Category: Theatre

My City by Stephen Poliakoff, Almeida Theatre, 24 September 2011

Janie and I are partial to a bit of Poliakoff on the stage, which is all too rare these days, so we were had been very much looking forward to this one.

Super cast too – and at the Almeida.

Here is a link to the Almeida resource on this production.

Tracey Ullman has tremendous stage presence. The conceit of the play – an old primary schoolteacher wandering around London telling stories about the place – sounds great.

Yet, in truth, this play was not quite top drawer Poliakoff in our eyes. It was revisiting many of his themes and styles, but perhaps without hitting the heights that earlier works hit. Perhaps it is the familiarity that detracts from the sense of excitement.

We had a very enjoyable evening at the theatre, but concluded that Poliakoff is probably, now, doing his best work for TV rather than for stage.

I think the reviews pretty much concurred with our views. Here is a link to a search term that should find most if not all of those reviews.

 

 

Three Nights In Buxton & The Importance Of Being Frank, 11 To 14 July 2011

Janie and I were struggling to remember all the details of this short break in Buxton with Chris and Hilary, in part to take in the Buxton Festival Fringe. Strangely, no photos.

I think we intended to walk but I don’t think we walked much, if at all. Perhaps the weather failed to smile on us.

Janie remembers speaking quite a lot with Todd at Nat’s Kitchen, before we stayed and also while we were there – he was helpful and full of advice. Perhaps I’ll be able to expand this entry when we do some archaeology on Janie’s diary.

I’m pretty sure there were one or two things that Hil and Chris were interested in seeing that we really didn’t want to do.

I have a feeling Janie and I went to see a folky-fusiony outfit in a basement bar type place one evening while Hil and Chris went to see a naff-sounding show which even they admitted afterwards had not been worth the candle.

The Importance Of Being Frank was a bit of a compromise choice which I’m pretty sure we all went to see and found funny in parts.

Here is a link to the relevant fringe preview.

That link is scraped to here, if the above link no longer works.

Quirky place but we liked it. Nat’s Kitchen reviewed – click here…

…or if that link has gone, scraped to here.

We also dined at the Old Hall Hotel one time – I think Hil and Chris were staying there and I think that was the first night…but our memories on this one are not great.

The only other thing I remember is the backdrop of the trip supposedly being an opportunity for the workmen to finish off snagging Noddyland (Janie had moved in a few weeks previously).

We returned to find only a couple of items from the list done; the rest of the time they had no doubt spent, as they had spent most of the preceding weeks, giving priority to the next big job. It took tears to invoke enough shame and sympathy to get them back in to finish off in the following few days.

The Village Bike by Penelope Skinner, Royal Court Theatre Upstairs, 25 June 2011

We really enjoyed this play and production upstairs at the Royal Court.

Here is the Royal Court resource on this play/production.

This was a really entertaining and thought-provoking play by the very promising playwright Penelope Skinner. I think this was our first sight of one of hers; Linda at the Royal Court a few years later – click here or below – confirmed our suspicions that she is a special talent.

Linda by Penelope Skinner, Royal Court Theatre, 28 November 2015

The Village Bike had a very fine cast for an upstairs production, not least Dominic Rowan and Romola Garai, both excellent. Indeed the whole cast was excellent, as was the set, directing, the lot.

Most but not all of the reviews rated it excellent – here is a search term that finds reviews and the other resources you might want.

Lunch At Lambeth Palace, Followed By The School For Scandal by Richard Brinsley Sheridan, Barbican Theatre, 15 June 2011

A rare visit to the theatre on my own and on a Wednesday. No point trying to get Janie to a Georgian comedy; she doesn’t do classics and she doesn’t do farcical comedy of any kind.

But for reasons of my own – I still have some distantly related ideas for a comedy play on a jotter – I very much wanted to see this show, which had but a short run at the Barbican before going on to the Holland Festival.

As it happens, I had been invited that day to Lambeth Palace for lunch by the Church Commissioners (as Ian Theodoreson’s guest), so it seemed a suitable day for me to take the rest of the day off and therefore be free to spend the early part of a midweek evening at the theatre.

While suitable in practical terms, it was perhaps not quite such a suitable cultural switch from a dignified Lambeth Palace lunch under the auspices of Rowan Williams, the Archbishop of Canterbury, to a bawdy Georgian comedy under the auspices of Deborah Warner, the radical stage director. Neither the irony nor the culture shock of the switch seemed to affect me unduly on the day.

The Lambeth Palace lunch was delightful, btw. I met several interesting new people (this was the only occasion I met Rowan Williams) as well as getting a chance to chat with Ian T and the people I know in that Church of England circle. I was particularly impressed with the dignified informality and grandeur with a tasteful lack of ostentation to the whole Lambeth Palace event.

Afterwards I had plenty of time to do some reading at the Barbican Centre over a coffee or two in the afternoon before seeing the play.

Here is an explanatory vid with Deborah Warner talking about her production of the School For Scandal:

https://youtu.be/nNYiQGGs4hw

In truth I wasn’t bowled over by this production, which had received mixed reviews. This search term – click here – will find you reviews and other resources on the production.

It had some super people in the cast and I thought some of the modernising ideas were quite interesting. But on the whole I thought it was a pretty standard production of a Georgian play with a few nods to modern touches.

Of course it isn’t easy to refresh ideas that have been around for centuries and get their relevance across to modern audiences…

…perhaps the two halves of my unusual day had more in common than I thought about at the time.

The Acid Test by Anya Reiss, Royal Court Upstairs, 28 May 2011

We’d really enjoyed Spur Of The Moment by the ridiculously young and talented Anya Reiss the year before:

Spur Of The Moment by Anya Reiss, Royal Court Theatre Upstairs, 3 August 2010

…so were keen to give her another try.

I don’t think this one worked quite as well for us. Yes, there was still sparkling wit to the dialogue. But basically this play was yet another drunken gathering descending into chaos comedy.

Excellent production qualities with top notch cast and creatives, as we expect from the Royal Court, but not top drawer Royal Court to our taste.

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

This search term should find you reviews and other resources on this play/production.

We’re still hoping to see Anya Reiss progress to greater things on the stage. Plenty of time; she was still only 18 for this one.

I Am The Wind by Jon Fosse, Young Vic, 21 May 2011

This short Norwegian play ticked most if not all of our boxes, in theory.

Adapted by Simon Stephens, whom we very much admire. Two fine actors in Tom Brooke and Jack Laskey. An astonishing, watery set…

…yet somehow the piece failed to move us much. To us, it felt like a slight piece with ideas above its station.

The critics loved it – click here for a search term that provides links to all the right places.

You can see a vid clip if you click through this link from this production at the Festival Avignon.

Paul Taylor in The Independent – click here – claimed not to much like Jon Fosse but found this production one of the best things he’d ever seen.

We didn’t get that “extra something” from the experience, but what do we know?

Dwelling In Bed Ain’t Bad by Paul Haenen, Riverside Studios, 14 May 2011

Billed as a sell-out wow show from Amsterdam and Antwerp, we thought we’d give this play with its short run at the Riverside a try.

In truth, it was a very slight but charming piece about a gay couple.

We quite enjoyed it, but in truth were not wowed.

There is a preview/teaser to be seen:

This search term – click here- will find other stuff on the short run at the Riverside (and to some extent the production generally.

I think we went to the Thai Bistro afterwards – not sure why that memory is quite strong but it is.

 

A Delicate Balance by Edward Albee, Almeida Theatre, 7 May 2011

A stellar cast for this Edward Albee revival.

Here is a link to the Almeida resource for this production.

Of course it was wonderfully well acted and the production was excellent, but I recall not being too enamoured of the play. It was quite long and wordy. I think you are supposed to feel trapped by the play, much as the characters are trapped in their circumstances.

On the whole the critics loved it – here is a search term that finds reviews and stuff.

I have also found an interesting vid that shows how the Almeida team transformed the place from The Knot Of The Heart into A Delicate Balance:

The Stock Da’Wa by David Eldridge, Hampstead Theatre Downstairs, 22 April 2011

David Eldridge plays are like buses – you wait ages then two come along at more or less the same time – this was two David Eldridges in a row for us.

I think this was the first production we ever saw at the Hampstead Theatre Downstairs, quite early in the era of Ed Hall using that downstairs space for experimental works.

It was the evening of Good Friday; an unusual night for a theatre visit.

No formal reviews down there of course, but a few informal ones and other resources through the search term linked here…

…e.g. There Ought To Be Clowns Blogspot – click here.

I remember we thought this was a very good production and made a mental note to seek out subsequently the Hampstead Downstairs, which, by jingo, we have done.

The Knot Of The Heart by David Eldridge, Almeida Theatre, 16 April 2011

This was a challenging play about addiction and the impact of those with addictions/addictive personalities on their loved ones.

Lisa Dillon was superb in the lead; it seems the lead part was pretty-much written for her. As usual at the Almeida, it was a well-chosen play, extremely well acted, directed and produced.

Islington Almeida Theatre 2011
David Eldridge was very much on our watch list as a writer; we’d seen a few of his that we really liked, not least his adaptation of Festen at the Almeida.

I must admit though, we both found this a tough watch. Perhaps it was too soon after Phillie’s passing for us to be suitably sympathetic to a character whose misery and tragedy seemed largely self-inflicted. But it was undeniably an excellent evening’s theatre.

Here is the Almeida resource on this play/production.

Below is a good trailer with quotes David Eldridge and Michael Attenborough commenting:

The play and production were (deservedly) very well received by the critics – here is a search term that finds reviews and other relevant resources.

Extremely powerful stuff.