Branagh Lithic
King Lear
by William Shakespeare
Fiery Angel and Kenneth Branagh Theatre Company, at Wyndham’s Theatre, West End until 9th December
Review by Mark Aspen
Welcome to the Stone Age. A circle of standing stones rings Wyndham’s stage, like a semi-dilapidated Stonehenge; and a fluid one, for we do not always see the same henge. Above hangs a massive glossy toroidal installation, its curved surfaces receiving the changing pictures of the projection and lighting designs of Ninna Dunn and Paul Keogan. It would not be out of place gracing the ceiling of a grand five-star hotel or an ocean liner. Designer Jon Bausor’s impressive setting is quite a spectacle.
The giant torus, though, often resembles the iris of a titanic eyeball, the pitch-black pupil in its central void an all-seeing organ of a Neolithic god, an atavistic deity. Such fatalistic influences impel the plot of King Lear, although Shakespeare does not place it in a clearly defined era. One can therefore forgive Shakespeare his anachronisms. The concept of political and military rivalries between England and France is clearly a preoccupation of the late medieval mind. And there are the repeated references to swords: the swordsmith first put in an appearance in the Bronze Age. This production sidesteps this by having almost everyone armed with a willow stave. A lot of time is spent by everyone thwacking everyone else with sticks.
Read more…Suspension Bridge
A View from the Bridge
by Arthur Miller
Headlong at the Rose Theatre Kingston until 11th November
Review by Heather Moulson
A girl sits on a swing with her back to the audience, against neon lighting, and a subtly tense soundtrack. A shiny floor resembles a river, surrounded by a stark black setting, with stairs leading up to a courtroom-like area. The overall design sacrifices the tawdriness of 1950s Brooklyn for a dark atmosphere that exudes an air of downbeat glamour.
Read more…Spectacle of Storms and Sherry
And Then There Were None
by Agatha Christie
Fiery Angel, Royal & Derngate, Northampton and ROYO at Richmond Theatre, until 4th November, then on tour until 13th April 2024
Review by Eleanor Lewis
For the British there are few places more appropriate to be transported away to on a rainy Hallowe’en night than a small, difficult-to-get-to island off the coast of Britain where ten strangers are about to meet their untimely deaths in very mysterious circumstances, which means of course an Agatha Christie.
Read more…Even Bigger Buns
Calendar Girls, The Musical
by Tim Firth and Gary Barlow
Bill Kenwright at the New Wimbledon Theatre, until 4th November, then on tour until 6th April 2024
Review by Michelle Hood
Tim Firth’s Calendar Girls began life in 2003 as a heart-warming comedy film based on the true story of a group of middle-aged women who, now famously, produced a hugely successful nude calendar in 1999 to help raise money for Leukaemia Research. The film, with a stellar cast including Helen Mirren, Julie Walters, Annette Crosbie and Celia Imrie, became a global phenomenon and went on to spawn a stage adaptation, also by Tim Firth. The stage version was successfully launched at the Chichester Festival Theatre in 2008, and the play subsequently transferred to the West End, during which time “the girls” were played by the likes of Lynda Bellingham, Anita Dobson, Lesley Joseph, Patricia Hodge and Sian Phillips.
Following the success of the film, and the further success of the stage play, came the third reincarnation – this time, Calendar Girls, The Musical, which Tim Firth developed with songwriter Gary Barlow in 2015. This latest 2023 touring version, produced by the late Bill Kenwright and directed by Jonathan O’Boyle, has been updated by the writers with a revised script and includes some additional songs.
Read more…Yo Ho!
Treasure Island
by Jago Hazzard after R.L. Stevenson
Teddington Theatre Club at Hampton Hill Theatre, until 28th October
Review by Celia Bard
The cast of Treasure Island certainly succeeded in entertaining their audience at yesterday’s evening performance, not least because of an unintentional promenade staging element, signalled by a fire alarm, which resulted in the actors vacating the theatre followed by the entire audience into Hampton Hill High Street where, completely unfazed, the actors provided a bit of impromptu street entertainment until a fire officer gave the all-clear. The actors returned to the theatre, followed by the audience and the performance continued.
Read more…Dying to Come
Heathers the Musical
by Kevin Murphy and Laurence O’Keefe
Bill Kenwright and Paul Taylor-Mills, at the New Wimbledon Theatre until 28th October
Review by Gill Martin
Beware, “Heathers the Musical contains haze, loud noises including gun shots, flashing lights and strobe as well as strong language and mature themes, including bullying, murder, suicide, physical and sexual violence and references to eating disorders.” That’s the dire warning in the theatre programme but, hey, it is a musical so how upsetting can it be?
Way back in 2018 a re-release of Heathers the Musical, a bizarre and bloody story of teenage cruelty, hit the cinema screens with stars Winona Ryder and Christian Slater. Even further back in the mists of time, i.e. 1988, it was cult satirical smash hit about vindictive and paranoid high-school kids who could score top marks in meanness.
Read more…Moral Dilemmas Exploded
Farm Hall
by Katherine Moar
Theatre Royal Bath and Jermyn Street Theatre Productions at Richmond Theatre until 28th October
Review by Mark Aspen
Theatre has many functions. Comedy makes us laugh; tragedy makes us cry. It can entertain (and the panto season is just around the corner) … or it can make us think.
Farm Hall has a contemplative depth that probably no other live performance art could provide. This is theatre at its best. It is not easy theatre though, and requires an investment by the audience, but an investment that pays handsomely.
Operation Epsilon was a military action towards the end of World War II. The British government detained some of Germany’s most gifted nuclear scientists, who were believed to have worked on Nazi Germany’s atomic weapons development. The scientists, who included three Nobel Prize winners, were captured in southwestern Germany during the late spring of 1945, as part of a larger intelligence mission. They were all interned together at Farm Hall, a former stately home near Godmanchester, then in in Huntingdonshire, from July that year until early in 1946.
Read more…Oil Slick
Enron
by Lucy Prebble
Richmond Shakespeare Society at the Mary Wallace Theatre, Twickenham until 28th October
Review by Ian Moone
It has been said that when America sneezes, the world catches a cold, and it was certainly a gargantuan sneeze that spread the global financial virus of 2008, resulting in the meltdown or recession of many of the world’s economies. The reasons for this crisis are many and various but the events at Enron, only seven years prior, described so succinctly by Lucy Prebble in this award winning play, certainly started Uncle Sam’s financial nasal hairs tickling.
At its peak in the summer of 2000, Enron’s share price soared at $90.75, valuing the company at $70billion and making it, on paper at least, one of the most successful companies in US history. However, only eighteen months later, the share price had plummeted to just $0.26 and, days later, the company was declared bankrupt, sending shock waves through the global financial markets. To this day, many still wonder how a business that had lead the way on technical and corporate innovation could have failed so catastrophically. Even more puzzling is how one of the most elaborate frauds in corporate history had escaped financial scrutiny for so long.
Prebble’s cautionary account of this monumental collapse takes us on a lightning-paced journey of revelation, during which she attempts to condense the complexities of Enron’s jaw-dropping underhand dealings, fake holdings and off-the-book accounting practices into approximately two and a half hours.
Read more…Beers, Whines and Spirits
The Nag’s Head
by Gabriel Fogarty-Graveson and Felix Grainger
Make It Beautiful Theatre Company at the Park Theatre, Finsbury, until 28th October
Review by Denis Valentine
The Nags Head is a show that sells itself on the lines, “Do you want to hear tales that will chill you to the bone…”, and in parts delivers on this idea but there are many other elements packed in to its hour and forty minute runtime, which make it much more than just a ghostly horror theatre tale. As well as its spookier elements, the show is a very lively, funny affair with great energy and craft from its three actors.
Read more…Essential Traviata
La Traviata
by Giuseppe Verdi, libretto by Francesco Maria Piave (translation by Martin Fitzpatrick)
English National Opera at the London Coliseum until 12th November
Review by Patrick Shorrock
This is very much La Traviata stripped down. Stripped of a producer’s particular take on prostitution. Stripped of possibly the worst music Verdi ever wrote (Flora’s guests pretending to be Gypsies in Act 2) but also of the cabaletta that follows Di Provenza (which I was rather less happy about). Stripped of furniture, apart from a single chair. Stripped of any kind of set, other than several rows of deep red curtains (designer Johannes Leiacker). Stripped of intervals, which makes for a bladder-testing two hours right through.
But this stripping down works brilliantly, because it throws the essentials of this great opera into greater relief. It’s all about the characters and how they are revealed through their music, with no decorative distractions, and nowhere for the performers to hide. The audience is almost too caught up in the drama to applaud the arias – at the end they gave it a standing ovation – and is utterly drawn in. Alfredo sings his offstage counterpoint to Sempre Libera from the stalls, which is also where he, his father, Anina, and Doctor Grenvil are placed for the finale, leaving Violetta utterly isolated on stage.
Read more…
Mark Aspen 