Directing · Live show

KING IV LIVE

Created and directed by Sean Higgins. 170 Russell, Melbourne.

The show

One night, three acts, and a concert called FUNERAL.

KING IV's debut live show was built around her album Psychopomp: The Other Side. It told one story from start to finish: a woman who has to let her old self die before she can become who she's meant to be. Live music, choreography, lighting and the screens behind the stage all worked as one piece, for one night only.

I created it and directed it, from the first idea to the last bow.

170 Russell, Melbourne26 June 2025One night only

What I did

01Concept & storyThe three-act narrative and the world of the show.
02Creative directionThe look and colour of every moment. Staging and lighting were a collaboration with Adrian Spuria and Fausto Brusamolino, and costume direction with KING IV and Adrian Spuria.
03Screen contentEvery visual on the screens, cut to the music and cued to the show.
04Casting & teamBrought in the choreographer, ran the dancer auditions and built the cast and crew.
05CampaignPoster, photography, marketing and social media.

ACT I

THE DEATH

KING IV begins as a grey being, one face among thousands in a world made of static. She reaches for a red hand, falls past giant stone sphinxes into the underground, and is led down by cloaked dancers until she lands somewhere far colder, where she finally gives in to everything she has held back.

Grey Being · Follow Psycho · The Underground · See You Later · Freaky

Screen content: grey beings marching across a grey void — **Screen** Grey Being

Dancers in grey costumes under white light on stage — **Live** The Underground

Screen content: two stone sphinxes either side of a chasm — **Screen** Follow Psycho

Screen content: brutalist concrete stairwells — **Screen** The Underground

Screen content: a spiral descending into the depths — **Screen** The descent

Screen content: KING IV standing on a floating sphere — **Screen** KING IV

White beams over the stage and the crowd at 170 Russell — **Live** 170 Russell

Into the cold

Screen content: an icy blue freezer with hanging chains — **Screen** Freaky

KING IV singing under icy blue light — **Live** KING IV

KING IV and two dancers silhouetted against a blue screen — **Live** Freaky

Screen content: three women silhouetted full length in the blue freezer — **Screen** Freaky

ACT II

THE REBIRTH

After the darkest night of the soul, a golden sun rises over a desert and the grey being is gone. KING IV returns in red, and wakes up to what she has become: a psychopomp, a guide for other souls. Her grey and red selves face off, the ones who tried to burn her as a witch fall to her spell, and a blood moon swallows the grey one.

The Darkest Night of the Soul · The Golden Thought · Motion · Silent Echo · Wicked · Murder

Screen content: a golden face rising out of desert sand — **Screen** The Darkest Night of the Soul

Screen content: golden light through a desert cave — **Screen** Sunrise

Screen content: a golden sun over the desert — **Screen** The Golden Thought

KING IV lit in gold, hair flying — **Live** KING IV

Screen content: red bubbles drifting over a golden horizon — **Screen** The Golden Thought

KING IV lifted by dancers in red under amber light — **Live** 170 Russell

The awakening

Screen content: red beams of light pouring out of KING IV — **Screen** Motion

Screen content: rows of grey faces facing rows of red faces — **Screen** Silent Echo

Screen content: a glowing red spell circle — **Screen** Wicked

Screen content: a hooded grey figure in the dark — **Screen** Wicked

Screen content: a grey full moon with birds crossing it — **Screen** Murder

Screen content: the blood moon — **Screen** Murder

ACT III

THE INVITATION

Then the coffin portal arrives, the set piece that came to define the show. KING IV steps out of it in her final form, and the dancers walk through it one by one and come out reborn. The night ends in a rave around the coffin, with an open invitation to the audience: only in death can you be reborn.

Entertain Me · Night & Day · Hot Damn · Firestone · Psychopomp · The Other Side

KING IV inside the glowing coffin portal on stage — **Live** The coffin portal

KING IV singing in red light — **Live** KING IV

Screen content: a red portal glowing in a frosted forest — **Screen** Night & Day

Screen content: a red sculpted face covered in eyes — **Screen** I'm Psycho

KING IV walking forward on a red-lit stage — **Live** 170 Russell

KING IV and dancers in red light — **Live** Psychopomp

THE CAMPAIGN

The FUNERAL poster: KING IV standing inside a glowing red coffin

The key art, the poster shoot and the roll-out across social, the website and the media release, all built from the same world as the show, so the campaign felt like the first scene.

CREDITS

Artist, composer & sound design: KING IV
Creative director & screen content: Sean Higgins
Choreographer: Adrian Spuria
Associate choreographer: Martijn Sedgfield
Additional choreography: Xavier Gibson
Dancers: Patrick Appiah-Cain, Kyle Borg, Briain Dixon, Austin Ulrich
Musical director & keys: Olie Powell
Drums: Anthony Murray
Guitar: Pat Gabriel
Lighting designer: Fausto Brusamolino
Costume designer: Djuno Fisher
Coffin portal: David Sell (The Show Off Person)
Radio comms & show caller: Sam Harper
Stage manager: Hara Papoulias
Production assistant & BTS photographer: Daniel Enright
Live show videographer: Nik Morris
Live show photographer: Giulia McGauren

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