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…Power, Passion and Punch
Macbeth
by Giuseppe Verdi, libretto by Francesco Maria Piave after William Shakespeare
West Green House Opera at the Green Theatre, Hartley Wintney, until 20th July
Review by Mark Aspen
Here’s something that packs some punch: Shakespeare, Verdi and a concentrated distillation of a dark psychological melodrama.
Shakespeare was a hero of literature for Verdi who always kept a copy of Rusconi’s Italian translation of Shakespeare’s complete works by his bedside. When he wrote Macbeth, Verdi was a 34 years old rising star. Yet he was an elderly man before he wrote another opera based on the Bard’s works, Ortello in 1887 (aged 74) and Falstaff, a rare dip into comedy for the octogenarian Verdi, in 1893. Sadly his ambition to write Re Lear never materialised. It is almost as if the intensity of Macbeth burnt out his creative urge for Shakespeare. Nevertheless, his youthful 1847 version was to be revisited up to the definitive Paris version of 1865, now presented by West Green House Opera. Macbeth buzzed around inside his head for two decades and Verdi often described it as his favourite of his operas.
It is the intensity of director Richard Studer’s production that makes it stand out. In Verdi’s Macbeth there is no romantic tenor lead, no soprano heroine, as one might expect in an opera. In fact there are no heroes at all. The two leading characters are real people who suffer for their over-vaunting ambitions, progressively tremulous, triumphant, terrified and ultimately torn apart by their guilt as they are sucked into a spiral of evil of their own making.
Read more…Some Are Loving
A Midsummer Night’s Dream
by William Shakespeare
Richmond Shakespeare Society at the Fountain Gardens, York House, Twickenham until 19th July
Review by Ralph Stanhope
This year’s Richmond Shakespeare Society’s summer open-air production was A Midsummer Night’s Dream, and a somewhat unusual one in that it was set in the 1970’s, although there seemed no specific reason why. So we take that as given.
Nevertheless, in general, the pace was very good; particularly in the wonderful scene where the four lovers, having suffered the mistakes of Puck leading to a terrific physical quarrel which, although at times became over-strident, was exceptionally well done. Scenes moved immediately into scenes; the action never faltered, and the cast deserved their obvious attention to this important part of any production.
Read more…Romeo and Juliet, but Not by the Bard
I Capuleti e i Montecchi
by Vincenzo Bellini, libretto by Felice Romani
West Green House Opera at the Theatre on the Lake, Hartley Wintney, 18th July
Review by Patrick Shorrock
This musically fine performance of a splendid but neglected opera left me wondering why Bellini’s take on the Romeo and Juliet story is not better known and not more frequently performed. It can’t simply have been the ravishing lakeside setting. (That said, West Green Opera is a well kept secret that deserves to be far better known as an alternative to Glyndebourne, Grange, or Garsington.)
Bellini’s music is downright ravishing and gives that instant operatic sugar hit of emotional intensity combined with unforgettable melody that only the best works provide. As well as oodles of splendid arias and duets for the lovers, we get a marvellously catchy cabaletta from minor character Tebaldo (the Tybalt character) that would adorn any collection of the top tenor hits, a superbly melancholy solo for clarinet, and some excellent ensembles. Musically, it is the equal of Norma but without any of that “how do we handle the Callas widows?” baggage. It certainly left me wanting more Bellini on the operatic menu.
Read more…Warm Comedy, Warmer Weather
Ladies Down Under
by Amanda Whittington
BCP at the OSO Arts Centre, Barnes until 20th July
Review by Andrew Lawston
Amanda Whittington’s play Ladies’ Day appeared to have a happy ending, as four friends from a fish-packing factory in Hull visited Ascot and won half a million pounds in a six race accumulator bet. But what comes after the happy ending?
This sequel, Ladies Down Under, is in part an exploration of how different people might deal with a dramatic change in their fortunes, as well as a further celebration of female friendship. This time, the four friends, still flush from their big win, decide to go on the trip of a lifetime to Australia. The OSO in Barnes is the location for this globe-trotting adventure.
Read more…Ancient and Modern
Poor Clare
by Chiara Atik
The Orange Tree Theatre, Richmond
Review by Harry Zimmerman
The Orange Tree’s latest production is Poor Clare, written by Chiara Atik, a show which has come to the UK after winning a slew of awards in the US.
The play tells the story of Clare, a wealthy young noblewoman in medieval Assisi who wants for nothing in life. Her plan for the future is simply to marry a rich nobleman and continue living her lavish lifestyle. However, her perspective on life begins to change when she meets Francis, a former soldier and son of a wealthy silk merchant, who has renounced wealth, privilege and power to live a simple life of piety and service.
Francis gradually introduces Clare to a new way of looking at the world and sets her on a new and very different path in life to the consternation and bewilderment of her rich, privileged family.
Read more…
Mark Aspen 