I didn’t make any notes in my log about this one. I don’t think we were overly impressed with it, but neither did we think it quite as awful as some of the critics. Still, I’d better let the critics do the job for me with this one, given that i wrote nothing.
This play/production had enjoyed rave reviews and lengthy transfers. Unusually for us, more than a year after it first came out, we decided to book it and see what it was like.
We’re not usually shrinking violets as far as “no holds barred” serious theatre is concerned, but we found this play intolerable. Perhaps our emotions were heightened by the recent shock news about Janie’s twin, Phillie, whose radical cancer surgery had taken place a couple of week’s earlier.
My logged verdict:
Ghastly – we walked out at half time.
Charles Spencer was pretty plain about the piece in The Telegraph:
At that time, along with Fung Shing, one of our favourite up market eateries in Chinatown, this is yet another fine place that didn’t make it into the 2020s.
Interesting (weird) evening. Programme missing – only insert sheet.
Actually the programme might turn out to be a play text which might turn up somewhere on my bookshelves.
I wouldn’t mind reading these plays again. This was Caryl Churchill in impenetrable mood.
Gabrielle Blunt, Jacqueline Defferary, Karina Fernandez, Bernard Gallagher, Valerie Lilley, Mary Macleod and Jason Watkins, directed by Max Stafford-Clark.
Then on to Old Park Lane Nobu for dinner. That place was the latest “in place to dine” back then, so we were keen to try it. Who’d have thought that, 25 years later, the signature black cod in miso dish would be something we can obtain from our local (Japanese) fishmonger and serve at home?
That was a lot of sensory stimulation for one evening – Caryl Churchill followed by Nobu. My guess is that Janie was very keen to try the place but could only get a late evening booking, so it sort of made sense to go after theatre.
To add to the excitement, we did it all again (in terms of theatre followed by dinner out) the very next day:
Spoonface Spencer Telegraph 07 Jan 2000, Fri The Daily Telegraph (London, Greater London, England) Newspapers.com
Spoonface de Jongh Standard 12 Jan 2000, Wed Evening Standard (London, Greater London, England) Newspapers.com
Spoonface Clapp Observer 09 Jan 2000, Sun The Observer (London, Greater London, England) Newspapers.com
