Tag: Harriet Walter

The Late Middle Classes by Simon Gray, Richmond Theatre, 22 May 1999

Very good indeed. Thought provoking.

That’s what I wrote in my log at the time.

Janie booked this one, so I can report that we sat in seats D6, D7 & D8…and that she paid £20 a pop for this excellent evening at the theatre. I suppose £20 really was £20 back then. Still sounds like value.

The third ticket was for “The Duchess” (Janie’s mum).

Harold Pinter directed an excellent cast including Nicholas Woodeson, Harriet Walter & Angela Pleasence. Here is a link to the Theatricalia entry.

Our friend, Michael Billington, liked it in The Guardian:

Late Middle Guardian BillingtonLate Middle Guardian Billington 27 Mar 1999, Sat The Guardian (London, Greater London, England) Newspapers.com

Paul Taylor in The Indy also thought highly of this production:

Late Middle Taylor IndyLate Middle Taylor Indy 27 Mar 1999, Sat The Independent (London, Greater London, England) Newspapers.com

We’ll have eaten at Don Fernando’s after theatre, because in those days, if we went to Richmond for theatre, that’s what we did afterwards. {Insert your own joke about “the late-dining middle classes” here].

Ivanov by Anton Chekhov, Almeida Theatre, 1 March 1997

We loved this play and production.

In those days, Ralph Fiennes was one of my buddies as Lambton Place…

…OK, what I really mean is that I’d quite often see him there and we were nodding acquaintances.

Anyway, Fiennes was doing great theatre work in those days, not least at the Almeida, which was having a heyday under the joint leadership of Iain McDiarmid (also one of my nodding acquaintances in the Notting Hill neighbourhood back then, as it happens) and Jonathan Kent.

I wrote in my log:

Very good production. Ian McDiarmid near stole the show the night we went understudying as Kosykh.

Here is a link to the Theatricalia entry, which informs us that John cater was supposed to play Kosykh.

Anyway…

Charles Spencer loved it in The Telegraph:

Ivanov Spencer TelegraphIvanov Spencer Telegraph 20 Feb 1997, Thu The Daily Telegraph (London, Greater London, England) Newspapers.com

Nicholas de Jongh was less sure in The Standard:

Ivanov, de Jongh, StandardIvanov, de Jongh, Standard 20 Feb 1997, Thu Evening Standard (London, Greater London, England) Newspapers.com

Paul taylor spoke highly of it in The Independent:

Ivanov, Taylor, IndependentIvanov, Taylor, Independent 21 Feb 1997, Fri The Independent (London, Greater London, England) Newspapers.com

While my friend, Michael Billington, loved it:

Ivanov, Billington, GuardianIvanov, Billington, Guardian 20 Feb 1997, Thu The Guardian (London, Greater London, England) Newspapers.com

…as did we (have I mentioned that yet?) – then we left the country for a few weeks.

The Children’s Hour by Lillian Hellman, Lyttelton Theatre, 24 September 1994

Some rare long intervals between visits to theatre and concert hall that summer, all down to the dawning of my business Z/Yen, which took up ludicrous amounts of time including weekends.

So this was our first arty-evening since Arthur Miller’s Broken Glass at the same venue some six week’s before.

Broken Glass by Arthur Miller, Lyttelton Theatre, 13 August 1994

The Children’s Hour is a great play – Wikipedia describes it here.

The Lyttelton production we saw was very good. Super cast including Harriet Walter and Clare Higgins. Howard Davies directed it. Theatricalia sets out the cast and crew here.

No on-line reviews for the 1994 production that we saw…

…except I now have the odd clipping:

Billington On The Children's HourBillington On The Children’s Hour Sat, Sep 24, 1994 – 30 · The Guardian (London, Greater London, England) · Newspapers.com

…and this one from Michael Coveney:

Coveney On The Children's HourCoveney On The Children’s Hour Sun, Sep 25, 1994 – 81 · The Observer (London, Greater London, England) · Newspapers.com

But anyway you can take our word for it that this was a very good production.

Arcadia by Tom Stoppard, Lyttelton Theatre, 17 April 1993

I liked this play and production far more than Janie did. Where I liked the intellectual aspects of the content, Janie found them pretentious and at times confusing.

Wikipedia gives a decent synopsis of the play – here.

Janie has never much liked plays that jump backwards and forwards in time, although, coincidentally, we saw Emma Fielding in a similarly time-shifting play recently (autumn 2019) which Janie really liked.

Michael Coveney revewed it the day after we saw it:

Sun, Apr 18, 1993 – 57 · The Observer (London, Greater London, England) · Newspapers.com

I think that’s one-nil to Janie in the “confusing rather than clever” stakes.

Michael Billington liked it more, I think:

Wed, Apr 14, 1993 – 26 · The Guardian (London, Greater London, England) · Newspapers.com