Review – Forever Looking Up, Illicit Theatre, University of Northampton Flash Festival, Castle Hill United Reform Church, Northampton, 17th May 2016

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If you thought the Mars One Project was a new way of calorie-controlling your chocolate intake, think again. It’s genuine – a project to establish a community of astronauts living on Mars. Crew One are scheduled to depart this earth in 2026, so if you want to volunteer, get your application form in now. Once you’re there though, there’s no way back, so the selection procedure for the best people is rightly arduous. Can you imagine what it would be like to go up to Mars in a rocket and know you will never come back?

That is the situation facing the characters in Illicit Theatre’s Forever Looking Up. They are the first group to head for Mars and have to come to terms with both the excitement of the mission and the tedium of being stuck in a rocket with people who you might not necessarily choose to spend the rest of eternity with. Whilst the Mars One project uniquely sets the scene, the issues facing our five heroes are largely the same that they might encounter in most closed communities. Apart from airlessness of course. And no gravity.

I loved the opening with its introductory video, allowing us to meet the five astronauts separately as they were interviewed for the camera. In just a few minutes you gained subtle insights into their characters that prepared you for their real life presentation on the stage shortly afterwards. I would say this particular footage was the finest use of video in any of these Flash Festival productions due to its originality and relevance. The next sequence in the show was almost contemporary dance in its format – with movements that suggested need and support, the confinement of individual thought and activity into enforced togetherness, and the emotional strains that the closed community would suffer because of their restrictions. I thought it was very well performed and I would have been happy to see more of it!

However, that would mean eating away at the time for the “scripted play” element of the piece, which would have been a shame. Once the astronauts’ responsibilities, characteristics and the basic plot have been established, it concentrates on two relationships between two people, and their repercussions on the wider group. Firstly: the blossoming love between Lily and Kaseem, which is against all the rules. The others snitching on them, telling the bosses that they’ve been kissing, felt like some kind of underhand sneak behaviour at school. I thought that was very sharply done. Second: the friendship between Zoe and Jessica, which builds well with Jessica showing pastoral care for Zoe’s troubled past – did she kill her mother? I think she may have. But Zoe misinterprets Jessica’s friendship for something more, and when Jessica reacts, horrified, at Zoe’s misplaced gaydar, the concord of the group is lost forever. Harvey’s solution to the Zoe/Jessica issue is final – although I understand in subsequent performances it might not be quite so clear cut!

It’s a very engrossing and gripping observation of a closed community imploding. I really liked the oppressive sense of a Big Brother somewhere out there, watching their every move, sounding his alarm whenever they went off piste. Technically, on the performance I saw, the backing music was too loud for the voices to carry sufficiently during those sotto voce private conversations. Nevertheless, I really enjoyed all the performances. The stage loves Sharni Tapako-Brown and she stood out like a beacon of brilliance in all her scenes. Even just in the diary scenes, when she’s not interacting with anyone else, she made the words come alive. And her conflicts of emotion with Zoe were stunning. Talking of whom, Sophie Guiver invested Zoe with a really strong personality, enigmatic with her past and the reasons why she left earth; and calculatingly vindictive after the misunderstanding with Jessica. She has a great stage presence and very confident delivery and I really enjoyed her performance.

As the senior chap on board, Charlie Clee’s Harvey quickly reveals himself to be much more fragile a person than you would like to be in charge. Awkward, nervous, and lacking in the personal charisma to be the authoritative figure that you would need to be at the helm, I thought Mr Clee did a great job in conveying those personal limitations and failures in what must have been a very hard role to grasp. Normally he doth bestride the stage like a Colossus, so it was riveting to see him portray so different a character. Vandreas Marc and Yolanda Lake made Kaseem and Lily into a very believable couple who start to come together and then start to fall apart. They were also particularly graceful in the movement sequences.

An absolutely fascinating piece that takes common themes of everyday life and projects them up into space, providing the added stress that the Mars One mission would definitely place on relationships. Intriguing and thought-provoking, and beautifully acted throughout. Congratulations to all concerned!

P. S. My spelling and grammar nerves were jagged by the time I’d read some of the company’s promotional material. I’ve honestly never seen so many mistakes on the printed page! I wouldn’t mention it but it’s a real bugbear of mine. Next time guys, get a good proof-reader. I don’t mind doing it for you!

Review – 100 Acre Wood, Nonsens!cal Theatre, University of Northampton Flash Festival, Castle Hill United Reform Church, Northampton, 17th May 2016

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Deep in the Hundred Acre Wood, where Christopher Robin plays, you’ll find the enchanted neighbourhood of Christopher’s childhood days. Hmm. I reckon that if your enchanted neighbourhood was made up of the inhabitants of this household, any Christopher Robin worth his salt would run a mile. But there is a link between A A Milne’s cuddly cosy children’s characters and these four troubled beings – they’re all (loosely) based on Christopher Robin’s pals. It’s a clever device and works very well, although the play itself is enjoyable and engaging enough to stand alone without any reference to Pooh.

When we entered the auditorium, Eddie was seated at the front of the stage, nervously waiting for an appointment with his counsellor where we discovered that he has had a breakdown following the death of his father in Afghanistan. Behind him, three oafs in a bed, which made an amusing contrast, but you appreciated absolutely why Eddie was anxious about returning back to the house-share with what would likely be not terribly understanding mates. However, he does pluck up courage and return home, and during the course of the play you see him attempt to re-integrate back into his old society and also see how his domestic partners (the aforementioned oafs) also have their own devils to cope with. There’s the neurotic and tidiness-obsessed Rachel, with her cleaning routines and her minute repositioning of furniture; the hale and hearty but prone to anger Tommy, who tries to bully the rest of the group into doing what he wants; and the apparently carefree William (Trespassers William, perhaps?) who suddenly becomes aware that his voracious appetite is not just something to entertain others with but is a serious health problem – both mental and physical.

I don’t know if the cast remember the TV series The Young Ones (surely they’re too young) but it strongly reminded me of that show with its wayward household of lovable miscreants, who lived in a surreal house with a talking fridge and other soft furnishings with opinions. 100 Acre Wood also has cupboard doors with a mind of their own and a talking fridge – no special effects, just an actor with a door in front of his face. It was so silly that it was very funny – but never over-the-top so that it got in the way of the serious message of the play. It also has a really well written and spoken sarcastic and surreal narration. There’s a lot going on there! No wonder Rachel was so neurotic. Freedom for eggs!

The cast gelled together extremely well and gave a really strong performance throughout. I thought Jared Gregory carried off Eddie/Eeyore’s general moroseness with great aplomb; that first scene, in particular, I found very moving and absolutely believed in the character’s plight and distress. His sense of embarrassment, and his simple inability to express himself was really well conveyed. Top work sir! I also thought Kieran Hansell was excellent as William/Pooh, channelling his inner James Corden with his hail fellow well met façade, hiding further distress. The scene with the honey (or hunny, I suppose) was one of those Ayckbournian moments when you start laughing heartily at what is ostensibly a really funny moment then the laughter catches in your throat as you realise you’re watching someone fall apart. There were opportunities for that scene to be played even more – shall we say… distastefully – and on reflection I think that discretion was the better part of valour.

Danni-Louise Ryan’s Rachel/Piglet successfully made us feel anxious with her own anxiety, fluttering around the set cleaning and moving things, never able to relax, lacking the courage and/or character to join in the lads’ fun, but not wanting to anyway because of the mess they would make. There was a wonderful scene between her and Mr Gregory when she suspects that he is plucking up courage to confess lurve, but in fact what he wants to tell her about his therapy. It was both funny and sad, as neither got to give or hear the message they wanted to convey. There was an excellent stagecraft moment when some paper cups that had been sent flying in an earlier scene and landed by Mr Smallmind’s feet, were retrieved by Miss Ryan for a later scene. And we just thought she’d forgotten to pick them up earlier, more fool us. I also enjoyed the robust performance by Elliot Holden as Tommy/Tigger, bouncing around the room and leaving a path of destruction in his wake. His was perhaps the character with the least light and shade to it, but he has great stage presence, and I loved his confidence and the clarity of his voice, which is something never to be underestimated!

A really good mix of the surreal and the harshness of reality, producing four excellent performances and hugely enjoyed by the audience. Definitely one of the best shows of the festival!

Review – Red Inquisition, Memoir Theatre, University of Northampton Flash Festival, Castle Hill United Reform Church, Northampton, 17th May 2016

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When I was growing up, the fall-out from American McCarthyism was still a Pretty Big Thing. He was the paranoid senator who interrogated creative artists to sniff out subversive communists from within their midst. To what extent the “red threat” was a real danger to America, or was just the paranoia of the times, is probably a matter of conjecture. For good measure, he also encouraged discrimination against homosexuals too, so he was obviously an awfully nice chap.

I always really enjoy plays, songs, films, books and so on that examine their own creative process – often it is the spark of creative genius. Spandau Ballet’s True is about how to write the song “True”. The French Lieutenant’s Woman (particularly the film) is all about how to make the film of “The French Lieutenant’s Woman”. Red Inquisition starts with our three actors discussing the benefits or otherwise of their new rehearsal space (which just so happens to be the space we’re sitting in) and what the subject of their new show will be. For me, this sense that the actors are sharing the same experience as the audience (and vice versa), living in the same surroundings, and breathing the same air is the stuff of theatrical electricity; and I was instantly captivated by that opening scene – which was also extremely funny, with all three performers demonstrating terrific comic ability. They consider a number of possible themes for the new play, running them up the flagpole to see if anyone salutes, until they discover a book about McCarthy and his witch hunts. The subject matter fascinates them – and a show is born.

It is indeed fascinating material; and they’ve dug deep into the archives to find footage of three particular McCarthy victims – Lena Horne, Arthur Miller and Charlie Chaplin. Three people who, by virtue of their creative genius, totally changed the world. Relevant video footage is compared with the actors’ own interpretations/impersonations of these people, bringing black and white memories sharply into today’s focus. I would say that it was much more effective when they were reviving live performance, such as Ciara Goldsberry’s beautiful singing of Lena Horne classics, or Jaryd Headley’s accurate recreation of the Chaplin gait; less so when they simply repeated scenes on video that they had already acted out. Mr Headley gave us a strong and moving portrayal of Chaplin, the effect of which was weakened by the on-screen repetition of the same words. We didn’t need to see that proof, we already believed you!

Daniel Hadjivarnava had the toughest job trying to make Arthur Miller come to life, because, as the video footage showed, in real life he was a very dull man! It may sound like a back-handed compliment to say that Mr Hadjivarnava portrayed Miller with considered accuracy, but actually I was very impressed with the way he captured him. Ms Goldsberry conveyed Lena Horne’s immense dignity and star quality with excellent understanding and insight; and Mr Headley absolutely brought Chaplin to life with his rather neurotic watching of old classics and tentative trying-out of new routines, needily relying on the support of others. He was also absolutely 100% confident in his delivery of every line and was a pleasure to watch.

There was a joke about Uta Hagen: four things I didn’t know about her. It sent the (majority of student) audience into paroxysms of hilarity. My fellow blogger and I sat in stony silence. Was it an in-joke? Or were we just stupid? The latter I can entirely believe. If it’s the former – don’t alienate sections of your audience into feeling like second class citizens, it doesn’t make them feel valued! I also thought there was a missed opportunity to make the content more relevant by concentrating on Miller’s Death of a Salesman and not on The Crucible, his allegory about McCarthy. Maybe they thought it was too obvious?

The choice of video at the end was inspired, powerfully showing how all these great talents triumphed through their adversity and regained their reputations and honour in the long run. Quite right too, a very positive and uplifting note on which to end. Fascinating subject matter given thoughtful treatment and with some excellent performances. Most enjoyable!

Review – Him, Just Bear Theatre Company, University of Northampton Flash Festival, St. Peter’s Church, Marefair, Northampton, 16th May 2016

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I’m going to add an additional first paragraph to the words I had already decided to write about this production, because, beforehand, I simply didn’t understand the play but now I have read someone else’s review of it, I could kick myself for having been so obtuse. The play now makes much more sense to me. However, I didn’t get it at the time, and there’s no point pretending I did. So, with that little aside out of the way, here are my original thoughts about Him. And I only wish I could be more generous.

As Snoopy might have written, it was a dark and stormy night… But there is an old church that serves as a refuge for Happy; he has done his best to make it comfortable with a music system, a kettle, a sofabed and his girlfriend – Her. Three portentous knocks at the door disturb their domestic peace. Fearing the worst, Happy gets the girl to run and hide before the intruder finally enters. They don’t recognise each other at first, but eventually Isaac (the new arrival) reveals that he does indeed know Happy and they go back… way back when. Quite what their previous relationship was we don’t really know. I think it involved Her, but it might not be the same Her as this Her. Eventually, when Happy is satisfied that there is no danger and he wants to introduce her to Isaac, he goes and brings her back on stage.

And that, gentle reader, is the point at which you either love this play or you find it so unfathomable that the temptation is to give up trying to understand what’s going on. Now, believe me, I do appreciate the enormous amount of time, effort, originality, talent and so many other excellent elements that go to make up the creation of a live performance. And I am the last person to want to discourage or take pleasure in anyone’s failures. I will always look for the good things in a theatre performance because I want to enjoy myself and it’s the good things that help you do that. But if, at the end of the day, you conclude that you really didn’t enjoy it at all, there is no point keeping a review blog unless you say so. Alas.

Back to the play and the reappearance of Her. As your loyal and faithful reviewer, I did my utmost to keep up with the nuances of the writing; but what you’re presented with is something, on the face of it, so ludicrous, that I really had to battle to keep engaged or find any positives. All I can say for certain is that she is not her as we have known Her. She may be a metaphor for… something? She may have different significance for different people. She may be real to one and false to the other. Or, the whole thing might just be Theatre of the Absurd in extremis. I like to think I wouldn’t have been one of the people who walked out on the first night of Waiting for Godot, but maybe I would…? And why Chuck Berry? Maybe I was supremely slow on the uptake on this one, but I would have liked to have been thrown just some tiny morsel of understanding – give the audience a break, guys!

Jack Alexander Newhouse spoke Happy’s lines so quietly overall that it was really hard to make out much of what he said – and I was sitting in the second row of pews! Surely from the back of the church it would have resembled a silent movie. His facial expressions were good but again minimalistic so you got precious little sense of drama. It was as though you were observing someone’s conversations from a long way away, when you wouldn’t expect to get any sense of what they were talking about. Neizan Fernandez Birchwood’s projection as Isaac was stronger and clearer – although I would still have liked more – and I liked his subtle questioning of his friend’s sanity when Her returns. But that I’m afraid was not enough to sustain approx. 75 minutes of bewilderment.

Ask yourself this question: you are seeking shelter on a cold and stormy night; you find a church; you say to yourself, this could be the perfect place to spend the night. You walk up to the door. What do you do? What I would do is try the door handle. If it is locked I would sigh, leave and find somewhere else to shelter. If it was unlocked, I would slowly open the door to make sure I wasn’t disturbing some service or vigil, and if it appeared to be unoccupied, enter. What I would not do is to thump, portentously, three times on the front door to be allowed into an unlocked church by people you don’t even know are in there. So why did Isaac do that? If there’s a good reason, then it shows that I really didn’t understand the plot at all; if there isn’t a good reason, then…why add further to the incredulity of the whole play?

Regrets to everyone involved but this really did not do it for me at all.

Review – Altered, Faux Pas Theatre, University of Northampton Flash Festival, Castle Hill United Reform Church, Northampton, 16th May 2016

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This fascinating play tells the true story of Beth Rutherford, a 19 year old girl suffering work related stress. Her father suggested she consulted a counsellor; but, for whatever reason, using hypnotic techniques, the counsellor implanted false memories in Beth’s brain. She managed to convince her – and Beth convinced the rest of the world – that her father had repeatedly abused her since childhood, had made her pregnant and then had carried out an abortion using a coat-hanger. Fortunately for the Rutherford family, history relates that the father was exonerated in the case; but the reality of what effect “bad therapy” can have on people provides a lasting topic for reflection long after curtain down.

The scene is set with some very familiar sound effects – hearing the Rutherford family make endless attempts to record their phone answering service greeting. We’ve all been there. It’s the sound of a happy family; giggling girls making a mess of it all, not taking it seriously, deliberately getting it wrong. It’s the sound of a normal family. That’s one of the reasons why, when it appears that Beth’s father has committed these awful acts, it all feels very shocking. The passing of time is noted by changing the letters on a scrabble board at the front of the stage. In fact, the scrabble pieces play a major part in the identity of the production – both the name of the play and the theatre company use this imagery – I guess because, like false memory syndrome – the scrabble tiles can be manipulated to create many different words and meanings.

The play is structured round the sequence of meetings between Beth and her counsellor, interrupted by various other scenes that attempted to illustrate other examples of wider memory failure. Some of these other scenes relied heavily on a degree of flippancy that I felt was at odds with the main theme of the play. For me, rather than dovetailing nicely or cleverly highlighting underlying themes, they clashed and provided too great a juxtaposition between Beth’s troubled mind and total slapstick. I appreciate that they were well performed; they just still rather irritated me if I’m honest. The fish, in particular…. Let’s just say I was happy when the fish finally had his chips. I’m perfectly happy to accept that this is a problem with me than with the performance.

One thing’s for absolute certain – it’s a stunner of a performance from Sophie-Rose Darby as Beth. There she sat, her eyes expressing that numb pain you have when you can’t join the links up in your brain to find a solution to whatever the problem is; undecided whether to find the counsellor’s attempts to draw her out constructive or intrusive. Her horror at her self-discovery at those terrible truths (that aren’t) locked away deep inside was very movingly portrayed. There’s a very difficult scene where she plays both sides of a confrontation between Beth and her father and she does it immaculately – unrushed, deliberate, superbly emotional. Her every line was spoken with complete conviction. At times she reminded me of Sheridan Smith. In common parlance, she nailed it.

On the other end of those conversations, Megan Burda was also very convincing as the counsellor, with apparently no axe to grind and no ulterior motive behind the structure of her questions, but you start to raise eyebrows to yourself as she gently introduces suspicions and inaccurate imputations from Beth’s responses. Surely someone who appears this genuine couldn’t possibly be deliberately introducing poisonous thoughts…could they? The remaining cast members – Aoife Smyth, Ellen Shersby-Wignall and Lucy Kitson, gave excellent support in their sketches and routines; and the poem, which brings the show to a conclusion, was very telling and beautifully performed by everyone. Certainly a play that makes you think twice and tells its story compellingly; an appropriate choice for Mental Health Awareness Week.

Review – X or Y, Infuse Theatre Company, University of Northampton Flash Festival, Castle Hill United Reform Church, Northampton, 16th May 2016

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I’m dipping my toes even further into the murky world of student drama, encouraged by my friends and co-bloggers Mr Smallmind and Mr Mudbeast. This is my first experience of the Flash Festival, an annual season of plays devised and performed by 3rd year students of drama at the University of Northampton. It’s a major part of their course, indeed it’s their dissertation, and so the performances are judged as part of their degree process – so it’s very important. Think of the jury final at Eurovision but with less glitter. Over the course of the first four days, I ended up seeing ten of the thirteen plays on offer and will write about each one individually in the order in which I saw them.

X or Y takes a witty and emotional look at transgender people, both from a historical point of view and also right up to date. It starts with the early court case of Ernest Boulton and Fred Park, who, as Stella and Fanny, were arrested for indecent behaviour in 1870 as a result of their transvestism and soliciting men. We see the witnesses, the judge, the lascivious doctor who gets too much pleasure from their physical examination, and the court’s final judgment. These scenes are interspersed with individual monologues from trans people, who you certainly sense are the real words of real people today, talking about their experiences of living within their own, alien, bodies and also how their families and society as a whole treat them. There’s also a projection into the future about what a baby-selecting clinic in the year 2041 might look like – and it’s pretty grim viewing!

It’s fascinating subject matter and it was treated with immense dignity and sensitivity, even though there was plenty of humour and physical comedy to enjoy. For me there were two major strengths to this production. The first was the ensemble work of the cast, marching in time (chiefly to Blur’s Girls and Boys, nice touch) as they reposition props and chairs with immaculate accuracy between each scene, everyone helping each other with their onstage costume changes which gave the whole show great pace and fluidity. The other strength was the truly devastating nature of those individual monologues. Each speaker would stand somewhere on a pink and blue line across the stage to indicate their position on the trans spectrum, and without fail each of the accounts of life as a transgender person was extraordinarily moving. There’s a sting in the tail too, reserved for the final scene, which really adds to the emotion.

There was a “dream sequence” – that’s the best way I can describe it – where the cast develop the story through movement and physical theatre; I have to admit I wasn’t entirely sure what they were trying to achieve here and, catching the eyes of the performers, only two of them seemed to be 100% confident in what they were doing. Apart from that, the energy and rhythm of the piece were perfectly maintained throughout.

The cast were uniformly excellent; highlights included Rhiana Young for the beauty of her monologue, Grace Aitken for her ability to switch from comedy to serious in an instant, Stephanie Waugh for the relish with which she tackled the vile doctor, Annalise Taylor for that scary receptionist and Kathryn McKerrow for her sheer all round stage presence. (Forgive me if any of those names are wrong – it took a mixture of research and guesswork to establish!)

Great use of music, perfect ensemble work, and really thought-provoking material. At least one member of the audience was sobbing at the end, proof that the performance could really hit your own personal emotions hard. This is one of those great shows where you can leave the theatre a different person from the one that went in, and that’s a real triumph. If you missed it at the Flash Festival, you have another chance to catch it in July at the Bedford Festival.

Review – Alexandra Dariescu Performs Rachmaninov, Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, Derngate, Northampton, 15th May 2016

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There’s nothing quite like a classical concert when you’ve been a bit stressed. That old line about music having charms to soothe the savage breast? Darn right. It doesn’t matter if it’s soft and gentle or belting and Wagnerian, music can take the place of a sensual massage any day of the week. I was in the mood for a musical massage, so the timing was perfect! And it’s always a pleasure to welcome back the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra to Northampton, the artistic hub of the East Midlands as I like to call it.

Our conductor for this mixed programme of German and Russian music was rising star M. Fabien Gabel, music director of the Quebec Symphony Orchestra, and a handsome and debonair chap to boot. I always like to observe the different ways that conductors work to get the best out of their orchestras. Some get swept away by a veritable tsunami of enthusiasm; others take control with a mere flick of their baton. M. Gabel takes a moderate path, his body lurching at a positive angle towards whatever section of the orchestra he’s addressing. The motion would be enough to send me to the chiropractors – but it certainly works well for him.

The first item on the musical agenda was the overture to Humperdinck’s Hansel and Gretel. I do like a good overture to start the ball rolling, and I was unfamiliar with this piece. It’s a very enjoyable mix of the smooth and the staccato and I thought the orchestra did a terrific job with it – beautifully clear phrasing, excellent precision. And there wasn’t a whiff of Release Me about it.

After the overture, the violins had to form a string huddle in the corner of the stage whilst the big guys wheeled on the super Steinway. I can never decide if this rearrangement procedure helps to build up expectation or just looks a bit silly. Half and half, I guess. Leader of the orchestra Duncan Riddell took his seat only to send one of his chair chucks flying, so there was a little more rearrangement to take place before we were able to greet our soloist for the evening, the officially fabulous Alexandra Dariescu. We had already seen Miss Dariescu here before when she performed Mozart’s Piano Concerto No 21, and had the interval crowd buzzing with excitement afterwards. This time she performed Rachmaninov’s Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini, which is another RPO favourite – we saw it here three years ago performed by Peter Jablonski.

After a minor contretemps between Miss Dariescu’s billowing dress and Mr Riddell’s violin stand (the dress, being the more substantial of the two, won), she sat down at the piano and gave us a most amazing performance, full of excitement, jokiness, passion and irreverence. From where we sit, we get a great view of the pianist’s hands on the keyboard. I can tell you there were times during that piece when they were a complete blur. My eyes could not assimilate all that dexterity, and it’s hard to imagine the brain messages that get processed to tell your fingers to move so quickly and so accurately. It took everyone’s breath away. Her reception was so enthusiastic that she returned for an encore – Ginastera’s Argentinian Dance No 2 – a charming little piece that I’d not heard before but full of South American flavour which flourished under Miss Dariescu’s delicate touch.

After the interval we were treated to a very grand experience – Beethoven’s 5th Symphony. I’m not sure I’ve ever heard this performed live before, and it goes without saying what a tremendous work of art it is. From those initial stabbing chords to the final triumph of its ending, there’s not a note wasted that doesn’t play a vital part in its overall effect and structure. It calls for vigour and bravado in its playing and it certainly got that. There’s so much going on during that performance that it was a wonder M. Gabel kept it all together – but he did. I was caught out by the sudden jump from third to fourth movement and it was only just before the end that I realised we were, indeed, just before the end. A hugely entertaining performance of what must be an extraordinarily demanding work. Thanks again to the Royal Philharmonic for continuing to bring their magic to us here in Northampton – may you never cease!

P. S. We weren’t able to order interval drinks – that’s the policy when there’s only a short time before the interval, half an hour we were told. That timing didn’t quite make sense to me, but hey ho. However, after all the piano shifting and the encore, the first part of the concert ended up being a good fifty minutes. Queueing unnecessarily for interval drinks is one of my pet hates, but I didn’t complain. Much. And actually the Beethoven was over relatively quickly, so I ended up finishing my Shiraz whilst walking home (a route that took me through a no-alcohol restricted zone but don’t tell anyone). I had already decided that if the police stopped me I was going to say “Beethoven made me do it.”

Review – Screaming Blue Murder, Underground at the Derngate, Northampton, 13th May 2016

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Interesting new staging for the most recent Screaming Blue. Instead of the podium being at the front and all the seats in rows looking towards it, they’ve added two or three short rows either side of it, at 90 degrees (or 270, depending your viewpoint). Talking of viewpoints, my guess is that sitting there you will get an excellent view of Dan Evans’ ears, but I’m uncertain to what extent you will feel the show is directed at you. Maybe we should try sitting there some time.

Talking of Dan, he was absolutely on fire this week. It was a packed house (always helps) and there were a few slightly louder ladies in the front rows for Dan to banter with. I say banter… it was abuse really, but they deserved it.

Our first act, new to us, was Matt Rees. He has a wonderful, deliberate, deadpan delivery, with just a hint of the lugubrious, but he’s really funny. Inventive, original material, that really hit the mark. I loved how Poundland, in Swansea, is the name of a sex shop – when I was a student I had a friend who lived nearby and I remember a few Saturday nights that suggest the place hasn’t changed much. There was a very clever routine about violence in a children’s nursery, nice observations about South Wales dining, and much much more. We’d definitely like to see him again.

Next up, and also new to us, was Jo Neary. A very different approach to presenting a stand-up act; rather than just telling a sequence of stories, she went modular. First we had her nervous sex toys powerpoint presentation but with the slides missing; we had some Bjork; we had a sequence spoken by her bitchy best friend; there were a few jokes interspersed in all this; and finally we ended up with her interpretation of Pan’s People performing Nilsson’s Without You. She’s a naturally very funny lady, and whilst some of the material was a little hit and miss (mainly hit) at her best she was hysterical. The variety-style of her performance kept it fresh and engaging too.

Our last act, whom we have seen at the R&D before, was Mitch Benn. I could just refer you to my blog post from September 2014 because his act was – I’m pretty sure – 100% the same. Fortunately, his material is great and he also delivers with attack and panache, so it was pleasure to hear it all a second time. Although his anti-Eurovision slant got my goat again!

All three acts were very much appreciated by the happy audience. Another Screaming Blue in two weeks’ time. We’ll be there, so should you!

Review – The Massive Tragedy of Madame Bovary! – Peepolykus, Royal and Derngate, Northampton, 11th May 2016

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You just know that when an adaptation of Madame Bovary includes the words Massive Tragedy and ends with an exclamation mark that the original Flaubert is not going to be taken too seriously. In fact, the cast conducted a straw poll near the beginning of the show to find out how many of us in the audience had actually read the original book. I couldn’t see anyone put up their hand, so I don’t think any of us were going to be purists.

I’ve not seen Peepolykus before but I have the feeling that the concept of purist isn’t something they would often take into account when devising a show. Four actors about play 25 roles; or alternatively, four actors are just themselves; when the programme says Javier Marzan plays “Javier Marzan” and Jonathan Holmes plays “Jonathan Holmes”, you might wonder if the £2.50 purchase price – relatively cheap though it may be – was worth it. The programme isn’t half as surreal and another-planet-like as the show though. There hasn’t been so much onstage shenanigans, addressing the audience directly and seemingly ignoring the play since Eric Sykes and Jimmy Edwards did Big Bad Mouse. And that was a very long time ago.

Mme Bovary is the archetypal village dweller who longs for the excitement of the bright lights of the glamorous city. She’s married to the kindly but passionless – and highly gullible – M. le docteur Bovary, and is always on the lookout for a bit of extra-marital how’s your father. I’m very sorry if I’m giving the wrong impression here – it’s what Emma Fielding, playing Emma Fielding, playing Emma Bovary, would say was the typical viewpoint of someone with a penis. Emma sees the role as being one of independence, of emancipation, of sisterhood struggle, of identity affirmation. But we all know she’s just sex mad, obvs.

Conor Murphy has designed a fantastic set, comprising of a number of sliding blackboard panels, where the scene is set by a cast member simply writing with chalk to explain the location, like “Yonville”, “Town Hall”, or drawing a gramophone to create music. 1856 was the year that Madame Bovary was published – so that’s an extraordinarily advanced gramophone for its era; I can imagine the company depicting Victoria listening to surround sound stereo through her noise-cancelling headphones. Concealed cubby holes reveal props, minor characters, and other rooms with a great sense of inventiveness and quirky humour. From where we were sitting in row C of the stalls, we could see that there were a number of large props high up in the air ready to be dropped into place. They piqued our curiosity as to how they would be used. A huge round chandelier swooped to the floor and doubled up as an amazing ball gown. For the agricultural fair, a flying pig loitered mid-air and an enormous rooster descended to the ground (or at least near it), stayed around for a minute or so, and then flew back up. All that effort for so little effect; never has such a big cock been so underutilised on stage.

Javier Marzan and John Nicholson have done a great job in adapting the book into this irreverent yet strangely touching stage version. Yes, it’s full of asides and nods and winks, apparently unscripted chats to the audience, even a pretend feedback session at the interval where Javier’s magic act wins the honour of being performed again. But the element of personal tragedy within the story still comes to the fore and without knowing the original story, it’s very hard to say where Flaubert ends and Peepolykus begins. We know the opening ratcatchers aren’t in the original because we are told so; but as the show progresses, all the lines between the source and the end product are delightfully blurred. I loved John Nicholson’s stupendously credulous Charles Bovary, innocently enabling Emma to have it away with the arrogant Rodolphe, a rakish performance by Javier Marzan. Jonathan Holmes’ “everything else” is a complete tour de force, rushing in and out of doors and coming back as different characters like Arturo Brachetti in a Feydeau farce. And Emma Fielding, playing Emma Fielding, playing Emma Bovary gives a really strong and character driven performance throughout – or at least until she starts playing herself.

Confused? I’m not surprised. You’ll just have to see the show to appreciate just how well it all slots together. A very funny and rewarding night – on at the Royal and Derngate, Northampton until the end of the week. That’s the end of the current tour but it may well crop up again soon in a theatre close to you. Wholeheartedly recommended!

Review – An Enemy of the People, Chichester Festival Theatre, 7th May 2016

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After a much needed afternoon nap, Mrs Chrisparkle, Professor and Mrs Plum and I wandered back to the Festival theatre for our evening main event. Of course I had heard of An Enemy of the People, but I had never seen it before. Nor had I read it. I have three volumes of Ibsen from my teenage years and it doesn’t appear in any of them. In fact, I’ve only seen Ibsen three times – each one a Hedda Gabler. That doesn’t say much for the variety of contemporary approach to Ibsen, does it?

Rather like Barker’s Waste that we saw last Christmas, An Enemy of the People is still enormously relevant to today’s audience even though it was written way back in 1882. In a little Norwegian spa town, whose wealth comes almost exclusively from tourists flocking to take the waters at the town’s baths, local doctor Tomas Stockmann has discovered that the water there is in fact riddled with bacteria and could do terrible damage to anyone in contact with it. The only safe solution is to close the baths down and have the water source safely reconstructed. The Mayor, an arrogant, pompous man who happens to be Dr Stockmann’s brother, and who pours scorn on his attitudes and activities whenever the opportunity arises, demands that the doctor withdraw his report because the cost of repairing the baths would be extortionate. Will the townspeople agree with the doctor that health and safety must come first, or with the Mayor that their taxes should be protected? Aye, there’s the rub. Although it startswith issues of how to deal with whistle-blowers, and the rights and wrongs of public funding, the argument moves on to discuss themes of intellectual superiority, loyalty, and self-sacrifice. It’s a very meaty, satisfying play, which really gets you involved, challenging one’s own sense of justice, and making oneself ask the question, what would you do in Stockmann’s shoes? I make no bones about it, I found the play absolutely riveting.

It’s a perfect production for the Festival stage, with Tim Hatley’s gloomy but not austere set creating a very believable, moderately grand house for Dr Stockmann, with an ever-stocked dining room and homely soft furnishings; which transforms superbly to the offices of the local newspaper and even more so to the house after it has undergone some changes at the end. Howard Davies’ direction is clear and pacey, and by the interval I was buzzing with excitement to see how the situation would resolve itself. The remarkable fourth act (being Ibsen it’s a five act play) where Stockmann speaks at a public meeting had me literally open-mouthed in awe. Cast members filled the auditorium, lining up the steps, shouting back to the stage, whilst others sat in seats in front of the audience, themselves watching what was happening on stage. I thought it was astounding.I ended up shouting at the stage too, even though Mrs C had to remind me it wasn’t actually a pantomime. I was jealous of people sat at the end of the row, because they were handed copies of the Mayor’s wicked statement and I just wanted to shove it back in their face saying it was rubbish. On reflection, maybe it was just as well I wasn’t sat there. After the high drama of the fourth act, when the final set emerged reflecting the sadness and defeat of Tomas and his household, I actually let out an involuntary cry of sympathy. That’s how much the stagecraft of the whole production took me along with it, making me acutely sensitive to the Stockmanns’ plight. Even before considering the performances, the combination of play and production had me on the edge of my seat. I absolutely loved it.

From a popular culture point of view, they’ve rolled out the big guns in the form of Hugh Bonneville in the part of Dr. Stockmann. Apparently this is Mr Bonneville’s first stage role in twelve years, and no doubt a sizeable number of the audiences will be there to see Lord Grantham in the flesh. (They may recognise another member of the Downton cast as well – under-sub-minor-footman Andy, played by Michael Fox.) I’d certainly never seen Mr B on stage before, and I was most impressed. He’s certainly one of those actors who looks and feels so comfortable on the stage, who is technically so reliable, and whom you look forward to their next entrance. I really enjoyed the way he captured all of the good doctor’s different aspects: the integrity, the family man, the self-appointed hero, the smugness, the misplaced vanity, the devastation. It was all there.

He is matched in snide villainy by William Gaminara playing his brother Peter, the mayor. We saw Mr Gaminara in the extraordinary The Body of an American in Northampton a couple of years ago and he is a very fine actor. His totally credible characterisation of the measly mayor, thin in spirit and generosity, was really striking, and I spent most of the play wanting to throw things at him, he annoyed me so much. There’s a really strong supporting performance from Abigail Cruttenden as Tomas’ wife, wrestling with the opposing desire and obligation to support her husband but also to make him see sense and not cut off the entire family’s security. Adam James plays newspaper editor Hovstad as keen as mustard to screw the mayor once and for all, with Michael Fox as his supporting sidekick vindictively adding his “bloody right”s, only for them to turn cowardly when it comes to the crunch – which was dramatically highly effective. For me the best supporting performance of the night was from Jonathan Cullen -whom I remember as a magnificent student actor when we were at Oxford – as the wheedling Aslaksen, who turns coat at the whiff of an extra penny in the tax and becomes a paragon of parsimony. Finally, hats off also to young actors Alfie Scott and Jack Taylor, as Dr Stockmann’s sons Ejlif and Morten, who stayed completely in character throughout,and whose appalled reactions, from sitting out in the audience and looking back at the stage when their father was being roundly abused by the town, were genuinely agonising to watch.

I appreciate that if I had seen other productions of this play before – McKellen at the National has been brought to my attention – I might not have been quite so blown away by this one. But I hadn’t. And I was. It’s on until 21st May, and I would urge you to see it at once!