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Group of happy young women celebrating with a toast of champagne in a bar

11 best bottles of bubbles for your buck

WHETHER you have $13 to spend or want to splash out up to $125, these top bubblies will ensure your party season gathering isn’t a fizzer.

Did you say garlic doughnut dessert?

DOWN by the Yarra in Warrandyte, this ambitious restaurant is serving a delicious celebration of Australian ingredients — including a surprising garlic doughnut dessert.

“That was a pool of my blood”

Rock City: Sugar Mountain bill & Moses Sumney interview, Golden Plains announcement, Rocket Science, Piknic Electronik & more, reports Mikey Cahill

Gob Squad und Muenchner Kammerspiele: War and Peace. Urauffuehrung am 23. Maerz 2016. en.

Playful take on literary classic

DON’T expect grim imagery or an intensive or academic scrutiny of Leo Tolstoy from Gob Squad’s adaptation of War and Peace, because this production is playful and eccentric rather than confronting or impenetrable, writes reviewer Kate Herbert

VCE student first among equals

VCE student Elizabeth Vu is working to make the world a better place through her leadership on refugees, fair trade and social justice

Taste restaurant review Delicious 100 chin chin

Is Chin Chin still worth the wait?

IT’S five years since Chin Chin first introduced Melbourne to the reservation-free restaurant — and the queues that follow. But is it still any good?

Sunshine Ella Caldwell, George Lingard and Caroline Lee Pic: Jodie Hutchinson

Four stories, one narrative

In his new play Sunshine, four, unnamed characters’ monologues tell the tale of a damp and doomed night when a marriage ends, a dead husband is mourned, a man betrays his friend and two strangers’ lives collide.

Son’s battle to stop Melbourne’s Dr Death

A “deranged” 1920s doctor who owed thousands after a horse racing gambling spree injected his whole family and housekeeper with morphine, but his awful plan to kill did not go smoothly.

Digging Melbourne’s City Loop

MELBOURNE’S City Loop changed the face of the city. Hundreds of workers took 14 years to bring the project to life, which was finished by 1985. Take a look underground during the construction of the loop.

Classic TV ads of the ‘70s and ‘80s

LIFE in Melbourne in the 1970s and 1980s was a blast, if these classic local television advertisements are any guide. Tap here for some of the best.

Last chance to see a five-star production

Beg, borrow or steal to get a ticket to Robert Lepage’s remarkable Melbourne Festival show 887, in which Lepage blends personal storytelling about his childhood in Quebec City in the 1960s with the political struggles of French-speaking Canadians during that same period, writes reviewer Kate Herbert.

Tiny town, big impact

VCE student Georgia Lee works hard to make sure isolation and drought don’t deter students from reaping the benefits of living in a small town

Kinky Boots a perfect fit in Melbourne: Cyndi

CYNDI Lauper says Melbourne will most appreciate the message of Kinky Boots, as she prepares to walk the red carpet on Saturday for the hit show’s Aussie premiere.

Best-kept secrets of the west

WE’VE scoured Melbourne’s west to find it’s best-kept secrets. From a pirate tavern to high tea, these are the places to eat and explore you may never have heard of.

The Color Purple Jayme-Lee Hanekom and Anna Francesca Armenia. Pic by Belinda Strodder

Sprawling saga hits a high note

THROUGH both song and story, the Melbourne stage production of The Color Purple captures the heartache and pain of Alice Walker’s 1982, Pulitzer Prize-winning novel on which the musical is based, writes reviewer Kate Herbert.

Vertical Influences PLEASE CREDIT 2016 JIM LEE PHOTO

On ice

There’s an icy twist to the Melbourne Festival show Vertical Influences, which is performed by figure skaters who take their artistic impression within and beyond figure skating, writes reviewer Stephanie Glickman.

National Photographic Portrait Prize 2016

Williams sings with Willie

Rock City: Melbourne’s best gigs including Marlon Williams at Out On The Weekend, Julianna Barwick, The Jezabels, Painters & Dockers, chosen by Mikey Cahill

Where to get our best veggie burgers

MELBOURNE’S best veggie burgers are short on meat and big on deliciousness. Make every day meat-free Monday with our pick of the vegetarian buns about town.