The King Of Hell’s Palace by Frances Ya-Chu Cowhig, Hampstead Theatre, 28 September 2019

We wanted to like this. The story, about a medical scandal and whistle-blowing, set in rural China in 1992, sounded right up our street.

Playwright Frances Ya-Chu Cowhig makes a compelling case for her play here…

…but we found the play itself stilted in style, the characters one-dimensional and the story rather too unsubtly obvious.

Chinese theatre perhaps has some of the above characteristics embedded in its culture, but Janie and I are familiar enough with China – we’ve been going there on and off since 1993 for goodness sake – we just felt that this play missed many opportunities to make its points more thoughtfully.

We felt that a talented cast was doing its best with a lengthy wooden script, so try as we might we couldn’t muster the desire to return for 75-80 minutes more after the interval.

A rare miss from the Hampstead these days, although we have noticed a sense of “playing it safe” creeping in to the upstairs scheduling; hence we’re booking less up there. Our next visit will be downstairs.

Here is a link to the Hampstead’s resources on this play/production.

It’s had decent reviews – this link should find them for you.

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.

The Intelligent Homosexual’s Guide To Capitalism And Socialism With A Key To The Scriptures by Tony Kushner, Hampstead Theatre, 22 October 2016

I’d forgotten how much Tony Kushner likes to write long plays. Perhaps the unfeasibly long title for this play (which Kushner helpfully abbreviates to an Apple-device-like nickname “iHo”) should have reminded me.

But I did remember how superb Angels in America had been in 1993, even though I only saw the first part of that seven-hour epic as I was so poorly the day Janie and I were supposed to see the second half that Janie went to see it alone while I spent the evening (as indeed I had spent the whole day) on the potty.

It had been a long wait for the next Tony Kushner and I snapped up these Hampstead tickets with relish when I saw the superb-looking cast and creatives list for iHo.

Before I forget, here is a link to the Hampstead’s excellent resource on this production of iHo. 

Still, come the weekend of our visit, when I saw that the production was listed as 3 hours and 30 minutes long, my heart sank a bit and I started to formulate contingency, bail-out plans, just in case it was all going to be too much. Two intervals give you extra scope for polite bail-out, of course.

Neither Janie nor I tend to have as much attention span as we once had. Perhaps it is a sign of the times; younger folk these days hardly ever finish a…or perhaps our increasing age decreases our patience – ’nuff said.

I needn’t have worried. The play has plenty going on to hold my attention for that length of time. Janie was less sure about the play than I was, but she was very taken with the performances, the design and the directing.

We ran into John and Linda – a couple we often see at the theatre and who live near the flat in Notting Hill Gate – for the first time in ages – chatting to them made both intervals whizz by.

The play might pick up some criticism for being a long, meandering ramble through an essentially simple plot about a family and their brownstone homestead in Brooklyn. But of course the play covers more than that; homosexuality, capitalism, socialism (and indeed Marxism) naturally show up; to a greater or lesser extent defining characteristics of the complex personalities of the chaotic protagonists.

Central to the plot is the overt and outspoken desire of the central character, a retired longshoreman/union-leader played excellently by David Calder, voluntarily to commit an act of euthanasia. His bisexual employment-lawyer daughter, the equally excellent Tamsin Greig, an intriguing opponent to the idea, matching the old git with her advocacy and connivances to try to steer the outcome her way, metaphorical punch for metaphorical punch.

The rest of the family and their entourages were also wonderfully depicted by this excellent cast. Family row scenes tended to have several people yelling at the same time, yet, through superb writing/directing, I felt that we were getting to hear and follow everything we were supposed to.

Anyway, we saw this production in preview, so the reviews are yet to show. The good ones will (in the fullness of time) be on the Hampstead resource for this production – here’s the link again. You’ll have to find poor/indifferent ones for yourselves unless I decide to return to this page and add some.

I thought this play/production was great and well worth seeing. Janie, less sure about the play, still thought it worth seeing. We both found a light, shawarma supper afterwards well worth eating.