Latest catch up on my reviewing and theatre writing.

I am aware now that I haven't been as hot on keeping a record on here of my theatre activities since December so this listing may be a bit link by link. The link to my @EM_Theatre Twitter account for my website, next to this blog post will hopefully help to keep readers informed too.

Here goes: in order of writing here are a list of my recent website posts for www.eastmidlandstheatre.com.

Derby Theatre's Cinderella production.

East Midlands Theatre.com and #culturematters

Jason Donovan to reprise role in Priscilla Queen of the Dessert.

Derby Theatre highlights of 2015.

Nottingham Playhouse. What's On Live.

Theatre talk for Club Encore news.

Brian Weaver Fellowship Offer to young actor.

War Horse goes on tour. Nottingham Theatre Royal.

Leicester Curve promotion. Jan/Feb 2016

Promotion for Anything Goes at Nottingham Arts Theatre

Oddsocks promotion. Family First.

#culturematters for the older generation.

Great opportunity to learn more about Greek Theatre.

Cats the musical returns in Summer of 2016 to Nottingham Royal Concert Hall.

http://eastmidlandstheatre.com/2016/01/23/review-priscilla-queen-of-the-desert-nottingham-royal-concert-hall/

Review: Priscilla Queen of the Dessert. Nottingham Royal Concert Hall.

Review: Cats at Loughborough Town Hall by Christchurch Theatre Club.

Review: The Snowman. Nottingham Theatre Royal.

The Great Gatsby. Coming to Derby Theatre. 

Writing for Sardines magazine. Professional writing.

Review: Hetty Feather at Nottingham Theatre Royal.

Twisted Dame Theatre Company writing opportunities. 

Piece on old time music hall event.

Review: Anything Goes. Musicality. Nottingham Arts Theatre.

Review: Any Means Necessary. Nottingham Playhouse.

Review: A Girl is a Half Formed Thing. Leicester Curve.

Promotion: Hetty Feather comes to Curve.

Review: Blood Brothers at Nottingham Theatre Royal.

Interview: Look Back in Anger interviews at Derby Theatre.

Round up on a month of reviewing across the East Midlands.

As you might imagine November and December have been rather hectic in terms of theatre and festive show reviewing as well as promoting events through www.eastmidlandstheatre.com. In early January 2016 I have been invited to Nottingham Playhouse to do an hour long talk to the Encore over 50s group about my theatre reviewing and theatre writing experiences. I am looking forward to that.

Here is a rough roundup of the reviews I have written since early November to the present date. I have also written an interview with actress Rebecca Little for Sardines magazine about her continuing presence in the annual Playhouse Pantomime. This will be published in the January edition.

Other relevant theatre promotion material features between the reviews on www.eastmidlandstheatre.com.

An Inspector Calls the National Theatre touring show of Priestley's famous work. Theatre Royal Nottingham.

A View From The Bridge. Nottingham New Theatre production at Nottingham University.

Beryl touring production about Beryl Burton acclaimed yet forgotten cyclist. Nottingham Playhouse.

Pam Ann - acerbic comedienne at Nottingham Playhouse.

Celtic Woman - Gaelic concert at Nottingham Royal Concert Hall.

Mack and Mabel. Touring musical starring Michael Ball and Rebecca LaChance.

The Diary of Anne Frank. Nottingham New Theatre at Nottingham University.

Dick Whittington. Panto at Nottingham Playhouse.

Oliver. Curve Leicester. Main house show.

The Great Gatsby. Nottingham New Theatre at Nottingham University.

Cinderella. Christmas show at Derby Theatre.

Neverland. Christmas show for children at Lakeside Nottingham.

Plus One. Helping under-privileged children and teens have access to the arts. Derby Theatre.

Hare and Tortoise. Neville Studio. Nottingham Playhouse.

The Witches. Curve Leicester. Studio show.

Review The Rubenstein Kiss. Nottingham Playhouse

Ten years on from its original London run staring Samantha Bond and Gary Kemp, playwright James Phillips' play The Rubenstein Kiss makes its Nottingham début at Nottingham Playhouse for their Conspiracy Season.

The Nottingham Playhouse publicity for the play states 'The story is set in 1950s America and in the Cold War period when the McCarthy anti- Communist trials were at their height. The Rubenstein Kiss is inspired by a real life Jewish couple – Ethel and Julius Rosenberg who went to the electric chair for allegedly passing on US atomic secrets to the Soviet Union. They protested their innocence until the very last. James Phillips' play explores what happens when truth and ideologies collide to reveal the anguish of a family and its quest for atonement.'

Director Zoë Waterman has returned to Nottingham Playhouse to direct this fascinating play and the finished result is compelling, stylish, stark but not without rays of humour and superbly acted by all of the cast.

Jacob Rubenstein and Esther Rubenstein are the play's protagonists who idealise Communism. As the quiet married couple actors Joe Coen and Katherine Manners completely encapsulate the characters of this period. These are just two human beings who have to make a life changing decisions that will not only affect them but could ultimately impact on the world in the future. The choices they are faced with are telling 'the truth' betraying their Soviet friends and receiving a long term prison sentence or having to die in the electric chair and suffer eternal public shame.

The themes in the play are about miscarriages of justice, compassion and the power of state control. The Rubenstein Kiss however, is not all doom and gloom. In fact it is mostly an uplifting experience and at its core there is a feeling of hope. It is about people doing the best they can in extra-ordinary circumstances and placing their family at the top of their concerns.

 

The 1940s/50s story of the Rubensteins, David Girshfield and Rachel Liebermann (Mark Field and Ellie Burrow) is told in flash back through two young people in their twenties who happen to meet at an art gallery showing iconic photographic images of  that period. Simon Haines is extra-ordinary in his role of son Matthew and researcher of law and past cases. Equally, Gillian Saker is utterly believable and sympathetic as Anna. A late comer into the play's action is Cornell S John as FBI agent Paul Cramner. John plays his role with a very human touch -strict as the police investigator but seen years later as someone who harbours a great degree of empathy towards the remaining families living with the legacy of the 'case of the century'.

The 'The Rubenstein Kiss' play is a moving portrayal of human dilemmas questioning the nature of loyalty towards family and country and ultimately the big question 'what would one be prepared to die for?' Another superb production at Nottingham Playhouse.

Runs until Saturday 17^th October 2015.

Review 1984 at Nottingham Playhouse.

Hitting the Nottingham Playhouse stage with both bare and bleeding feet running, Duncan Macmillan and Robert Icke's Olivier Award winning acclaimed adaptation of George Orwell's dark political drama 1984, is a sure fire choice in starting off the Playhouse's Conspiracy Season with a startling bang.

 

Fresh from two runs in London's West End where it has been playing to packed houses, this terrifying theatrical version of 1984 ( a co-production between Nottingham Playhouse, Headlong and Almeida Theatre) wows and frightens. The various design elements; lighting by Natasha Chivers; stage design by Chloe Lamford and sound and video design by Tom Gibbons and Tim Reid respectively prove a collective theatrical and shocking tour de force. The adaptation inspired by the appendix of 1984 and directed by McMillan and Icke is phenomenal and this is truly theatre that makes us think about language and the nature of freedom and questions the fickle  natures of memory and reality.

Although the real year 1984 is long past, Orwell's bleak world of Big Brother watching still rings scarily true today with surveillance cameras high above most city streets in the world and monitors protecting and probing our every move in the shops and public buildings. In this fictional world where keeping a diary is unlawful and thoughts are criminalised, being in love is actively forbidden and history erased, the audience is completely gripped throughout. You can almost hear the audience's collective hearts breaking over Winston and Julia's doomed love affair as their world is literally pulled apart and gasps of real shock over Winston's torture.

Often it is said that a theatrical venture is an ensemble piece. Perhaps this can be a lazy description but not so in this constantly changing play of 1984 where within a second's worth of blackout the cast re-appear in completely different places on the stage and verbal repetition and human erasure fight for attention. Mere ensemble, hardly does the art justice. It is easy to see why this production has universally been offered five stars by the critics. Abstractly quoting from the play, maybe the critics were unsure whether they were seeing five or four stars and, terrified out of their wits, opted for five. If six or seven stars were another option 1984 would still be most deserving.

Every single performance by the ensemble; Tim Dutton, Stephen Fewell, Janine Harouni (Julia), Christopher Patrick Nolan, Ben Porter, Matthew Spencer (Winston), Simon Coates, Mandi Symonds, and the young girl played by either Anna Jaques or Victoria Todd is exemplary.

1984 is one heck of a production and deserves to go on winning award after award as it continues at Nottingham Playhouse and goes on to Australia and the USA.

Runs until Saturday 26th September 2015 at Nottingham Playhouse

See Nottingham Playhouse ONLINE to book and see more details about the stunning Conspiracy Season ahead.

Say Sum Thin 9 review at Nottingham Playhouse

This year's spoken word festival 'Say Sum Thin 9' at Nottingham Playhouse on 25^th July must be the best ever. With a total of thirty plus events and workshops happening throughout the day there was plenty to keep any poet, would be playwright, word smith, rapper and even circus skills enthusiast happy for hours.

 

 

The entirety of the Nottingham Playhouse building has been given over to the event run by Nottingham's poetry collective The Mouthy Poets. This year's theme is Carnival and the grand opening starts off with a parade of colourful costumed dancing by Hyson Green's talented Zodiac Allstars Dance Troupe. DJs and musicians supplied the day long musical atmosphere on the theatre atrium.

The interior of the Playhouse is superbly decorated in a glittering display of brightly coloured fabrics and shapes plus masks and fabulous headdresses supplied by City Arts. With a plethora of workshops to attend I chose to observe a very popular workshop run by playwright Nick Wood. Situated on the Playhouse stage, it was an inspiring session culminating with professional actors reading the participants scripts.

The Mouthy Poets had two main shows happening in the event. The smaller afternoon show was delivered in the Neville Studio and showed off some incredibly mature performance poetry talents and allowed opportunities to others to show their skills through open mic. The jam packed evening show brought the day to a fantastic close through locally written poetry that carried the carnival theme in many different and emotionally engaging poems that not only used spoken word but cleverly incorporated a variety of multimedia and dramatics.

Originally published in the EG section of Nottingham Post newspaper. Monday 27th July.

Passionate about Poetry. Interview with Deborah 'Debris' Stevenson.

In order to learn more about the upcoming Spoken Word Festival at Nottingham Playhouse writer Phil Lowe arranged to meet up with Deborah 'Debris' Stevenson, founder of The Mouthy Poets, to talk about their upcoming extravaganza – Say Sum Thin 9. This is a whole day of performance, music, creative workshops and live poetry at Nottingham Playhouse on Saturday 25^th July 2015. The spoken word festival begins at 12 noon and finishes at 10pm and Deborah was as passionate as ever to expound upon the events and the organisation behind them. This is the first time such a large event has been organised through Nottingham's The Mouthy Poets. Deborah elaborated.

 

 

 

“Every Summer we put on a big Mouthy Poets show that generally takes up a large amount of the Playhouse. We have an afternoon show plus an evening show. So, in an infrastructural sense, yes we have had similar shows. However, in our previous Say Sum Thin shows we have had one head-liner and the event programming has only been for three or four hours. The difference with this year is that it is a full on festival. Rather than having one head-liner we have a hundred plus artists including dancers, rappers, Sheep Soup theatre company, Nonsuch Theatre, Zodiac All Stars, a dance group of fifty plus young people, Harry Baker and many others. It is packed with international and local artists all happening in one space and every single space is non stop programming from 12pm to 7pm. Then we have this massive evening show in the main auditorium which is packed full of artists including Mouthy Poets plus a separate Mouthy Poets matinee. It's bigger and better and certainly more of a festival than we have ever put on before. How can I put it? Similar - times a hundred, basically!”

There is no denying the passion behind the event. Deborah further explained that Nottingham's Mouthy Poets meet every Friday. As a collective of fifty people and through their management team, interns and the young people in the company, together they organise and programme the event. This also empowers the young poets into making real life decisions and promotes their motivation within the poetry collective. Deborah picked up with how it was all germinated this year.

“I guess really, communally, the seeds were started in January this year when I started booking artists but the intensive community organising aspect has probably been ongoing since April. I'm crazy happy with everything so far! The programming is really exciting. The standards of the two separate Mouthy shows is really inspiring and thrilling. I think because the ambition of the programming is so high our young poets are rising to the challenge.

As part of the programme we have got a poets vs. rappers battle with a local organisation called Clash Money and we've got a play writing workshop with internationally known children's playwright Nick Wood put on by Nottingham Playhouse. In that workshop people will be making a play during the day and then there will be a rehearsed reading in the afternoon of those fresh new plays. To mix up the creativity we are going to have a foraging room which will have loads of fresh plants and up-cycled jewellery and other products. Flex Records have a 'paint something' workshop and then City Arts are showing a 'flexibition'. The whole space is being dressed by City Arts with all their carnival art. Additionally, we are making giant poetry games during the day and teaching book binding too. It is so massive that the young Mouthy Poets have felt like they need to step up to that and so, not to ruin anything too much, we have UV lights with poetry being done in the pitch black with illuminated elements. Personally I am stepping into a whole new genre by doing a grime rap track through my own music.”

The Say Sum Thin 9 event sounded like huge commitment and Deborah continued with her passionate explanation, concluding...

“We are all working to a maximum capacity at the moment. We all keep laughing and we all keep pushing towards excellence. I must say that working with new art forms cross pollinating creatively between poets, musicians, dancers, rappers and others is so stimulating and challenging in a good way. It has really energised us all and as we don't have much money everyone that is getting involved is doing so for artistic reasons. Those creatives involved are excited to make a painting live with poetry and children; they are excited to make a play live with fifty people and then share it; they are excited about all the live creativity that they can offer on the day and beyond. I think the people of Nottingham will be excited too and we welcome everyone and their families on the day. What we are getting out of it is the sharing and engaging the public with our spoken word art or art in alternative forms and enjoying that interaction as artists with the public themselves. Our Mouthy Poets ambition is to fill that main auditorium with people enjoying the huge variety of creative work being shown at Nottingham Playhouse on Saturday 25^th.”

 New programme information hot off the press! Click on timetable below for clearer image.

Review: Midlands Academy of Dance and Drama Showcase 2015

This 48^th Anniversary Gala student Showcase from Nottingham based Midlands Academy of Dance and Drama showing twice at Nottingham Playhouse is totally outstanding and utterly professional. Every single aspect of the showcase is polished to a glittering sheen of its singing and dancing life.

 

This reviewer had the privilege of seeing the third year graduate show at London's Criterion Theatre in May this year and that was mightily impressive. Now this exciting Nottingham showcase features ninety-six students from across all three years including the twenty-six from the graduating class.

The hard work that has clearly gone into presenting this student showcase is breath-taking. There is never a moment's respite in the packed programme and full appreciation must go to the totally dedicated staff at MADD under the principal Frances Clayton and production co-ordinator Edward Nudd. Especial notice should be given to professional choreographers and directors Emma Clayton, Ryan Lee Seager, Stewart Arnold, Mark Webb, Daniel Gordon, Mark Hedges, Stuart Hayes, Kamilah Beckles and Sue Sparham. Additionally, the total theatrical package wouldn't be complete with the superb live band with musical director Callum Clarke and the amazing light ( Leigh Mulpeter) and sound (Rob Ketteridge) from MAC Productions Ltd.

The showcase features sixteen musical numbers including dance in various styles. The first half highlights have to be a re-imagined Bohemian Rhapsody, the opening number Queen of The Night, a very funny Keep It Gay, and Please Don't Touch Me performed by Amanda Blockley and Braidley Wilson. There's some terrific heart stopping dance in The Rich Man's Frug, frightening all male choreography in the menacing Where's Your Head At? and we finish with the vibrant closing piece The Rhythm of Life featuring the entire third year ensemble.

The second half opens up spectacularly with Steel Town Sky followed by third year vocalists Summer Rozenbroek, Rebecca Telling, Sadie Marie-Ebbon and Savanna Darnell singing I Have Nothing to great applause. Comedy highlights in the second half include Man Up and the flirty Doctors' Orders and more sombre pieces such as the touching dance piece Amazing Grace. Throughout the showcase the dancers excel in their often athletic work showing their dedication, fitness and fluidity and hard won choreography that make it all look easy. Such talent takes years of honing and the capacity audience clearly appreciated them.

In writing a review one is conscious of those artistes not mentioned and in this case theatrical numbers equally not mentioned. Certainly every one of the ninety-six performers perfectly demonstrate why their top talents have been chosen to be a student at such a prestigious school as Midlands Academy of Dance and Drama! They should all be very very proud. Next to me in the audience are the parents of a young woman who is starting her course at MADD in September this year. In the interval they tell me that she is sitting at the end of the row and is getting emotional at the thoughts and sights of what lies ahead of her. Her parents seem extremely impressed as were many a set of parents and families in this capacity audience tonight. She can look forward to being coached by industry professionals of the highest calibre.

The showcase ends on a huge high as a costumed cavalcade of singers and dancers begin the final numbers by the full company. The Freak Flag story book character costumes are totally brilliant and there seems to be a never ending flow of students spilling out of every door and lining the auditorium. The whole audience is smiling and clapping along and as the final notes of the following Car Wash number hit the roof the fully deserved applause is deafening.

After the showcase and outside of my opinion and outside the theatre itself are a very happy crowd of audience well wishers including former students who have come along to support the current students. The terms “brilliant”, “extremely professional” and “loved the way it all flowed” echo through the throng. #rogeroverandout.

PS: To read more about my visit to the MADD college earlier this year click this LINK.

Production photo credits Joe Shaw

Review: The Siege. Nottingham Playhouse

No stranger to political drama himself, playwright Howard Brenton has described the Palestine based Freedom Theatre of Jenin's production of The Siege as 'Real political theatre, performed out of the terrible and inspiring experience of a struggle for freedom and justice and living proof that telling stories and entertaining audiences are powerful acts of resistance to oppression.'

The ninety minute drama by this famous Palestinian theatre company is an emotionally gripping non stop tale of Palestinian freedom fighters who, in 2002, sought sanctuary in the Church of The Nativity in Bethlehem. The work is actually enhanced by the very nature that all six male actors are speaking Arabic (with English language surtitles above the action) throughout the play. Only the character of the 'tour guide' speaks English.

The stories of the fighters and the nuns, priests, and civilians with them in the church, plus the opposing Israeli army and their tactics, are brought to life through a variety of ways including archive film footage, monologues and dangerously realistic shooting and bombing effects. Strange high pitched noises are used by the Israeli forces to demoralise those holed up in the church and there is even a moment of dark humour as one of the fighters reacts to the enemy's psychological method of forcibly using his mother's voice to beg him and his comrades to surrender themselves.

Writer Nabil Al-Raee's story abounds with talk of miracles, sacrifice and visions of Jesus in the church. Helicopters circle the church and snipers hide on every rooftop. The thirty nine day siege drags on and we hear that food is getting short in supply. The centre of Bethlehem is paralysed keeping tens of thousands under curfew. All the while we hear of the controversially biased nature of the media coverage. It is a desperate situation as the trapped are starving and the wounded are slowly bleeding to death. Actors Ahmed Rokh, Ahmed Tobasi, Faisal Abu Alheja, Hassan Taha, Milad Qunebe and Rabee Hanani bring the stories terrifically and terrifyingly to life.

From the very outset the audience enter the auditorium to the distant sound of Christian chanting and the impressive visuals of the dark interior of the set designed by Anna Gisle. Given that drama historically had it's origins through a blend of religion, ceremony and entertainment and later on developed strong connections with the Christian church this reviewer has the uncanny feeling that the Nottingham Playhouse audience are almost cast as the captive witnesses in the stage reconstruction of Bethlehem's Church of the Nativity. As the 'tour guide' says “I'll take you on a tour to get to know this place.” In The Siege you also get a 'tour de force' company of brilliant theatre makers.


Review originally featured as lead review in EG section of Nottingham Post 12th June 2015

Review A Skull in Connemara: Nottingham Playhouse

Make no bones about it - this production of A Skull in Connemara by Martin McDonagh at Nottingham Playhouse is a bloody cracking play. Directed by Fiona Buffini it allows for plenty of slow burning craic in the first half and really steps up the drunken murderous pace in the second. It is also such a wonderful story with more twists and turns than a shattered pelvis bone that this reviewer feels acutely spoiler shy.

The moody set of a lonely cottage interior sitting among the darkening misty coastal hills of rural Ireland is superbly created by award winning designer Madeleine Girling. The house is finely detailed even to the point of having a fire burning in the grate and smoke rising from the chimney above. Girling also takes us to a bleak graveyard where the hero Mick (Ged McKenna) digs up human bones from the graves to make room for more bodies. This is well realised with soil coming up by the spade full and we hear a chilling cracking sound as the flimsy coffins are broken into.

A Skull in Connemara is a short play at under two hours.The scripting is super economic, genuinely funny and like McDonagh's other plays and film In Bruges it has a poetic stream of pitch black tragic comedy running through it. There is even a 'gobshite's glossary' in the programme explaining some of the Irish slang and swear words! On a serious note the play touches upon the loneliness, regret and remorse of the main character Mick Dowd who often sits alone in his cottage knocking back a potent Irish spirit made from fermented potatoes called Poteen. Getting drunk is Mick's way of dealing with the death of his wife Oona who was killed in a car crash seven years ago. Rumours about the true cause of her death have been a constant source of malign gossip in the local community. Did Mick's drunk driving kill her or was her death deliberate? It is a grave matter for all. What will they find when they dig up her bones? Is there some devilish Skulduggery going on in Connemara?

 

Peopled with just four actors McDonagh's play gives plenty of scope for characterisation and given that most of the time the majority of them are fall down wobbly from the Poteen they all do a brilliant job of keeping the drunken scenes real. As Mick Dowd, actor Ged McKenna pulls out all the stops (and bones) with a solid and very believable performance as the duplicitous widower. The only woman in the play is the strangely named Maryjohnny and her cunning and cadging nature is terrifically drawn out with an understated and grubby clothed presentation by actress Paddy Glynn.

Diversely motivated brothers Thomas and Mairtin (Paul Carroll and Rhys Dunlop) complete the foursome. Thomas is the local Garda who dreams of being a great police detective but fails to see the blindingly obvious criminal scenes in front of him. The dim cop is comically realised by Carroll but even his comedy has a devilishly strong vein of secret cruelty – this in a man that is supposed to represent the law abiding side of their community.

On the opposite side of the law there is naughty boy Mairtin - a cunning eejit constantly correcting his potty mouth in front of Granny Maryjohnny. Dunlop brings great energy to Mairtin's quasi likeable character and is brilliantly funny in every one of his entrances – especially the unexpected one. In fact that is what is so delightful about this rarely performed play – the aspects of the unexpected.

A Skull in Connemara abounds with deceptively simple characters and situations that draw you into their world almost as a smugly amused observer. Then just as you are toasting your toes by the lovely warm cottage fire someone throws a proverbial firework into the flames and everything you expected to happen explodes unexpectedly around you! Head to Nottingham Playhouse to see this beauty of a pitch black Irish comedy while you can. Oh and there's a biteen of swearing, so there is now.

 

Credit for the feel of the show should also be given to lighting designer Ian Scott, sound designer: Adam P MCready and fight director Philip D'Orleans.

 

Runs at Nottingham Playhouse until 6th June 2015

Review originally written for The Public Reviews website May 27th 2015

Review: Beautiful Thing at Nottingham Playhouse

It is easy to forget that sometimes in an audience member's life it is the first time they have viewed a play despite it being around for a couple of decades and despite said play having a worldwide cult following. It is easy to be ignorant of why the play is such a draw to audiences whether gay or straight. On a first time viewing of Jonathan Harvey's Beautiful Thing at Nottingham Playhouse, a play centred around an awkward blossoming and loving relationship between two young male teenagers, this reviewer finds himself initially confused at its success. Dramatically interesting yes, amusing certainly, brave even, but what is the big deal?

Beautiful Thing is set in the early 1990s and had its world première at the Bush Theatre in July 1993. The play won rave reviews from critics and audiences alike and went on to tour the following year with a short run at the Donmar Warehouse. In 1994 it made its West End début at the Duke of York's Theatre and shortly after the run work began on a screen adaptation. In 1996 Film4 Productions released the film to more acclaim and the story reached a much wider audience than all theatres combined. Beautiful Thing has gone on to be a worldwide success entertaining and enlightening audiences in Germany, Holland, The USA and Australia. It must have something going for it then, surely.

 

Charlie Brooks and Sam Jackson as Sandra and Jamie

 

This initial confusion of mine is not inferring that it is not a good play. It most certainly is and is very well written and performed with a huge amount of honesty and energy by the small cast of five. It is the second time director Nikoli Foster has directed this play set on a landing outside three homes on a rough Thamesmead council estate in South East London and the direction is acutely observed.

Any personal confusion about why the blossoming gay relationship between the teenage boys Jamie (Sam Jackson) and Ste (Thomas Law) should be such a big deal stems from my own ignorance regarding the fact that in the 1990s this relationship would have been illegal. Even more shocking to discover is the fact that the play was produced only one year after homosexuality was declassified as a mental illness in Great Britain. I was genuinely shocked to learn that homosexuality was considered a mental illness. I know that people can be prejudiced but that is a whole new level of intolerance.

Now I start to understand how such a piece of theatre could be life changing and continue to inform and offer hope to the often marginalised gay, bisexual and trans members of society. My confusion is lessened even more by my further reading (excellent and invaluable programme notes by Ruth Hunt CEO of Stonewall) that states that despite some recently historical changes in the law regarding lesbian and gay relationships there is still a long way to go to total non discrimination. Bullying and violence towards these members of society still continues whilst bigotry and ignorance prevails and even the simple sight of two men holding hands in the street can provoke strong reactions in some in 2015. How must it have been in the 1990s of the story of Beautiful Thing? In some it would have offered a confirmation that their love and sexuality was being shown in a positive light. In others a chance to walk out as Mr and Mrs Disgusted at the interval and never return. Thankfully, the majority stayed put.

Gerard McCarthy and Charlie Brooks as Tony and Sandra

So, do I now consider Jonathan Harvey's play differently after my first time viewing and have a deeper understanding of the issues it addresses? Yes. I feel it is a poignant play that grows on you and helps one consider the plights and lives and loves of others that should have an equality of good fortune the same as everyone and the same socio-political rights.

The production currently at Nottingham Playhouse enthrals and moves in its drama, wickedly amuses in the comedy element and is occasionally shocking in its moments relating to causal domestic violence.

Thomas Law and Sam Jackson as Ste and Jamie

The whole cast are exceptionally strong in their character portrayals. Charlie Brooks amuses with her brash humour and is tender with her feelings towards son Jamie even when he comes out as being gay. Sam Jackson is perfect as the sensitive young man Jamie, vulnerable but brave in initiating a homosexual relationship with his friend and schoolboy neighbour Ste.

Thomas Law is heart breaking as Ste the sixteen year old; beaten but not down; in denial of his sexuality and finally hopeful in his desperate need for love and acceptance. Gerard McCarthy is wonderfully alive and enigmatic as Sandra's hippy artist lover Tony. Vanessa Babirye is frighteningly realistic in her drugged up depiction as Mama Cass reborn and totally convincing generally in the complex role as the mixed up neighbour Leah. There are still references in the play to 1990s television personalities and jokes about them are thoroughly enjoyed by the Nottingham Playhouse audience.

The Brutalism inspired set design (Colin Richmond both set and costume design) allows for fast changes and creative interpretation of the piece and adds considerably to the atmosphere of the piece. Ben Cracknell's (lighting design) and George Dennis's (sound) enhance the whole experience.

Vanessa Babirye as Leah

There is a lot of fun and food for thought in Beautiful Thing, a play that doesn't posture as a gay play but provides hope and enlightenment for those who need its nourishment. Beautifully done.

Review originally published by The Public Reviews on 29th April 2015

Photo Credit Anton Belmonte.

Beautiful Thing plays at Nottingham Playhouse until Saturday 9th May. See this LINK for booking.

Review: The Mist in the Mirror at Nottingham Playhouse

Judging from my last two visits to the theatre (The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time and The Mist in the Mirror) theatre technology has suddenly got very exciting and certainly helps add a terrific atmosphere to the plays that a straight forward set perhaps would not.

In this instance Oldham Coliseum Theatre and ITD (imitating the dog) have joined forces to create a masterpiece of Gothic drama in a stage adaptation of Susan Hill's ghost story The Mist in the Mirror. The adaptation is by Ian Kershaw and the result (in this touring production) is a stunning and scary piece of Gothic story-telling shown mostly in black and white with some amazing effects. The piece is a wonderfully stylish piece of theatre directed by Kevin Shaw.

Imitating the dog have been creating and touring original performance work since 1998. Pete Brooks, Andrew Quick and Simon Wainwright are the Artistic Directors and their work has built a company with a unique reputation in the UK, Europe and internationally. They also collaborate as creative partners for other works. Their recent work includes concept and projection design for Soul Sister in the West End and fairly recently the outstandingly popular and critically acclaimed The Hound of The Baskervilles for Oldham Coliseum Theatre. The Guardian newspaper called them "a company at the forefront of testing the nature of theatre".

In 'The Mist in the Mirror' we witness a restless young traveller named James Monmouth (Paul Warriner) becoming obsessed with the legacy of a famous fictional explorer known as Conrad Vane. During the story, superbly narrated by Jack Lord, as The Reader, Monmouth is repeatedly warned by a range of eccentric individuals to leave well alone. It is a bit like watching a horror film where the hero foolishly decides to venue into the creepy cellar where the killer lurks in the shadows and you know darn well he shouldn't but the crazy compulsion drives them onward.

The interaction between live and digital is brilliantly done. Rain pours down almost constantly, spooky fog at the docks fills the stage, doors disappear before your very eyes, and the darkness of the fantastic set created by Barney George adds superbly to the chill factor. My astonished self almost wanted to laugh out loud at the brilliance of a train carriage seemingly arriving on set, the hero descending from the carriage and the train departing in a ghostly mist. This was all done by projections and a solid entrance. The whole short play contains so many wonderful tricks of light, dark and shade and illusion that you are completely drawn into the story. The cast of five (Sarah Eve, Caroline Harding, Jack Lord, Martin Reeve, Paul Warriner) work together terrifically to tell the story with some perfect timing as they flit in and out of the darkened set as shadows of evil and good intent.

This is a Gothic fireside story that draws the audience into its complicities, makes you jump rather than terrifies, has creepy voice echoes that resound around the theatre and has an otherworldly mystery from flickering Edwardian gas lit start to startling finish.

Running at Nottingham Playhouse until 4th April 2015

Review Mermaid at Nottingham Playhouse/Shared Experience

Nottingham Playhouse are really doing themselves proud these days and their latest collaboration with innovative theatre company Shared Experience is no exception. Polly Teale has adapted and directed the story of the Little Mermaid for the 21^th Century. Thankfully, we see no Disney schmaltz in this stage production. Instead we have a gripping and emotionally taut tale of two worlds: the unselfconscious life of the mermaids in the depths of the oceans and the human life that exists on the land and sometimes encounters peril on the seas.

All is atmospherically set (designer Tom Piper) on a raised area surrounded by the seemingly cavernous and rusting walls of a sunken wreck. The performers use every inch of the stage to mesmeric effect and the rapt audience are so quiet during the story that you could hear a pin drop into the theatrically poetic ocean.

Shared Experience are well known for tackling text head on and devising new interpretations of story-telling and pioneering distinctive performance styles that celebrate a union of physical and text based drama. Mermaid is certainly a very physical piece and the actors playing the mermaids; Miranda Mac Letten, Ritu Arya, Amaka Okafor as mermaids one to three along with Sarah Twomey as Little Mermaid are exceptional in their physical dexterity. The three numbered mermaids morph into a variety of characters during the show. One second we see them being a sad selection of vacuous teenage girls hell bent on making a misery of a school friend's life and next as royal courtiers or a frightening gaggle of sea witches. Their costume changes are staggeringly quick.

As the Little Mermaid newcomer Sarah Twomey shines in her depiction of the inquisitive mermaid desperate to discover human life with all its joys and horrors which she discovers in a search for love and self love. Her speechless pleas to her would-be Prince lover are heart breaking as is her desire to be loved and the indignities suffered to gain human love in a stuffy royal court. An announcement that Twomey has sustained an injury prior to the show and is to be performing the role in a less physical way doesn't reflect whatsoever on her delicate and considered performance tonight.

Woven throughout the story is a central character called Blue. Blue is played with sensitivity and energy by Natalie Gavin. Blue is also the teenage girl viciously teased at the start of the play by her so called school friends for the way she looks and acts. The cruelty reflects the reality of extreme styling by girls to win or attract attention from their contemporaries and boys or men. Throughout the play there are constant references to mirrors, critical gaze and a sense of self in people of both sexes. Gavin's Blue documents the story during the play in a big book and, in a sense, directs the action through a force of will and growing self confidence often linking herself deeply with the mermaid.

Blue's mother, played by the wonderfully versatile Polly Frame, is portrayed as a woman suffering parental frustrations as well as being exasperated by the attitudes of her unemployed husband. Frame also plays Grand Mer the older mermaid and the haughty Queen in the royal household in several miracles of quick change.

All of the actors are tremendously flexible not only in the divergent parts they play but in the hard physical work and necessarily supple nature of the piece. The two men in Mermaid portray the emotionally crippled and physically drowned soldier Prince (Finn Hanlon) and the King (Steve North) plus fishermen in a stormy sea. All of their characters stand up well in a sea of actresses.

Much of the terrific atmosphere is generated through sounds of the sea and of waves and undercurrents that batter the mermaids across and under the stage. The sound scape is created by composer and sound director Jon Nicholls. Equally thrilling is the live tonal singing by the mermaids and the supporting songs from a chorus of twenty-six young girls who sit as witnesses at the sides of the set. Director Polly Teale wanted the local girls in the work to bear witness as the girls on stage face the challenges of being a young woman in a complex world. As the plays tours other local girls will be involved in this way and they will all take part in a nationwide project that accompanies the show and looks at the effect of the media on girls' sense of self and empowers them to challenge myths about femininity.

This poetic stage adaptation is as profoundly deep as the ocean itself and its universal themes of separation, desire, loss, loneliness, and pre-occupation with appearance to please others are very evident and beautifully demonstrated with Shared Experience's thrilling style on stage tonight. As a piece of theatre it works swimmingly well.

Mermaid production photos credit Robert Day

Review Tony's Last Tape at Nottingham Playhouse.

Andy Barrett's new one act play 'Tony's Last Tape' has a few similarities with Samuel Beckett's play 'Krapp's Last Tape'. Both the playwright's names end with a double T, both plays reference the obsessive documenting of a full life through tape machines, and both have a single old man in a scruffy dressing gown as the hero. Plus at some point both heroes pull out a banana from a drawer and eat it. The banana that is – not the drawer.

 

 

This act of the eating the banana happens early on in Tony's Last Tape and there were a few knowing visual and verbal nods in the packed Neville Studio audience at this reference. In fact the whole play is about referencing a personal past and in many of the audiences' minds and political leanings – reverence. For the subject was not Krapp but the late Tony Benn, a divisive Labour politician. The rapt Nottingham audience appear to be made up, almost entirely, of Labour supporters enjoying the jokes and the wit of a political man. Barrett's new play is especially commissioned by Nottingham Playhouse as part of their Power and Politics season.

Throughout the play we learn that Benn was born in 1925 and christened Anthony Neil Wedgwood Benn, a set of names he grew up to dislike and much preferred to be plainly called Tony Benn. In his working life he served as a Labour politician and member of Parliament for 47 years and his political bias was to the far left.

Actor Philip Bretherton plays Benn brilliantly in this studio based production. The play is set in a writing room at Benn's home, a cluttered mess of books, files and papers crammed on a solid looking set of bookshelves and an equally cluttered desk at which the protagonist often sits and scrabbles about in its deep drawers. Ostensibly, Bretherton as Benn is there in a private hour to record another section of his memories onto various tape machines all running simultaneously – a loop to loop on top of the book shelves and two cassette recorders on the desk itself. The random nature of his taped expositions cover his opinions of former politicians with whom he worked or opposed, the various strikes he supported, his time as an MP for Bristol South East and his Socialistic motivated trips to Russia and to China. Bretheron puts all these across in such a fascinating and impassioned way through his interpretation of Andy Barrett's writing and the direction of Giles Croft that, even if you haven't a great interest or knowledge of politics, it still very much engages as a play.

Saying that, it is not all about national politics and one man's experience of socialism. We hear too about Benn missing his wife Caroline who died in the year 2000 and he amusingly refers to his own lack of DIY skills in the home. We get a practical example at one point late into the play where the actor Bretherton has to gingerly clamber up on top of his desk in order to change a light bulb. Even as he did so a joke without an answer popped into my head “How many Labour politicians does it take to change a light bulb?” Like any good researcher I found an answer. “None, they do not have a policy for that.”

We also hear of his time as young man in the RAF – a subject which is weaved cleverly into the story and often serves to illustrate other subjects through the viewpoint of a daring young pilot. Throughout the play Philip Bretherton embodies the dogged spirit of this political radical that had more compassion for the people he served than the political personalities he served with – with a few exceptions such as PM Jim Callaghan.

In short we come away with a picture of a complex impassioned man, a vegetarian, a pipe smoker and a self confessed drinker of far too much coffee. We too discover that after retirement from politics and endless writing of published diaries and memoires he was taken up as a contemporary hero by the young and considered a man with a great sense of humour and personal vision.

'Last' is an ambiguous word. It can mean most recent as well as ultimate. At the very end of the play we discover the meaning of this word in relation to the play's title. In Barrett's superb script the actor as Benn considers death and the often unknown causes thereof. He says that his own death might be from cancer, from a heart attack, natural causes or even potassium poisoning from eating far too many bananas. In gentle defiance he eats yet another banana and on departing the stage considers what 'Last' for him actually means. But that would be telling. It's probably on one of his tapes.

Tony's Last Tape played at Neville Studio Nottingham Playhouse until 28th February

Review originally published by The Public Reviews 27th February

Photo credits Robert Day

Five star review: Posh at Nottingham Playhouse.

This regional première of Laura Wade's 'Posh' a stunningly conceived and brilliantly written play about uber privilege and pomposity hits the Nottingham Playhouse stage like a shattering glass of the wrong sort of wine served up by the wrong sort of person. Snobbery and cut glass accents abound and some of the characters are so upper class arrogant that you would willingly punch them for their self-important ways and exclusive and ultimately damaging social and political ideals. Saying that it is very funny and gasp out loud controversial in parts. This is a co-production between Nottingham Playhouse and Salisbury Playhouse and only the second production after its Royal Court/ West End début. The packed audience this evening are testament to the play's savage humour and well earned credentials.

 

 

The almost predominantly male cast are superbly cast as young Oxford students from very socially advantaged and moneyed backgrounds where they blithely forgive their own criminally riotous behaviour by paying the victims off with wads of cash. Chris, a gastro pub landlord - convincingly played by Neil Caple (the action is mostly in a fancy suite in a pub) finds his guests progressively trashing his establishment and abusing his daughter and is expected to take all the abuse as long as he isn't left out of pocket. All sentiment for the human victims goes out of the window like the hired prostitute who refuses to take part in their lurid games.

 

The two women's roles are both strong characters. We have call girl Charlie played with a firm grip on reality by actress Joanne Evans. Evans also sings beautifully in Latin during the dramatic scene changes and creates the mood for the ever darker episodes of the play. The landlord's quick witted daughter is captured wonderfully by Charlotte Brimble – a recent graduate of the Royal Welsh College of Music and Drama. To balance the practically all male acting ensemble we have an all female creative team with director Susannah Tresilian at the helm. The use of theatrical space through Tresilian's directorship is exemplary aided with Ellan Parry's terrific set realisation.

 

The boys played by Tom Clegg, Dario Coates, Simon Haines, Tom Hanson, Robbie Jarvis, Laurence Kennedy, Philip Labey, Jordan Metcalfe, Tom Palmer, and Jamie Satterthwaite, are portrayed as just that - adults masquerading as - immature 'boys'. Even though a few of the well drawn and complex characters give us reason to be somewhat sympathetic towards their childish behaviour and their desires to put wrongs right they are all lacking in the experience of the real world particularly in their non relationships with the women they encounter. Upper class snobbery rules supreme with these guys and appals throughout. The ensemble work terrifically together and all are utterly believable in their parts. Many times in the play you forget they are acting so engaging are their relationships with each other.

Posh is a cripplingly funny play where the laughs are from the horror of increasingly bad behaviour brought brilliantly to light by the cast and creative teams. The language of the piece can be uncompromising at times even savage in the meaning of ;awesome or amazing and conversely at others it is blunt as fuck. It plays at Nottingham Playhouse only until the 28^th February so Carpe Dieum and grab a hot ticket to this five star Trashmeister of a play.