Othello for Septuagenarians
Creditors
by August Strindberg adapted by Howard Brenton
OT Productions at the Orange Tree Theatre, Richmond until 11th October
Review by Patrick Shorrock
Strindberg has a reputation for making his audiences suffer while his characters tear one another apart in a desperate desire to destroy each other. He may have a reputation for misogyny, but it is perhaps more accurate to suggest that he hates humanity regardless of sex and gender. Miss Julie, his most famous play, is so harrowingly nasty that I don’t know I could ever bear to see it again. Creditors by contrast is unexpectedly funny and prompts a good deal of laughter in Howard Brenton’s witty and vivid translation. (‘The guilt doesn’t go away: your creditors will always get you in the end’.) These characters are older and tougher than in Miss Julie: harder to wound, with less to live for, which lowers the emotional stakes.
Read more…Bloodless but Heartfelt
Lucia di Lammermoor
by Gaetano Donizetti, libretto by Salvatore Cammarano
Barefoot Operaat the Arcola Theatre, Dalston until 13thSeptember and then on tour until 5th October
Review by Patrick Shorrock
Barefoot Opera shows it means business right from the start by beginning not with Donizetti’s prelude, but with Lucia’s mother singing a gloomy Scottish ballad about women being doomed to suffer at the hands of men, before the score proper starts.
The musical arrangement works really well at conveying the colour of Donizetti’s score, with a band comprising saxophone, accordion, double bass and piano – plus, on occasion, a xylophone that is also used to convey the sound of a glass harmonica by scraping a violin bow across the edge. This makes for a wonderfully spooky mad scene and is much better than the flute that used to be popular last century. I’m glad that reverting to the glass harmonica that Donizetti had in mind has now become fashionable again in the opera house. The care taken with this arrangement, where every musical choice seems to have been thought about thoroughly, was admirable and refreshing. I remember a production of the Coronation of Poppea at the King’s Head Islington that also made good use of a saxophone, which really is the arranger’s friend when it comes to reduced orchestration.
Read more…Glossy Prince
Pippin
music and lyrics by Stephen Schwarz, book by Roger O. Hirson
Cygnet Players at the Putney Arts Theatre until 6th September
Review by Heather Moulson
I had mixed feelings about the musical Pippin, with its strange fictional plot about two historical figures derived from the early Middle Ages. It fell flat when I had previously seen it. However, I went along this time to the Putney Arts Theatre with the incentive to get to really know this piece, the music and lyrics written by the legendary Stephen Schwartz: I was a big Godspell and Wicked fan and wanted to like Pippin too.
On James Chadwick’s set, the large orchestra was placed neatly to one side of the generous stage. Here the charismatic narrator, the Leading Player, greeted us with vibrancy. He brought everything to life very quickly, in the monumental stage presence and powerful voice of Jamie Miller-Hughes.
The eponymous Pippin, beautifully attired but suitably unimpressed with his royal father, was played by Laurence Parvu, whose singing was striking and strong. However, Paru took a while to get comfortable in the role, but by the second half he truly relaxed and used his performing skills beautifully.
The exciting, if shallow, half-brother Lewis was an impressive presence. I would like to see more of Alex Dehn, who took on this role, as his is a name worth watching out for. The conniving stepmother Fastrada, played by Caroline Steersmith, used her wiles skilfully.
Alex McKinven, as Pippin’s father King Charlemagne, cut a noble figure while expressing a mixture of love and exasperation for his naïve son. The gory battle behind the glitz of the chorus to Glory with scattering of limbs and torsos was well done; an a headless dialogue with Katie Sterland was terrific.
I felt sad about the microphone turbulence, as Pippin’s vampy grandmother Berthe did such a wonderful number No Time At All. It was very profound, and with hearty audience participation. Lily Gillespie Moult still shone through the technical issues.
The supporting cast, strong and pleasing to the eye in co-ordinating shades of orange and red, connected well as a strong chorus. Phoebe Fleetham, Janet Huckle and Louise Bravery’s costumes arrangements were arresting. I particularly liked the Leading Players’ and Pippin’s seventies garb.
Musical director Mimi Roberts produced wonderful sounds. The energetic and studied chorus deserve an accolade. Choreography, by Kim Schenkelaars, was well planned out and confidently handled, and the featured dancers were flawless.
The widow Catherine, who rescued Pippin, was sincerely played by Katie Dart, who took what seemed pointless snide comments from the Leading Player on the chin beautifully. I Guess I’ll Miss The Man was sung poignantly, and was one of the best numbers. Thomas Carter as her son Theo was great fun and formed a bond with Pippin.
There was apt and bold lighting by Emma Hunt and Andy James. Particularly effective was the red hue on the orchestra, highlighting their presence without intrusion.
Director Alex Johnson brought the best out of this complex piece and, you know what . . . I like Pippin.
Heather Moulson, September 2025
Photography by Russell Hughes
Monochrome Mozart
Don Giovanni
by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, libretto by Lorenzo Da Ponte
Ensemble OrQuesta for Grimeborn Opera Festival at the Arcola Theatre until 30th August
Review by Patrick Shorrock
There is a fine line between authentically rough and ready and not really good enough. It gives me no pleasure to say it, but Marcio da Silva’s production of Don Giovanni is on the wrong side of that line.
Mozart’s opera is a hugely demanding piece, with fearsomely difficult roles that require immense vocal proficiency and theatrical charisma. Unless you have a vocally well equipped cast, you shouldn’t even be thinking of putting this opera on. With romantic and modern opera, sheer volume and intensity can cover a multitude of sins, but that is not an option for Mozart, where beauty of tone and fluent coloratura are also needed.
Read more…Doggedly Searching
The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time
by Simon Stephens, after the novel by Mark Hadden
Putney Theatre Company at the Putney Arts Theatre until 30th August
Review by Polly Davies
I missed Simon Stephen’s adaptation of Mark Hadden’s best-selling novel at the National Theatre back in 2012, but having read the book I was intrigued to see how it would translate into a stage play. Well, under Francis Bodiam’s direction the answer is brilliantly. This is a stunning production, compelling and thought provoking.
The story maps the internal thoughts of a young man Christopher, as he tries to understand the changes happening around him, centring on the death of the dog belonging to his neighbour. Christopher attends a special school; is highly intelligent, fascinated by numbers, but has difficulty coping with daily life. In his obsessive quest to discover who killed the dog, his logic is impeccable. But the series of emotional and personal challenges he faces offers the audience a rare insight into the world of a neurodivergent teenager.
Read more…Wise Saws
All The World’s A Stage
compiled and produced by Anne Warrington
Poetry Performance at Garrick’s Temple to Shakespeare, Hampton 24th August
Review by Hilary Jones
The wonderful garden pavilion on the banks of the Thames, built in 1756 by David Garrick to honour his muse and hero William Shakespeare, could not be a more fitting place for Poetry Performance to tread the boards in its presentation of all things theatrical. Its splendid round room has a mere 45 seat capacity. This intimate space provided the setting for the fourteen-strong cast to perform an array of poetry and music in its production, All The World’s A Stage.
The cast was led by Master of Ceremonies Ian Lee-Dolphin who joined Annie Morris on vocals and guitar. After this vibrant start, the first section Theatrical Greats began fittingly with resonant Francis Abbott reading the timeless Shakespeare’s All the World’s a Stage, from As You Like It, that created the right and true setting for this hour-long piece of theatre.
Read more…Oh I Do Like to Be Beside The Seaside
The Elixir of Love
by Gaetano Donizetti, libretto by Felice Romani, translation by Joseph Morris
Wild Arts Summer at Opera Holland Park until 16th August
Review by Patrick Shorrock
Donizetti’s evergreen opera might seem like a soft option for an opera company, but realising its charms to the full actually takes a lot of hard work, talent, and good judgement. A performance as delightful as this one – for all its feeling of effortless spontaneity – doesn’t come out of nowhere.
This young cast all had attractive voices that were wellused and they all acted with just the right level of enthusiasm as an ensemble, rather than competing for the audience’s attention. Guido Martin-Brandis set the production by the seaside in the 1950s.
Read more…Wagner Stripped Bare
Tristan und Isolde
by Richard Wagner
ShatterBrain Productions and Regents Opera for Grimeborn Opera Festival at the Arcola Theatre, Dalston until 16thAugust
Review by Patrick Shorrock
The phrase only at Grimeborn might have been invented for this performance, in which Tristan and Isolde – that great peak of the operatic repertoire – is performed with a piano quintet instead of an orchestra. That is not quite the full story, as we do also get hunting horns and a pipe for the shepherd, as well as occasional woodwind (described enigmatically in the programme as banders). But most of the time it is two violins, a viola, cello, and piano, who have to cope with Wagner’s extortionate demands for a full orchestra. And most of the time Michael Thrift’s arrangement sounds rather good: like fine Fauré chamber music and banishing memories of that bloated over-ripe Liszt transcription of the Liebestod.
Read more…Marry in Haste, Repent at Leisure
Don Pasquale
by Gaetano Donizetti, libretto by Giovanni Ruffini
West Green House Opera at the Green Theatre, Hartley Wintney, until 27th July
Review by Mark Aspen
West Green pulls out quite a surprise for the culmination of its Silver Anniversary Season, and it is a right bonzer, taking Don Pasquale down-under. It casts Grant Doyle, a fair dinkum Aussie, in the leading role of Pasquale, and even the surtitles are in Strine!
The production is a thinly-veiled tongue-in-cheek homage to West Green House Opera’s founder, the redoubtable Marylyn Abbott, whose garden design and opera production careers have run in parallel on both sides of the globe. Formerly part of the management of the Sydney Opera House, she bought the lease of West Green House in 1993 order to create the perfect English garden, bringing with her expertise gained in setting up the renowned Kennerton Green Gardens in Mittagong, New South Wales. And it was Marylyn Abbott who inaugurated West Green House Opera in 2000 with The Marriage of Figaro. Over fifty productions later along comes Don Pasquale in bushwhacker hat.
Read more…Royal Add Dress
By Royal Appointment
by Daisy Goodwin
Theatre Royal Bath Productions at Richmond Theatre until 26th July, then on tour until 9th August
Review by Eleanor Marsh
Daisy Goodwin’s debut play is a highly fictionalised account of the relationship between the late Queen Elizabeth II and her dresser, along with the designer and milliner who were allegedly responsible for all her outfits for the last twenty years of her life.
Read more…
Mark Aspen 