Tag: Brian Friel

Fathers And Sons by Brian Friel, after the novel by Ivan Turgenev, Donmar Warehouse, 26 July 2014

The programmes hadn’t arrived, so (most unusually for the Donmar) we got a simple black and white printed A4 foldy. Standards.

The play was very good indeed, though, as was the cast. The usual high production values for the Donmar too.

Here is a link to the wonderful Behind The Scenes material which Donmar has now put on the web for interested folk to download.

A bit slow, but then this IS a 19th century Russian story and it IS Brian Friel, whom we like very much, btw.

The critics on the whole shared our enjoyment of it – click here for a link to reviews.

In short, this was a good’n.

Translations by Brian Friel, Questors Theatre, 12 May 2001

Another Saturday evening at The Questors with Janie’s mum, The Duchess.

The commercial arrangements for the evening will have been scrupulously fair:

  • The Duchess will have done The Questors tickets – we found out many years later she got a certain number of guest freebies per year with her subscription which she scrupulously deployed on us;
  • Janie and I will have done the interval drinks and dinner afterwards. On this occasion we went to Monty’s in Ealing – a place where you could get a late night tandoori or ruby and the Duchess would be allowed as many “last smokes” as she fancied without us being thrown out.

As always, The Questors will have been a very acceptable quality of production – the top end of am dram; semi-professional really.

And as always, The Questors has an exceptional archive – far better than most professional theatres, enabling you, dear reader, to read all about it, including the whole programme, without additional help from me, by clicking this link.

Dancing At Lughnasa by Brian Friel, Lyttelton Theatre, 22 December 1990

Wow.

I have strong memories of this one. Just one word in my log:

Superb.

It was a convoluted process getting to see it, as I was really suffering with my back knack when this production opened in London (October 1990; it had spent the spring and summer at the Abbey Theatre in Dublin).

Anyway, Bobbie and I sorted out some good tickets for just before Christmas and my goodness this one was worth seeing.

Excellent cast, including Brid Brennan, Stephen Dillane and Alec McCowen. In truth I don’t know Director Patrick Mason for anything else but he can come visit again.

I remember early the next year recommending it to a Dutch software developer, Gerard Mey, who was working on a project with me in London and asked me to recommend a show. I wondered if it was too challenging for someone who does not boast English as a first language. Gerard told me how much he enjoyed it, while admitting that he found some of the language difficult, but said that his head had been full of so many interesting thoughts and ideas since seeing it. That’s a recommendation in my book!

I’ll leave it to the experts to explain in their words just how good this show was.

Michael Billington spoke very highly of it in The Guardian

Billington on LughnasaBillington on Lughnasa Wed, Oct 17, 1990 – 38 · The Guardian (London, Greater London, England) · Newspapers.com

Michael Coveney gushed about it in The Observer when he saw it at the Abbey in the spring:

Coveney on LughnasaCoveney on Lughnasa Sun, May 6, 1990 – 57 · The Observer (London, Greater London, England) · Newspapers.com