Theatre – Page 11 – Ian Louis Harris

Edinburgh Day Four: Lunch With Marie & Joe Logan, The Roots Of The Blues, Let’s Talk About Porn, 20 August 2018

The weather was much improved again today; yesterday was a weather blip. So we played tennis again at Leith Links in the morning.

Then off to have lunch at Marie and Joe’s new apartment in the south of Edinburgh, not too far from Summerhall and The Meadows. It took just over 45 minutes to get there door to door with a change of bus.

P1020715 — Janie insisted on taking some pictures along the way

We had a guided tour of the new place, including the new kitchen and en suite bathroom, which we were thus seeing before Linda Cook gets to see them; which is sure to be a source of much consternation.

Joe cooked a rather wonderful fish pie as the centrepiece of the lunch. We had a cherry roularde and some cheeses to follow, so that was us pretty much sorted for food today. Nice wines too.

It was really good to see Marie and Joe in their new home environment; when I saw them in Edinburgh last year…

A Day At The Edinburgh Fringe Festival With Old Muckers, 22 August 2017

…their moving plans were still up in the air.

We had some very interesting conversation about the festival, Edinburgh generally, politics generally, death, siblings, niblings, isms and anti-isms. You get the idea.

When lunch came to a natural end, I announced that I wanted to seek some indoor tennis shoes from Bruntsfield Sports in Morningside on our way back to Edinburgh. Marie and Joe volunteered to walk off lunch with us and chat some more.

It turned out that Bruntsfield Sports in Morningside doesn’t do those shoes; it is their branch at David Lloyd that sells them.

Still, we were by then near a convenient bus stop for central Edinburgh, so said a fond goodbye to Marie & Joe while stepping onto a bus to Princes Street.

We sought out the Apple Store on Princes Street in a vain attempt to get Daisy’s iPhone re-batteried (takes hours, we’ll need to do that in London). But I did procure the very iPad keyboard upon which I am typing right now, which should make my travelling blogs easier to write (i.e. wordier) in future.

On the way to Apple I spotted a show, Let’s Talk About Porn, at C, which looked interesting; a troupe of youngsters and plenty of time to faff around at Apple. Once I realised that’s we needed very little faffing time at Apple, I spotted another performance, The Roots Of The Blues, near to the C show (theSpaceTriplex) and just about enough time to pick up the tickets and fit both shows in.

So we ended up doing the very thing we promised we wouldn’t do; ran around like mad things fitting in a couple of shows at near-breakneck pace.

Both shows were worth it. The Roots Of The Blues was a mix of lecture and performance by Toby Mottershead. Charming, informative and he’s also a very able guitar player/blues singer. Toby’s slide guitar playing was exceptional and a new live experience for me and Janie.

Then up to C for the play Let’s Talk About Porn. This was a verbatim theatre piece, performed in a physical style by a very young troupe. “Sadly” we didn’t see the dour bar-tenders at the upstairs bar, but we did grab some water and did see the Flamenco duo from the previous evening sitting around before and after the play.

The play was good; we’d seen a fair bit of material on this topic before but it was an innovative, thoughtful, physical and interesting piece.

Then home, where we fancied little food and no booze – so we relaxed with just some toast and juice. Daisy managed to set off the smoke alarm by burning some toast – mercifully those things switch them selves off quite quickly and it was still reasonably early when that happened!

All of our photographs from our week away, mostly at the Edinburgh Fringe, can be seen on our Flickr album by clicking here on the picture below:

Edinburgh Day Three: A Fortunate Man by Michael Pinchbeck, Flamenco Global & Dinner At Roseleaf, 19 August 2018

The promised deluge mostly dumped its load overnight, leaving a drizzly, mizzly morning.

We’d already rescheduled the Falkland Palace/real tennis outing to Tuesday and/but there was no hope of modern tennis either in the murk, so we had a very pleasent, quiet morning hunkered down with our provisions.

We watched the start of the test match while grazing, then set off to the City to collect our tickets…

…and then go out to Summerhall. There we saw A Fortunate Man, a two-handed play adapted from the book about a rural GP, in the rather apt setting of a former veterinary college lecture theatre. It was a very moving piece.

A Fortunate Man has been very well received – reviews can be found here.

Then on to Flamenco Global at C. This had been a more serendipitous choice; I simply wanted to find some music (for variety) at that hour when we found that we couldn’t get tickets for Extinguished Things.

We had a glass of wine at the bar before the show, served by the most disengaged, humourless young people we have so far encountered in Edinburgh, which, together with the rather dour queue management at C, didn’t seem to auger well.

But as it turned out, Flamenco Global was a stunningly good act. Ricardo Garcia is a superb and seemingly very sweet guitarist. His playing was accompanied by some fine dancing by Nanako Aramaki.

We chatted afterwards with a nice Scottish couple who were fans of Flamenco and of Garcia in particular.

Then the bus home…

…for a quick freshen up and then off to the Roseleaf for dinner.

Great grub and friendly staff. daisy started with satay prawns & went on to a chunky Cullen Skink (a sort of smoked haddock chowder), while I started with an excellent mushroom soup followed by a trout dish. A fruity Viognier wine. We even had deserts – Janie had affogato (all the fashion I am told) while I tried a banana parfait with ice cream & chocolate named Bananarama.

All the music was similarly late 1970s early 1980s with various retro feels in the crockery and a collection of mad hats around the walls for mad hatter tea parties, apparently. For a short while we had a strange couple next to us – she had no volume control, occasionally speaking so loudly and strangely it was hard nor to look. They ate incredibly quickly and mercifully moved on at pace too.

Quirky place, superb food, excellent service, rounded off our day very nicely.

If you want to see all of the photographs from this trip, click this link or the Flickr Album link picture below:

Edinburgh Day Two: Harpy by Philip Meeks, Wu Song The Tiger Warrior, Dinner At Ship On The Shore, 18 August 2018

We rose late by our standards and pootled around first thing. We played tennis around 11:00 – the courts were deserted on a formerly-drizzly, albeit Saturday, morning.

We took some brunch at Mimi’s Bakehouse on Shore, then went off to get some provisions. Found Great Grog for wine & coffee. Then a sports shop for some training troos, then Leith Farmers’ Market for some brunch provisions for tomorrow, as the weather is set very poor.

Then we went in to Edinburgh proper for our shows, both recommended by the nice family in Let Me Eat Too. First up, Harpy – a one woman play with Su Pollard. Very good performance but the play was a bit slow and all over the place. It has been pretty well received though – reviews can be found here.

In need of refreshment and reasonable comfort, we eventually found an Andalusian tapas/wine bar place happy to let us sit outside and drink some wine. There was a curious incident with a pair of drunks and their Yorkshire terrier dog and I got shat on from a great height, literally. Good job I was wearing my vinyl (imitation leather) jacket.

Then on to Wu Song – The Tiger Warrior. The recommendation lady had described it as musicians from North Korea but actually it was an extraordinary mime/dance show from Taiwan.

We probably wouldn’t have booked it had it been described to us more accurately but we really enjoyed it, so that lady’s confusion proved to be our friend. It was pretty well received in formal reviews too.

Home for a wash/change and then on to Ship On The Shore for dinner. Excellent fish meal.

We shared a crab salad starter. Daisy tried lemon sole while I went for seafood linguini.

Massive portions but superb food. We got home before the rain started…just.

All of our photographs from our week away, mostly at the Edinburgh Fringe, can be seen on our Flickr album by clicking here on the picture below:

Edinburgh Day One: Angry Alan by Penelope Skinner, NewsRevue, BattleActs & Dinner At Chop House Leith, 17 August 2018

We rose quite early, to be greeted by the sight and sound of miscellaneous gulls outside our window and even a bevy of eight swans, which graced our view daily throughout our stay. They even came to say goodbye just as we were leaving, a week later.

We found our way to Leith Links on foot (less than 10 minutes walk away) and played tennis there. Three courts in good condition; quite similar to our regular arrangements at Boston Manor.

Then we returned to the flat to wash, change and sort out bus/tram passes. Once we were “appy” with that, we set off into Edinburgh. First stop, to collect our tickets for today at the High Street Fringe ticket shop.

Then we headed towards Underbelly, to get our bearings & find some lunch. An Underbelly usher recommended Let Me Eat Too, where we had giant “Balmoral” panini wraps of chicken, haggis & cheese. There we met a nice English family – the son was in a show & the parents had some good ideas/suggestions for us.

We subsequently decided that places like Let Me Eat Too and their portion sizes were a bit “over belly” for us at lunchtime ahead of shows at Underbelly and the like, so we lightened up our subsequent post-tennis/lunchtime arrangements.

We saw the only play I had pre-booked for the trip: Angry Alan by Penelope Skinner. It was a superb piece, very well acted by Donald Sage Mackay, whom we had seen quite recently in White Guy On The Bus at the Finborough. Angry Alan has been very well received, on the whole, in formal reviews. By chance, we got to meet Donald Sage Mackay & Penelope Skinner afterwards in the Underbelly cafe.

Then we hunted down tickets for the shows that nice family recommended, &/but took sanctuary in the Checkpoint cafe on Bristo Place. I went on a bit of a fool’s errand from there to try & get tickets in person – app/collect works much better and cheaper it seems.

Then we strolled on to George Square to see NewsRevue; the other show I had pre-booked before we set off for Edinburgh.

I have been hanging around NewsRevue since the early 1990s and had material in the show, including the Edinburgh “best of” shows, for most of that decade. Of course I had often seen previews of the Edinburgh show at the Canal Cafe, but this was the first time I had ever seen the show in Edinburgh. The show has a different vibe in a 500-seater auditorium with the performers miked up and the audience in “early evening Fringe” mode rather than “late night cabaret” mode.

But it is still a very good show, as it has always been; and oh boy was it packed the day we saw it; probably the case every day. NewsRevue really has become an Edinburgh Fringe institution now.

Then we strolled back to High Street to collect those appy show tickets for tomorrow. Then back to Cowgate for quick drink at Underbelly & then on to Three Sisters (Free Sisters) to see Michael Keane (a friend of mine from the real tennis community) & his pals in a comedy improv. show named BattleActs.

Not really our sort of thing; improv. shows, but this one was done very well and had packed out a fairly sizeable room at the Free Sisters.

We bussed back to Leith, stopping for dinner at Chop House Leith for some excellent aged steaks and a couple of glasses of very quaffable red wine.

We’d had a super first day at the fringe.

If you want to see all the pictures we took on this Edinburgh trip, you can find the album by clicking here or the picture (Flickr Album link) below:

But It Still Goes On by Robert Graves, Finborough Theatre, 27 July 2018

“My bad”, as the young folks say, choosing this one.

These days, I usually avoid plays written in the “between the wars” period; there’s something about them stylistically that tends to grate on me and especially on Janie.

This one, by Robert Graves, never previously performed, seemed like such interesting subject matter for its time, from such a fine writer, I thought we might be in for a winner.

Here is the Finborough resource that drew us in, now with post-production links too.

It’s probably not the best idea for me and Janie to go to longer, wordy plays on a Friday evening, even at the best of times. But this was at the end of a hot and steamy week…

…a very wordy play with a disproportionately long first “half”…

…I thought the play might usefully be renamed “But It Still Goes On And On And On”…

…we ducked out at the interval and retreated to Noddyland via Mohsen.

Clearly many people and indeed a fair proportion of the reviewers, really liked this play/production. Here is a link that finds reviews, good, bad and ugly.

To be fair, there was quite a lot to like about the production, as is usually the case at the Finborough. The cast were very good and the production tried to invoke a 1920s atmosphere pretty well, given the limited space and resources available in a room above above a pub; albeit one of the very best pub theatres on the planet.

It was the play that proved to be a let down for us. Hugely stereotypical characters; angst of the spoilt brat variety amongst the privileged classes…

…yes, of course we did feel sympathy with the characters who had suffered in the Great War and those who were struggling with their necessarily suppressed (in that era) feelings of various sexuality. But by gosh was it laid on with a wordy trowel and some ludicrous sub-plots.

It reminded me a bit of The Pains Of Youth by Ferdinand Bruckner; an Austrian existential angst play from the same era which, several years ago, also had us out of the theatre early, missing the rather inevitable tragic ending:

Pains Of Youth by Ferdinand Bruckner, Cottesloe Theatre, 7 November 2009

Further, I don’t think Robert Graves was a natural for play-writing and although the probable reason that the play was originally hidden/unperformed for many decades was its overt references to sexuality, I’d suggest that one of the other reasons was that those who commissioned it and others who subsequently looked at it decided that the play was not much good.

Given the subject matter, the play is, of course, an interesting curiosity in our modern era and I can see why the Finborough decided to produce it.

The acting was very good on the whole; Alan Cox played the lead role; his daddy Brian Cox (the actor, not the pop-scientist) was in the audience to watch him the night we were there.

We’re still fans of the Finborough; we just didn’t like this play.

The Strange Death Of John Doe by Fiona Doyle, Hampstead Theatre Downstairs, Followed By Dinner At Fora With Dot And Randy, 23 June 2018

Janie and I were fascinated by the descriptive rubric about this play, so booked to see it as soon as the tickets went on sale, as oft we do for the Hampstead Downstairs.

Here (and through the embedded picture below) is a link to that rubric and other Hampstead resources about this play and production.

Even the programme for this one is downloadable for free – I haven’t seen the Hampstead do that before – a new initiative perhaps?

A few weeks before our booking, I got a message from Dot to say that “they” would be in England the weekend of 23/24 June and wondered if I could recommend a show for them to see and/or it would be nice to meet up. In the event, there were still tickets for this play available and Dot seemed keen to join us.

“They” turned out to be Dot (who came to Z/Yen from the USA as a summer intern a few years ago, recruited by me while I was experimenting with recreational on-line poker using my first ever smart phone – that is certainly an Ogblog story for another day)…

…plus her beau Randy. Randy came to England on this occasion primarily for work purposes, whereas Dot was in transit, on her way to watch some football World Cup live in Russia.

Anyway, it made a change for me and Janie to go to the theatre with some other people – it is years since we last did that. Dot and Randy made excellent company too, bringing a different perspective to the themes raised in the play and indeed interesting perspectives on the current geopolitical maelstrom on both sides of the Atlantic pond.

Before the show, we had a chance encounter with Ollie Goodwin, who was also at the Hampstead but he was watching the upstairs show…so it proved to be a brief encounter. Still, always good to see Ollie.

The play itself indeed proved to be very interesting and superbly acted/directed. All of the performers were very good indeed. Janie and I again noticed Callie Cooke as exceptional – we still remember Firebird (another Hampstead Downstairs triumph which Ed Hall himself directed) and Callie Cooke’s performance in it as one of the best:

Firebird by Phil Davies, Hampstead Theatre Downstairs, 2 October 2015

In those days (2015) the Downstairs studio eschewed official reviews, but the Hampstead’s policy has changed, so you will find official and unofficial reviews through this link – click here. The official reviews are good but not rave reviews, whereas some of the unofficial noise is unequivocally complimentary. My take on it is that the play has its flaws, not least the rapidity of the scene changes and the amount of walking on/walking off that goes on in short scenes, but that the flaws do not detract from the drama, tension and fine acting within the piece. This production is well worth seeing.

It’s not ideally suited for the very squeamish – it is mostly set in a post mortem lab – but I was able to cope with it which means that most people should be OK – the grizzly bits were mostly done with sound rather than visuals. I glanced at one grizzly point to see if our entourage looked OK and assessed that Randy might be as squeamish as me, whereas Janie and Dot were lapping it up. Indeed the two girls looked as though they might, had they lived in late 18th century Paris, have sat in the front row of the guillotine execution sessions, knitting.

After the show, Janie, Dot, Randy and I went to Fora in St John’s Wood for a very tasty Turkish meal and a chance to chat about the issues some more. Randy generously picked up the tab at Fora – he can visit again 😉 – so Janie insisted on dropping the young couple back at the Hotel Intercontinental, bringing a most enjoyable evening to an end. Yes, come to think of it, both of them most certainly can visit again.

Utility by Emily Schwend, Orange Tree Theatre, 2 June 2018

We thought this was a fabulous piece, beautifully portrayed.

The synopsis sounds like a great many plays; a domestic drama about a woman trapped in an unsatisfactory marriage, struggling to keep the household together domestically and financially.

This is kitchen sink drama to such an extent that there is even a kitchen sink with a somewhat intrusive window as part of the set. I think the theatre had accidentally withheld two decent seats (our usual favourites) and sold the two that were restricted by the set; so we made a late seat swap to return to “our” regular seats. Minor stuff for previewistas like us – I’m sure the Orange Tree will resolve/have resolved for post preview audiences.

In short, the play is extremely well written and the performances are all excellent, making this an exceptional production well worth seeing.

Here is a link to the Orange tree resource for this play.

All of the performances were excellent, but Robyn Addison as the lead role, Amber, was a standout performance in this piece.

Formal reviews have just started to come in at the time of writing, but they seem to be coming through as deservedly good ones – click here for a link to find them.

Did Janie and I go to Don Fernando to chew over the issues and some Spanish food afterwards? By heck we did.

If you get a chance to see this production of Utility, we suggest you take it.

Masterpieces by Sarah Daniels, Finborough Theatre, 28 April 2018

Image borrowed from Amazon, from whence the text might be bought.

I’d been keen to see this one. I remembered reading it “back in the day” and had wondered how it might work as a performance piece.

In truth, it didn’t work for either of us.

Here is a link to the Finborough’s resource on Masterpieces.

The subject matter of the play is fascinating; pornography, the objectification of women, violence against women and how all those things might interrelate. But, to me, the play fails to develop characters and plot sufficiently to make the audience care about the drama; only about the issues.

Janie thought that maybe it was the production that was a bit stilted rather than the play. Hard to tell.

Perhaps we were a little jaded because we were both tired after a longish day at a tennis match…

A Week Dominated By Intense Middlesex v MCC Contests, 24, 27 & 28 April 2018

…but then again, I played the same fixture the previous year, after which we saw and loved The Ferryman at the Royal Court:

The Ferryman by Jez Butterworth, Royal Court Theatre, 29 April 2017

A little unfair, perhaps, to compare a Finborough production with a Royal Court one, but the point is we do have the stamina for long days and long plays if/when the quality is high enough.

Returning to Masterpieces, I can understand why it seemed timely to revive the play, given the topicality of its issues in a subtly different context 35 years on. But as a play, it seemed very old-fashioned to me and the style in which the Finborough directed and produced this play very much locked it in as an 80s period piece, which (for me) was a mistake.

We rarely walk at half time, but on this occasion, tired and cognisant that the second half contains gruelling material, we did walk.

I believe this production is getting mixed reviews at the time of writing, so you don’t need to take our word for it – click here and skim the various reviews. Indeed, the piece has c3 weeks still to run at the time of writing, so you can go judge for yourselves.

On the matter of Sarah Daniels writing style, I cannot find an extract from Masterpieces but here is a short monologue from The Gut Girls which gives you a feel for the style:

Anyway, we have seen far more hits than misses at the Finborough, so we remain fans of that super place.

Postscript: An Extract From Masterpieces…

…has subsequently emerged on the web. Here is an embed [pun unintended]:

Mayfly by Joe White, Orange Tree Theatre, 21 April 2018

We thought this was another really good Orange Tree production of a new play by a new playwright. Once again Paul Miller and his team showing a consistently good eye for talent.

On paper it sounds like yet another small-scale drama about lonely lives and handling grief. But the dialogue sparkles, the mix of tragedy and comedy is elegantly handled and the production values are quite outstanding for a tiny theatre like the Orange Tree. Very clever design with the odd coup de theatre thrown in for good measure.

Here is a link to the Orange Tree’s excellent resource for this play/production.

Below is the trailer:

All four performers were excellent, with Irfan Shamji as Harry the standout performance amongst stiff competition…not that it IS a competition.

In truth, it is a slightly slow play – a lot of build up and back story – but the dialogue is so well written and the piece so well acted and directed, the 105 minutes seemed to whizz by in a jiffy…

…much like the life of a mayfly.

No reviews at the time of writing – ahead of press night – but I’d expect this one to be well received, so (if you are reading this during the run, which ends 26 May), book early to avoid disappointment.

Here is a link to a search term that will find all the reviews once they get here.

For once we did not indulge in Spanish food after the show – my indulgences over the preceding 24 hours, which included a sashimi feast when I returned from Chelmsford…

A Day At Chelmsford With Charles “Charley The Gent Malloy” Bartlett, Essex v Lancashire Day One, 20 April 2018

…had done me in food-wise – but in any case we both felt sated by this excellent evening at the theatre.

The Phlebotomist by Ella Road, Hampstead Theatre Downstairs, 14 April 2018

Gosh, we thought this was a very good production indeed.

We both normally have reservations about “dystopian future” plays. Janie in particular was not sure about the subject matter of this one when we booked it. Had it not been for my enthusiasm for the specific moral dilemmas I saw coming and our general sense that Hampstead Downstairs plays are normally worth seeing, we might well not have booked this.

In short, the play is about a future society in which genetic profiling becomes the “be all and end all” of people’s prospects.

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

Indeed Janie said she found the subject matter creepy during the interval and we noticed that several people did not return after the interval. That is a real shame, because the play was extremely well acted, directed and produced; well worth watching for the drama that unfolds, even if the story line is not quite your bag.

The plot was somewhat predictable, because (without wanting to give too much away) the motivation that might cause certain behaviours could only logically have been caused by the eventual, pivotal plot twist.

But I still think this is a good play – the dialogue is top notch and the moral dilemmas well worth exploring, even if in the context of a future society, elements of which seem prescient but the extreme version depicted seems somewhat unlikely.

Below is the promotional video for this play/production:

Reviews aren’t out yet, but when they do appear you’ll find them through this search term, click here.

Superb performances – all four of the cast but especially Jade Anouka and Cherelle Skeete – names we’ll look out for from now on.

Even Janie came round to the subject matter when we discussed the issues at some length over the rest of the weekend.

Highly recommended.

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Postscript: An Extract From Masterpieces…

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