Tag: Mona Hammond

Blood Wedding by Federico Garcia Lorca, Cottesloe Theatre, 14 December 1991

Gosh I thought this was very good.

I think it might have been my first experience of a Lorca play and by gosh this production of Blood Wedding was powerful.

I saw this with Bobbie.

Subsequently Janie and I both became very keen on Lorca and saw a good production of Blood Wedding at the Almeida in 2005.

But returning to this production, the Theatricalia entry for it is here. A very young Helen McCrory starred as the bride and Cyril Nri was the groom.

It seems that we saw a preview, as press night was three days after our sight of it.

Below is Michael Coveney’s review from The Observer:

Coveney On Blood WeddingCoveney On Blood Wedding Sun, Jan 5, 1992 – 41 · The Observer (London, Greater London, England) · Newspapers.com

I think they got their timing wrong having press night on 17 December… a rare Cottesloe opening that missed out on Michael Billington or indeed anyone from the Guardian. But in my view it was the critics who missed out on a very good production.

The Crucible by Arthur Miller, Olivier Theatre, 30 June 1990

I rated this production very good and I remember it surprisingly well.

Howard Davies directed this one and gathered an excellent cast. Tom Wilkinson as John Proctor, Zoe Wanamaker as Elizabeth Proctor, Clare Holman as Abigail, plus a top notch RNT ensemble, as was the way at that time.

Here is the Theatricalia entry for this production.

Below is Nicholas de Jongh’s review from The Guardian:

de Jongh on The Cruciblede Jongh on The Crucible Sat, Jun 2, 1990 – 21 · The Guardian (London, Greater London, England) · Newspapers.com

This production must have been very good, because it is quite a long play and I had “done my back” pretty dramatically the week before. Thus started a period when my back would tell me whether or not I was fully engaged in a theatrical production. For this one, I only recall the superb drama; I don’t recall the pain!