Haircuts by children, a play about communist Russia, and Marianne Faithfull are just some of the acts in store at Perth's International Arts Festival (PIAF).
Australia's longest running multi-arts festival, which will feature theatre, dance, music, visual arts, literature and film, involving more than 1000 artists starts on Friday.
Director Shelagh Magadza said the festival's opening night would feature Spain's La Fure Dels Baus and 60 West Australian volunteers in a jaw-dropping show staged 70 metres above the ground with the help of a crane.
"It looks fairly terrifying, but it looks like they are having a great deal of fun ..." Ms Magadza said on Thursday.
Russia's Maly Drama Theatre's production Life and Fate, adapted from Vassily Grossman's 20th Century classic Russian novel, depicting the life of a Jewish physicist, is exclusive to PIAF in Australia this year.
The play was banned in Russia for its portrayal of communism.
Luigi Pirandello's classic play Six Characters in Search of an Author, by British director Rupert Goold, will kick off the festival, featuring six characters who demand their story be told when they arrive unannounced during the editing of a docu-drama.
Ms Magadza said the play had received fantastic reviews at the Sydney Festival.
For the daring, Haircuts by Children will see children open a free salon and act as mini-barbers.
Etiquette, set in a cafe in Perth, will allow festival goers to become part of a script when they don headphones and act of the play following directions.
More than 330,000 people attended festival events last year, giving the Perth festival a bigger audience per capita than any rival festival in Australia.
Ms Magadza, in her third year as director, said the festival had been blessed by growing audiences, helped by the success of the Beck's Music Box.
"I think our audiences are actually getting more adventurous and they are coming from a wider, more diverse section of the population, so it ranges now from kids and families coming to a lot of the families and writers' events to a very young professional demographic who are hanging out down at the Music Box," she said.
"People are up for a risk, as long as it's quality."
Marianne Faithfull is one of the many musical acts set to grace the stage at the Music Box, from a variety of different genres.
Her first show has sold out and a second show at the Astor Theatre was announced soon after.
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