forgiven for assuming the various phases of her output – spanning mainstream fashion editorials to avant garde tapestries – were created by different artists. And yet there is a unifying thread that binds her canon together. Borland’s images often hide a dual personality, albeit on a sometimes inscrutable level. Emotional extremes are superimposed, challenging the viewer to make sense of an underlying contradiction. “I think that’s partly the success of my work, but it’s also partly its downfall too,” Borland says of the duality found her shots. “When you’re conveying insights or ideas or other ways of seeing things, you’re giving the viewer another way of looking at the world. But I think what y

The National Gallery of Victoria is bringing a world-first exhibition of works by MC Escher to Melbourne this summer. Between Two Worlds | Escher X nendo will feature more than 160 prints and drawings from the renowned Dutch artist as well as an immersive Escher-inspired environment created by Japanese design studio Nendo. We can't wait to see how they'll respond to Escher's most iconic image: the physically impossible, Hogwarts-esque staircases. Escher rose to prominence in the 20th-century art world for his mind-bending and mathematically complex works like ‘Hand with Reflecting Sphere’, ‘Relativity’ and ‘Balcony’. Though he considered himself to have little mathematical ability his art has become iconic for its seamless tessellation, warped perspectives and impossible objects – like endless, connected staircases and mirrored self-portraits. The works are on loan from the Gemeentemuseum in the Hague and will be joined by an immersive experience created by Nendo design studio. By manipulating geometry, space and perception like Escher, Nendo will create a never-before-seen exhibit that will bring the artist’s work to life. Cathy Leahy, the NGV's senior curator of prints and drawings says that Nendo is using Escher's playfulness to create the world-first experience. "Escher works with positive and negative space a lot and shapes transforming from one element to another. Nendo have created this space that you walk through that has some of those elements." Between Two Worl

George Baldessin and Brett Whiteley were both born in 1939, achieved meteoric success in their respective cities of Melbourne and Sydney, and died tragically young. Yet the similarities don’t stop there. In the most comprehensive exhibition of both artists in more than 20 years, the National Gallery of Victoria explores the parallels between the two artists and the ways in which their provocative and expressive approach to the human figure created work with a distinctly Australian sensibility. Featuring more than 120 works,it includes such masterpieces as Whiteley’s 20-metre long painting The American Dream (1968-69), as well as five of Baldessin’s Pears sculptures (1971-72) and his acclaimed MM of Rue St Denis (1976) drawings.

The Soldiers Memorial Institute Military Museum in Bendigo is reopening with a new exhibition highlighting the region's significant contribution to military conflicts around the world. Robert Milton: Military Artist will be the inaugural exhibition at the museum and will feature works from artist, ex-serviceman and Bendigo local Robert Milton. Milton has served as a Scots guard, sniper, master sniper and instructor in both the British and Australian armies. His creative practice is defined by highly intricate pencil sketches depicting soldiers in the field, though he also works with oil paints and watercolours. Milton was the official artist for the Sydney Invictus Games and SAS 'Long Ride Home' initiative.  The new exhibition will run for several weeks, and Milton will give an artist talk to further unpack his work. The Soldiers Memorial Institute Military Museum has been closed since 2016 for major redevelopments, including the construction of a state-of-the-art exhibition space. They will reopen in November 2018. 

Fitzroy’s Laundry Bar is a stalwart of Melbourne’s late night club scene and their Thursday night party – fittingly titled No Frills – will have you Drake-dancing into the wee hours of Friday morning. This mid-week party boasts free entry and drinks specials including $5 vodkas and $15 jugs. They’ll be playing the best rap, R’n’B and hip hop going round, so expect anything from top 40 bangers to old school sing-a-longs.

Did you know Bon Jovi formed 35 years ago? The hair rockers have been performing just about nonstop since 1983 and never say goodbye. And they are returning to Australia in December in support of their latest album, This House is Not for Sale.  They were last here in 2013, though without founding guitarist Richie Sambora, quit the band in a huff during the Canadian leg of the tour. Sounds like bad medicine to us. He was replaced with Phil X, who will be performing during this tour and is now an official member of the band.   In 2013 Bon Jovi played Etihad Stadium (soon to be Marvel Stadium), which has a capacity of about 50,000 people. This time they're kicking it up a notch, playing the world-famous Melbourne Cricket Ground, which can hold 100,000. The 2013 setlist included plenty of bangers, including of course 'You Give Love a Bad Name', 'Bad Medicine', 'Livin' on a Prayer' and 'Lost Highway'. Fingers crossed this show will be just as rocking. Keep the faith. 

The late '90s and early noughties was the golden age for dance anthems and for a lot of us, those Ministry of Sound mixes still have a very special place in our hearts. Admit it, you've probably got hazy memories of dancing to The Shapeshifter's 'Lola's Theme' or waiting for that drop in Tiesto's version of 'Adagio for Strings' (I don't care what you say, it's a massive tune).  The Ministry of Sound-era hits may not be getting much airtime in clubs these days, but these certified bangers will be getting a 'classy' upgrade this summer at Ministry of Sound's Orchestrated concert, where your favourite club tracks from the past 25 years are going to be performed with a live symphony orchestra.  The Orchestrated tour will be landing in Melbourne on December 9 at Margaret Court Arena. Expect to hear dance anthems by Fatboy Slim, Eric Prydz (wear your best leotards for that one), and Robert Miles. The show will feature guest vocalists including Sam Sparro ('Black and Gold'), Alison Limerick, and Crystal Waters. The first run of Orchestrated concerts last year sold out, so you'll want to get in quick when general public ticket sales open at 10am on Monday, August 6.  

The Melbourne's longest running and most successful improv comedy night, the Big Hoo Haa, is improvised comedy at its rawest: minimal pretension, audience participation and maximum laughter. Anything could happen! Well, not anything. Scripted comedy, for example. That definitely won't happen.

A Thursday night staple in Melbourne, comedy at the European Bier Cafe is still going strong. They’ve featured all the big names, including Sarah Silverman, Adam Hills, Jimeoin, Dave Hughes, Stephen K Amos, Wil Anderson and heaps more, plus all the best Melbourne and interstate comedians there are. It's a guaranteed high-quality night of laughs for just $12; what more could you want?

If you know Fitzroy's Catfish, you'll know that this little bar does a mean Philly cheesesteak and they sure know a good craft beer when they see one, but they also run comedy nights every Tuesday. Comedians including Nazeem Hussain, Claire Hooper, Joel Creasey, Tom Gleeson and Tommy Little have all graced the Catfish Comedy stage, so order a cheesy steak sanga on Tuesday nights and pull up a chair, laughs from the best comedic talents in town are guaranteed.

Every Tuesday Lido Cinema's intimate Jazz Room hosts a free night of established and rising stand-up stars. Some big Melbourne names have graced the stage in recent months including Dave Thornton, Danielle Walker (pictured above), Corey White and Laura Davis.

It's mostly rising stars who take the stage each Sunday night at Club Voltaire, but big names also check in from time to time, including Dave Thornton, Greg Larsen, Anne Edmonds and Damien Power.

Iliza Shlesinger became the first woman to win NBC's Last Comic Standing, and has gone from strength to strength since then. She hosted a dating show, Excused, a hugely popular podcast, Truth and Iliza, and a game show called Separation Anxiety.  But it's on the stand-up stage where she's at her best. She's had four Netflix stand-up specials since 2013, and she'll be bringing material from her latest one, Elder Millennial, to Melbourne's Athenaeum Theatre.

Michael Palin's work across Monty Python's various projects, Ripping Yarns and A Fish Called Wanda is the stuff of comedy legend. He has more quotable quotes under his belt than almost any other comedian, and his characters have endured for more than 40 years. Palin was last in Australia in 2015 – the same year Python reunited for a record-breaking run at London's O2 Arena – but is returning with a new tour revisiting his extraordinary repertoire. He'll also be delving into his latest project – documenting the journey of the HMS Erebus, a ship which in 1845 set off from Hobart before meeting a disastrous end in the Arctic when it was trapped by ice.