Tag: Yarit Dor

Strange Fruit by Caryl Phillips, Bush Theatre, 15 June 2019

I have long been a fan of Caryl Phillips‘s writing; I discovered his novels in the mid 1980s and have several of his books in hard cover.

So I was excited to see that he had written a play, although, when I booked Strange Fruit at The Bush, I didn’t realise that it was an early work, written in the early 1980s, prior to the first of the novels.

Here is a link to the Bush resource on this play/production.

Below is the trailer:

I think Janie and I saw a preview, although it is hard to tell at The Bush when press night might be without doing deep research.

In any case, we found the production slick and the acting truly excellent.

Written and set in the early 1980s, the play covers some fascinating aspects of African-Caribbean culture and issues from that time, many of which resonate strongly with issues of migration and identity in our current troubled times.

In truth, the play is somewhat unsubtle, starting in a rather tinny, scene-setting style and tending towards melodrama at the end, in ways that Caryl Phillips clearly ironed out as a writer very soon after writing this play.

But there are flashes of brilliance in the writing and the characters, while somewhat stereotypical, are tragic and engaging.

In fact, the whole piece is engaging throughout; although the play is rather long for the simple story it tells, the piece held our attention throughout.

This is not a play that will cheer you up if you seek some light entertainment. It will make you think about the issues and if you like visceral drama then it is most certainly for you.

Formal reviews, if or when they come, should be available through this link – click here.

Bush Theatre
The Bush Theatre at night. Photo by Guy Bell –
licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 International license.

The Bush does not shy away from producing plays of this kind and that’s one of the reasons we like the place so much.

Jam by Matt Parvin, Finborough Theatre, 16 June 2017

This was not the best Friday evening Janie and I have ever had.

First stop was the Finborough Theatre – our latest hot place – in several senses of the term that evening – it had been a scorcher of a day and was still well hot early evening. The heat in part explains our irritability.

I deposited our “friendship form” with the delightful volunteers at the ticket desk who were unsure what to do with the form, making an almighty fuss about it until someone senior enough came downstairs, grabbed the form and took it away. By this point, Janie was convinced that the senior response was inadequate in the circumstances, whereas I was convinced that it was fine; all I had wanted to do was save myself the price of a stamp by handing the thing in rather than posting it.

We were there to see Jam by Matt Parvin – click here for Finborough resource.

The acting was superb and the subject-matter really interesting, but Janie and I both found it nigh-on impossible to suspend our disbelief in the behaviour of the characters,  in particular the school teacher, given the situation.

Before any savvy readers start to think that we read reviews and then find ourselves seeing the production as reviewers would have us see it, I should say that it is our habit studiously to avoid reading reviews until we have seen a production and formed opinions for ourselves.

But on this occasion, our friend, Michael Billington’s review in the Guardian – click here – sums up almost exactly how we felt and how we discussed it in the minutes/hours after we left the theatre.

David Ralf in The Stage is kinder on the piece; “a touch contrived”. He is also full of deserved praise for the quite excellent performances by the two on stage; Jasmine Hyde and Harry Melling – remember where you heard the names first.

Long before we got to the theatre, Janie and I had agreed that we had a crazy craving for Persian food – Mohsen’s. This craving was only exacerbated by references to the Iranian origins of the teacher character in the play.

But it turned out that Mohsens is closed for a refurb at the moment.

No matter, we thought, Alounak is still there and not such a detour for us. Well, we used to be fans of Alounak’s food, but the standard seems to have declined considerably – at least to our taste. Now we can hardly wait for Mohsen to reopen.

Not the most successful Friday evening ever – but then there was still Saturday evening to come and that turned out to be an altogether more pleasing experience…

…I guess it was a case of “jam tomorrow”.

Diary Of A Madman by Al Smith after Gogol, Gate Theatre Notting Hill, 29 July 2016

I rather liked the idea of this modern adaptation of Gogol’s magnificent short story, Diary of a Madman, set in modern Scotland.

This show is going to Edinburgh in August and then running at The Gate Theatre in September, but we booked for one of three previews at The Gate, which we thought would be a good way to see the production.

The play and production certainly had its moments, but also had some longueurs. Perhaps these will be ironed out between preview and main show, but the preview ran for some 90 minutes and I suspect that 60 to 70 would work better; there is certainly at least 20 minutes-worth of material, mostly earlier in the piece, that is surplus to requirements and made the play seem slow.

But it was very well acted and there were some lovely ideas in there. The bar scene towards the end was a wonderful mixture of anarchic, comedic and suspenseful drama. Some of the topical humour about referenda should play well, especially in Edinburgh.

Here’s a link to the Gate resource on the production. Too early for reviews at the time of writing, but perhaps not at the time of reading.

Janie particularly enjoyed the pea soup followed by “Big Al” pasta dish at Chez Clanricarde after the show.