Fringe
Midsummer Night's Dream,
Old Paddling Pool
The Bard's Midsummer Night's
Dream is an intriguing affair, and Rooftop Theatre's inspired
interpretation makes for a fascinating production. Bewitched
and bewitching, the drama exists in a curiously fantastical twilight
zone.
The same could be said of the
plays' heros and heroines. In a tale that sports the best trademarks
of Shakespearean comedy, these star crossed lovers have plenty
to imagine their way out of - chiefly a love potion misadministered
by the sprightly Puck.
The company's enthusiastic
response to performing in Queen's Wood capitalises on the audience's
involvement. Forced to imagine that an old paddling pool is by
turns a princely castle and a quiet glade , it's hard to watch
without engaging. From the first entrance by scooter to the hoodlum
fairies' final transformation into wacky workmen, this show works
like dream indeed.
Dangerous Liasons, Pentameters Theatre
Compagnie Sublime are an unusual
addition to the fringe theatre scene. Instead of devising work
or sticking to crowd pleasing classics, they opt for unusual
but accessible plays. Simple as this may sound, theirs is a fine
craft: making a complicated performance look easy.
Dangerous Liasons is no exception.
In Choderlos de Lacos' well made drama, the company find plenty
to sink their teeth into. The love games offer theatrical rituals
for the company to relish, and Dominic Druce's ambitious translation
fine tune's the plot's farcical elements.
High points include Emily Hobbes' sensitive rendition of the
prudish woman cruelly seduced. Martin Cort's direction is also
captivating, and a special mention goes to David Palmer's masterful
stage managing of a three doored set. All in all, an accomplished
production of a fine play.
Arabian Night, the soho theatre
Intertwining lives and simultaneous action - despite sounding
like a split-screen film, Roland Schimmelpfennig's latest is
quite unequivocally theatre.
The German born artist draws
on a variety of disciplines to create his startlingly original
play. A background in directing and a passion for performance
as well as scripting may explain the meticulous crafting of this
authentic yet fantastic piece of stage stuff.
A man trapped in a bottle, a woman kidnapped as a child, a girlfriend
betrayed, an old man reborn and a young adulterer murdered are
the characters that keep Schimmelpfennig's time bomb of colliding
worlds ticking. Sexy and cerebral, the plot is both fantastical
and convincing.
Director Gordon Anderson is lucky enough to have some highly
talented performers at his disposal. Anna Hope's sleepy allure
is captivating as the lovely Franziska who dooms all who fall
her her. Stephanie Street goes all out as down-to-earth Fatima
Mansur, although she has to work quite hard to get much of a
reaction from her mope head driving boyfriend, played by Akbar
Kurtha (probably the weakest link in a cast of highly strung
performers). But even Kurtha shows a taste for the new as the
charms of illicit lust win him over, and the telepathic timing
of all on stage makes the show such a risk-taking success.
Anderson keeps the pace up
and relishes the sheer inventiveness of the script. Arabian Night
may invent outlandish rules, but it sticks to them. This urban
thriller is not only exotic and thrilling, but curiously plausible
as a study in the passions that unite us.
The Low Down
If you hate thesps but like a good yarn, here are the places
to go. These arts venues come with fooderies attached, not to
mention a cult following.
The Arcola, Dalston overground,
0207 503 1646
Artistic director Mehmet Ergen turned a sewing factory into a
theatre and called it the Arcola. Now he has two studios at his
disposal and a following from the Turkish community in Stoke
Newington. Text based dramas upstairs, experiments underground.
Candid Arts, Angel tube,
0207 837 4237
Whether it's music, dance, cabaret, film or fine art you're after,
the smorgasboard of events on offer in the high ceilinged galleries
and performance spaces of Candid Arts are sure to tickle your
fancy. Films from the Prague Film academy up next.
Jackson's Lane, Highgate tube,
020 8341 4421
Kwaks cooks up some culinary masterpieces in the modestly priced
Jackson's Lane kitchen, and the artistic diet on stage is just
as varied.
With dance, film and theatre on offer, it's no wonder Victoria
Wood saw fit to support their charity appeal.
Riverside Studios, Hammersmith
020 8237 1000
If you like theatre to give you a shiver, the Riverside Studios
are worth a visit. You don't have to brave the outdoor bar for
a view of the Thames, but if you dare to enter the auditorium
you'll be hard pressed to avoid a chill down your spine. From
innovative foreign acts to British based mime companies, the
shows here nimbly side step those theatrical clichés that
keep audiences at a comfortable distance from performance.
The Theatro Technis, Mornington Crescent underground, 020
7387 6617
A strong commitment to greek drama, multilingual performances
and the strength of the community makes actor-director George
Eugeniou's brainchild a happening place. From the high ceilinged
performance space to the cheap ticket prices and family-run bar,
generosity defines the place.
The BAC, Clapham Junction overground
020 7233 2223
Anything from experiments in flying to puppetry can be sampled
in the BAC's multiple studio spaces.This place has art and sustenance
on tap. There's a bookshop, café, and bar, along with
performance and workshop spaces. Even opera and stand-up comedy
can also be found.
Archive
Peeling, The Soho Theatre
Women's work has never been so rewarding. Director Jenny Sealey
unites performers Sophie Partridge, Lisa Hammond and Caroline
Parker to rework the Trojan Women, serving Kate O'Reilly's script
into the bargain.
It's the text that prevents
this look at disability from crippling itself on politically
correct intentions. By focussing on three disabled extras doomed
to the bit parts of dimly lit Trojan Women chorus, O'Reilly creates
characters who can only convincingly be played by the disabled.
Furthermore, she hones a story in which the characters' own attitude
to how they look is fundamental to the narrative.
And a clever narrative it is.
Bored at the back as they wait between cues, the three protagonists
gossip away and watch the Trojan Women, in which they have just
token bit parts. But the action before their eyes has a bearing
on their own lives, and the secrets they feel moved to confess
reveal how much they have in common with the females of greek
tragedy - or indeed, with any women.
Doubling as designer as well
as director, Sealey's decision to dwarf her characters within
extravagant ballroom dresses is thoroughly inspired. These costumes
function as eye-catching conceits for disguise, concealing as
they do the layers of other garb and also the detritus of the
day, from crisp packets to hair dryers.
And so it is with humour and
pathos that 'Peeling' disposes of a lot of myths and reveals
several truths. Tackling such weighty subjects as motherhood,
friendship and the fine line between honesty and bitterness,
an audience inclined to judge by appearances is made to really
think twice. This production does justice to the themes of disability.
Oedipus at Colonus, The Theatro Technis
A trilingual production of Oedipus is certainly ambitious. Director
George Eugeniou's achievement is to make such a task look effortless.
What's more, Eugeniou dares
to take on the lead. With a little help from David Mantovani's
evocative music, he rises to the challenge, his self-blinded
Oedipus infusing the very landscape of Spyros Koskina's design
with pathos.
A chorus of carefully choreographed
elders and a poised Antigone serve as poignant commentators on
the old man's plight as he struggles to reconcile his torturous
past to a hostile present. The sheer time required to talk in
three language captures the limbo land of Oedipus's predicament,
and Eugeniou succeeds by trusting to the story to speak for itself.
Like Oedipus himself, the greatest strength of this production
lies in humility.
Helena Thompson
Jitterbug, The Arcola
Billed as a look at a dance that touched the lives of many across
time and place, Bonnie Greer's latest sounds harmless enough.
But these tenuously linked scenes and wispy dialogue make for
elusive drama.
A less assured director than
Mehmet Ergen would have trouble pinning down the five interlocking
playlets . Lovers, Jews, Auschwitz survivors - under the influence
of the Boogie-Woogie, Ella Fitzgerald and Little Rock, the worlds
of these very different characters collide without ever really
engaging.
Ergen's achievement is to make
a virtue of such whimsicality. Actress Ruth Posner in particular
warms to the appeal of this delicate writing, and designer Michalis
Kokkoliadis's clever set of free floating steps and changing
locations charts the promised path across time and place. Fragile
stuff, this, and not exactly gripping drama - but a production
that serves Greer well.
Helena Thompson
Travis Prophecy, The Union
Theatre
(transferring to The Hill Street Theatre)
True to their name, Brute Culture
don't mess around. Their script is devised, but there's nothing
indirect about all the sex, drugs, and rock and roll. Furthermore,
director / devisor Amanda Caswell lets her characters do what
few playwrights allow by ditching conversation whenever possible.
So it comes as something of
a shock that behind all the violence and copulating lies a preoccupation
with something as ethereal as the spirit world. Certainly the
nine actors doubling as a thick crowd of twenty-somethings draw
more on intuition than classical training.
For 'Travis Prophecy' is as
much an exploration of the occult and the powers of instinct
as it is a tale of abuse. Nine-year-old Travis uses the gift
of prophecy to escape a violent home life then begins to abuse
his gift to manipulate his friends, only to find that the childhood
sweetheart he longs to woo knows him too well to be duped.
This lesson in the perils of
trying to control anyone's loves and lives, least of all ones'
own, would have benefited from a bit of editing. However, the
actors perform with an instinctive sense of each others' strengths
and weaknesses and Caswell's ability to stir up a storm on stage
with as few words as possible pays dividends in sustaining an
engagingly physical piece of theatre. When the cards are down,
the result is mesmeric.
Helena Thompson
Diaspora Jigs, the Old Red
Lion
'I hate to waste a
feeling,' says one of the protagonists in Irish playwright Seamus
Finnegan's two-hander. He voices an objective at the heart of
this wry yet compassionate script, a bitter-sweet play which
sparks drama from emotionally charged characters who seemed to
live through their language.
Rob Jarvis and Emma Tate live
up to Finnegan's demands and prove versatile actors. They take
on a fistful of cameo roles in his tale of two young hopefuls'
descent into homelessness, and warm to Finnegan's great knack
is for surprise. Primarily an entertainer, he is also the unheard
voice of homelessness, and many a masquerading joke hones a social
critique that dares to mock its audience.
To his credit, Finnegan grounds
a thoroughly modern mode of story telling in an understanding
of older traditions. There are slides, but this is not multimedia
- the scenes are futuristically locationless, but their finely
crafted integrity far from alienates. This is a memory play that
really resonates with the present.
Lemon Love, the Finborough
Theatre
A first play is an
act of faith. One which musters a bit of magic is a bonus - especially
as magical realism hasn't so far made the leap from books to
stage.
And in many ways, Benjamin
Yeoh's new drama suspends disbelief. It is in fact about holding
your breath, a play which turns a resolutely innocent but knowing
eye on young emotions. It even features a couple of ghosts -
an elderly couple who come out of the woodwork and who know each
other as well as a pair of Beckettian tramps. But where it really
takes a risk is in quoting large chunks of other people's poetry.
For the most part, the naturalistic
delivery of our two lovers chatting away over endless cups of
coffee guards against the collapse of a text which if declaimed
would feel less like a play than an exercise in induldgence.
To their credit, Salima Saxton and Louie Bayliss capture the
wistful allure of cafe conversation, whilst Elizabeth Freestone's
deft direction and Fiona Scott's understated design let these
fragile fourty five minutes speak for themselves. Sometimes new
writing doesn't know when to stop - short but sweet Lemon Love
just lingers.
Boesky's Choice, Camden
People's Theatre
Mention Phelim McDermott or
Marcello Magni and you show you're in the dramatic know - say
Absolut theatre and you're likely to confuse your fellow theatre-goers.
Yet this distinctive ensemble have the skill, precision and patience
to forge their own name in the world of mime and movement.
Hot on the heals of Camden
People's Theatre's festival of visual theatre, Boesky's Choice
explodes a trio of gingham clad clowners onto an apparently prop
free stage. Behind the curtain lurk the goodies of a covetous
protagonist - what unfolds is a meticulous told tail performed
by actors who are far from fools.
Rachael Spence', Patrick McGinley's,
and Victoria Marshall perform with the split second timing of
a real ensemble. Their familiarity with Pinter and Beckett informs
their fascination with the human condition without ever distracting
from the sheer exuberance of a genuinely authentic and well-told
story. Not a word is spoken but the emotions are easy to translate
thanks to Terry McFaden's sensitive directing.
Absolut's experience working
with London youth communities ballasts their observations against
the kind of whimsicality that turns mime into self-referential
induldgence. In particular, the consumer nightmare of oversized
products lends a gritty edge to the group's collective imagination.
For ultimately, it is the detail of this seemingly effortless
fantasy that brings the piece to life. Even the dust is labelled.
The Wordsmith's Lament, Upstairs at the Gatehouse
Little known playwright Billy
Woods has not written a good play, but he has taken some calculated
risks for which he deserves applause - and that's why The Wordsmith's
Lament is worth seeing. He's created is a trilogy of bad plays
for three different directors to direct, with genuinely engaging
results.
Woods was commissioned to write
a dramatic exploration of literary theorist Roland Barthes' essay,
Death of the Author. He fits the bill by presenting us with the
playwright labouring over his work, killing him off, then privileging
us with a preview of his play from rehearsal through to performance.
His satire is actually an intellectual discourse which places
all importance on the question of how the plays relate.
Barthes would have clapped
to see this self-referential drama climaxing at the point when
the players question the author's intention. He would doubtless
have enjoyed Philip Bosworth's performance as the confused actor
struggling to placate his director, and appreciated that like
lighting designer Racky Plews, we are required to wait until
the third play for the real pay off. The avante-garde version
of the tame little script whose creation we witnessed is certainly
worth the wait.
To its credit, this controlled
experiment in theatre practise deconstructs without losing the
plot. That we don't care about any of the characters, least of
all the wordsmith, is surely the point.
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