Tag Archives: Yvonne Arnaud

Romeo And Juliet – February 2012

9/10

By William Shakespeare

Directed by Robert Icke

Company: Headlong

Venue: Yvonne Arnaud Theatre

Date: Friday 24th February 2012

This was superb, one of the best productions of R&J I’ve seen. And as it’s still early in the tour, there’s the chance it will get even better.

From early on, I realised this was going to be a very different version of the play than I was used to, so I had to set aside all previous knowledge and just flow with the action on stage. And there was plenty of fast-paced action in this production, which made it easy both to follow the story and to forget what was ‘supposed’ to come next. To start with, the set was bare apart from a large white frame high up towards the back of the stage. Once the lights came up a bit I could see that this surrounded a platform, which I thought would be the balcony later on. Steps led up to this platform on either side, and there was a wide doorway underneath the platform with meshed areas either side. The floor was simple wooden boards, and the bed was slid on through the doorway as needed. This allowed for fast-paced changes of scene, and as they often ran two scenes at the same time, we got through a much edited version of the play in two and three-quarter hours. Nothing was skimped, however, although I did feel the ending was a little brief for the emotional rollercoaster ride to fully sink in. Even so, it was an amazing journey, and one I hope to repeat (if we can fit it in).

No prologue, just a droning sound before the start – I was very relieved when it stopped (reminded me of Therese Raquin at the National) – and then the lights came on very brightly and the time was projected onto the screen in front of the platform: Sunday, just before 5 a.m., and we saw the seconds count through. Two characters came on from the wings and crossed to the right of the stage; one of them was lighting a cigarette. Two other characters crossed the opposite way and left the stage, with the two groups barely acknowledging each other. Then we had the first of the rewind/repeat sections. The actors all moved back into their start positions, pretty much, the time went back to the start point, and the action began again. This time, the lighter wouldn’t work and when he tried to light his cigarette, the chap hurt his thumb which he then sucked. He’d already made a noise from the pain, and that caused the other two blokes to look round. When one of them saw the lighter chap suck his thumb, he asked the question, “Do you bite your thumb at us, sir?”, a reasonable request in the circumstances. Thumb-sucker was very conciliatory during this bit, but his companion was well up for it, and then Benvolio and Tybalt joined in – well, it’s not going to end happily, is it? Tybalt spat on his chips and offered one to Benvolio, who ate it, just to avoid a nasty scene. Then the bed came on in the middle, with Capulet and Lady Capulet on board. Capulet received a phone call, clearly to tell him of the fight, and he leapt out of bed a little too briskly for a man of his advanced years, calling for his sword. Mrs Capulet also got up – we may have got her line about “a crutch” – and then the prince was making a chunk of his speech condemning the violence, standing on the platform at a podium bristling with microphones.

At this point, the order of events was very different from the text, and the cross-cutting of scenes is a little tricky to recall; I’ll do my best to get it down. I think the next bit was a short chunk of the scene where Capulet invites Paris to his feast and gives Peter some letters to deliver. The time was being shown on the screen again, and after making a brief invitation to Paris, Capulet called for a servant. Peter and the nurse both came on stage and Capulet handed the letters to the nurse, or she took them, I’m not sure exactly how it went. They left the stage, and then we had the second rewind/repeat section; this time the letters went to Peter, with a puzzled look from the nurse (presumably she knows that Peter can’t read) and the action continued.

I wasn’t sure at first about these rewind sections, but I kept an open mind and now I can see that they bring out the chance nature of the tragedy. If the lighter had worked, if the nurse had taken the letters, if, if, if. The first rewind may not have made a huge difference, admittedly, but it did show us the level of hostility between the two camps and how some little perceived slight can set them off, which is a very important aspect of the play to establish early on.

I think the next bit was Romeo either coming on stage and lying on the bed or the bed coming back on with him on it, having been taken off sometime before. He may have lain there through the letter bit, but he was certainly there while his father talked about how withdrawn he was, and the picture on the stage was a clear demonstration of Montague’s words. Benvolio also reported the events of the fight up on the platform, as if he’d followed on from the prince’s speech. Whatever the order of events, Romeo got up just before Benvolio arrived and they went straight into discussing Romeo’s sadness. I had a few brief seconds of fame again tonight, as I was the unlucky comparison with Rosaline.

Peter came on next and told us of his plight. He did ask someone in the audience for help reading the letters, through mime, but no luck. Romeo offered to help, and looked through each envelope, telling Peter the names, while he tried to remember them by counting on his fingers. When Romeo got to the one for Rosaline, he reacted strongly, letting Benvolio know who his love was. As Peter left to make the deliveries, Benvolio snuck the Rosaline invite out of his back pocket and waved it under Romeo’s nose as they finished the scene.

Juliet was next on the bed; she was listening to her iPod, wearing large headphones. We could hear the music blaring out, and it was no wonder she didn’t hear the nurse call at first. When she realised her mother was coming to see her, she stopped the music and took the headphones off, and from Lady Capulet’s behaviour, it was clear that mother and daughter hadn’t spent a lot of time together over the years. The nurse was in the room at first, folding some laundry, but Lady Capulet sent her out. Then she sat on the bed to talk to Juliet, but the distance between them was too much for her and she didn’t know how to start, at least that’s how I saw the situation. I felt she called the nurse back in to help her find some way to broach the subject of marriage, and despite the nurse’s ramblings, she did at least bring up that very subject.

It was very noticeable how different Juliet was with the nurse compared to her mother. Her mother was distant and uncomfortable with her; the nurse was very relaxed and cuddlesome with Juliet, and the funny story, apart from being very well told, had Juliet joining in for her bit – this was clearly a well-worn tale which Juliet liked to hear. The nurse used a West Indian accent when quoting her husband’s words, which gave it a more authentic feel. During the final repetition, Juliet saw from her mother’s expression that they’d overdone it, and her request to the nurse to “stint” was a wise choice. What Juliet wasn’t keen to hear was talk of marriage, and although she said the right things to her mother, it was clear to us that she didn’t fancy becoming anyone’s wife just yet. Peter broke up the scene by telling them they were all wanted for the feast – the screen was showing Sunday at 7 p.m. or thereabouts (they actually used 24 hour notation).

Before this point, we had the rest of the scene where Capulet talked with Paris, but I’m not sure where exactly that was inserted. I do remember that when Lady Capulet was telling Juliet what a fine catch Paris was, the man himself walked through the back of the stage, coming on from the right and exiting by the centre doorway. His torso certainly looked splendid from where I was sitting, and if that was the only consideration I would have advised Juliet to snap him up immediately.

The torch/Queen Mab scene was played using actual torches – electric ones – and Benvolio and Romeo lit Mercutio’s face while he went through the details of Queen Mab’s attributes. I was aware during the party scene that Mercutio had actually been on the invitation list, and in this scene he had his visor up, while Benvolio and Romeo had theirs down. There was loud music playing in the background for most of this scene, although they did start off with some funky (and funny) dancing on the stage. The servants were running around with trays and wearing white DJs, and we also saw Lady Capulet and Tybalt up on the platform having a snog, so the relationship there was clear cut. Capulet’s cousin was brought on in a wheelchair, and although he was willing to get up, Capulet insisted that he sit. I noticed during their reminiscences that they talked of Lucentio’s marriage – as we’ve just seen Taming recently I wondered if that was an in-joke by Shakespeare, referring to his earlier play? And then we heard Petruchio mentioned later on..…the plot thickens.

After Tybalt had finished smooching with Lady Capulet, they both came downstairs, and Tybalt was very unhappy at Romeo’s presence. Capulet was firm with him, and even snippy by the end, but I didn’t see any awareness of Tybalt’s extra-curricular activities with his wife. Instead he seemed to want everyone to get on for the sake of having a good time, and his comment about Romeo’s good reputation suggested that he was less focused on revenge than is sometimes the case with this play. Capulet can often seem more concerned that nothing untoward is done in his house to spoil the fun, but later…… This was more a total ban on hurting someone who hasn’t done him any harm and who is generally reputed to be a decent young man, Montague or no.

Romeo’s chance encounter with Juliet didn’t happen at first. He was sitting on the front left corner of the stage, swigging from a bottle, while in the centre of the stage Capulet called for his daughter to be brought out and presented to Paris, who was done up in African tribal gear. Juliet was very reluctant, but Paris ignored this and embraced her. They then left the stage, and the rewind button went into action again. This time, one of the servants – Peter? – brought on a tray and crashed into Paris, spilling the contents, don’t know what they were. As they scattered, and Peter and the nurse picked some up, Juliet skipped out of the way towards the front of the stage and looking across it saw Romeo standing there, looking back at her; he’d been alerted by the noise of the spillage. Their eyes met, it was love at first sight, you know the deal. Their sonnet was spoken later at the front of the stage, and I reckoned they were both feeling their way through this first encounter. Their youth and inexperience came across clearly.

The party finished with Capulet very drunk and wanting everyone else to stay. I think someone whispered in his ear to point out that it was after two (the clock was showing us the time as well) and he looked at his watch before saying “Is it e’en so?” and saying goodnight to everyone. When Juliet asked the nurse to name the people as they were leaving, the latter pretended not to know who Romeo was at first, but when Juliet told her to run after him, she relented and told her – obviously too tired to walk far, never mind run.

The next scene was mainly Mercutio and Benvolio in front of the Capulet garden wall. Romeo leapt off the stage to begin with, which represented his escape into the garden, and the other two were left, much the worse for drink, sprawled on the stage and singing songs very loudly, as drunks tend to do at 3 a.m. when other people are trying to sleep. There were plenty of bawdy gestures as Mercutio attempted to conjure Romeo’s presence, but nothing too over the top (makes a pleasant change) and they soon left to go to bed. Romeo came back down the aisle he’d hidden on, and I got another surprise; the balcony scene wasn’t played out using the platform! The bed came back on with Juliet on it, and they played the scene that way. The stage isn’t very high in the Yvonne Arnaud, so Romeo could get onto it very easily, and this helped to move the scene along quickly. Juliet was lying on her front on the bed with her head on her hands, as remarked on by Romeo, and there was a lovely sensitivity to her performance. Romeo was still a bit gangly and uncoordinated which fitted his age, as they were playing them both very young this time.

The next scene had Friar Laurence giving a lecture on the medicinal properties of plants with the aid of slides which were projected onto the big screen. The friar snapped his fingers to have them changed, which mostly worked fine, but I think he had a bit of trouble with one of them (intentional, for laughs). He was carrying a folder with his notes, and his attitude of a teacher addressing a class was a nice bit of fun. They even rang a bell towards the end of his speech – fortunately no one left the classroom. He also held up a small phial of liquid when he mentioned “for this, being smelt..” – pay attention, cause it’s going to come back in later. When Romeo told the friar his news, he dropped his notes in surprise – got a good laugh – and he gave Romeo a strong telling off for his behaviour. I noticed that Romeo, like Juliet, joined in for some of the friar’s familiar lines, possibly “Riddling confession finds but riddling shrift”?

Now for the hangover scene. In similar vein to the famous RSC production many years ago which had the Ferrari on stage, there was a gelato seller with his trolley and a couple of chairs for Mercutio and Benvolio to rest on. I noticed that Mercutio wore blue suede shoes, and given the use of music in this production (I haven’t gone into detail yet) I half expected some Elvis before the night was out. But they didn’t make anything of it that I saw, so perhaps it was just a fashion statement this time. Romeo was livelier when he met them this time, and when the nurse turned up with Peter, she had clearly spent a good part of the morning taking advantage of the Verona sales – Peter was laden with carrier bags. Mercutio’s line about “a sail” became “a sale”, with the word written large across most of the bags.

This was the next rewind section. When the nurse and Romeo moved aside to converse, Peter turned his back, I think to light a fag, and Mercutio snuck over and rummaged in the bags, throwing the contents all over the place and brandishing a bra. This broke the conference up, and the nurse left without making the necessary arrangements with Romeo. So the action rewound, and this time although Mercutio threw some of the clothes about the place, he and Benvolio were chased off and the nurse was able to complete her business with Romeo. She took his offered money after an initial show of reluctance, and when she began with “Lord, Lord, when ‘twas a little prating thing” I thought we were going to get the whole weaning story again, but mercifully not.

Juliet came back on with the bed, and her impatience was absolutely typical of a teenager. The nurse did look tired when she turned up, but given the number of bags she’d accumulated, we could see why. The two of them sat on the end of the bed and had their little conversation. Juliet hit the nurse with a pillow at one point, which led to the comment about having an aching head, and she made Juliet rub her back (other side) before finally giving her the news she wanted. She also gave her a lovely cream or pale yellow dress with a veil to wear to her wedding, so she’d done more than shop for herself all morning.

The scene at Friar Laurence’s cell was brief, and I don’t remember if we got any of the lines at all. If we did, it was just the opening bit. The friar and Romeo stood on the platform and Juliet joined them there in her wedding dress before heading off for the marriage ceremony. This was a general point about this production; they preferred to show rather than tell, so a good deal of the dialogue was cut in favour of showing us the essential action, and on the whole I found it worked very well for me.

Back in the streets, and at the gelato stand Mercutio and Benvolio were still lounging around. Tybalt arrived with a couple of his men, and despite Mercutio’s aggression, Romeo spoke very amiably with him and Tybalt actually did look satisfied as he put away his knife and turned to go. Of course Mercutio couldn’t leave it at that, and squirted some raspberry sauce from the gelato stand on Tybalt’s head. He may also have added some sprinkles. While the others held him back, Romeo being right in front of him, Tybalt was able to stab Mercutio under Romeo’s arm before running off.

The usual lines from Mercutio about his wound were played very differently tonight. At first he fell down and seemed to be hurt, but then he got up and it was clear he had been joking with them. My mind was reeling a bit as I tried to figure out where we were going – was this going to be a rewind moment? Were they going to play it without Mercutio being killed? And then, amidst the joking, Mercutio took off his shirt and we could see the red stain under it, on his vest. Benvolio and Romeo saw it as well, of course, and their looks alerted Mercutio to his fate. This was an incredibly moving moment. We’d been shaken out of our complacency, and lulled into a humorous mood by Mercutio’s clowning, and now the fact of his death hit us like a bullet; I’m tearing up with the memory as I write – a superb bit of staging. Mercutio had a few final lines before Benvolio helped him off stage, and then Romeo was left alone to seek revenge on Tybalt. He had a knife which had been dropped during the earlier brawl, and used it on Tybalt who came back, unarmed. His body fell in the front left corner of the stage, and Romeo half knelt, half lay on it through the next section.

At this point the bed came on again with Juliet, and she launched into “Gallop apace, you fiery-footed steeds”. I found this incredibly emotional; with Tybalt’s body reminding us of Romeo’s impending banishment, her joyful anticipation of her wedding night was beautifully juxtaposed with the evidence of the violent social order which has doomed that very relationship from the start, and it emphasised the love/hate dichotomy of the play, which this production brought out to the full.

For the next part there were three scenes intercut, if memory serves. The prince announced Romeo’s banishment from the platform, Juliet on her bed received the bad news from the nurse, while Romeo was also on stage with the friar, seeking his help. They whirled around one another, with the two older characters trying to soothe the younger ones, until both Juliet and Romeo were standing side by side on the bed and the nurse and the friar were walking round it. It worked very well, and although we missed out on the nurse’s visit to the friar, the through story was very clear. The first half ended with Romeo and Juliet kissing, embracing, and starting to throw their clothes off as the bed was drawn back and the lights went out.

The second half began with the short scene between Capulet, Lady Capulet and Paris. The bed had already been brought on below, and stayed in darkness while these characters were on the platform above. Again, they used the rewind feature with this scene; after Capulet had explained the situation, Paris took the huff, went behind the doorway to pick up his bag and left, after Lady Capulet’s two lines and a look from him that made her move out of the way. He didn’t come across as a nice man, this Paris, rather domineering and unpleasant. Then they redid the scene, with Capulet deciding at the last minute to make Juliet’s choice for her, much too late as it happened. With the time being shown so clearly throughout this production, the humour of Capulet’s change of day from Wednesday (too soon) to Thursday (just right) was emphasised, and we laughed. Lady Capulet looked unhappy about the match, and from Capulet’s behaviour later we got a good idea why. But now the action shifted to the bed below, with Romeo and Juliet waking up and discussing the time. They were decent when they got out of bed, thank goodness – nudity may be realistic, but it can distract from the main point of the scene – and Romeo left up the aisle as he had before.

Juliet was a changed girl when she stood up to her mother this time. She’d been very cooperative earlier when her mother paid her an unaccustomed visit to tell her about Paris, but now she threw quite a strop over the suggestion of marriage. But first they discussed Tybalt, and I got the impression that her mother wanted her to stop grieving because it was hard for her too, and either Juliet’s obvious suffering made her restraint harder to maintain or if she could suck it up, so could Juliet – not sure which it was. They did seem to be closer for a while at this point, although it’s only because Juliet was choosing her words carefully and therefore appeared to be in sympathy with her mother. Anyway, once the marriage deal was mentioned, the claws were out, and it’s up to Capulet to sort out the mess.

This portrayal, by Keith Bartlett, was marvellous. He managed to show us a man whose anger and need to control made him a monster, while still being a recognisable human being. Of course, it was the reactions of the nurse and Lady Capulet, along with Juliet, which really gave us the sense of this man’s effect on his family; they were terrified to step out of line, and kept glancing at him in that submissive way that told us how bad things were. Capulet spoke his lines slowly and clearly, with pauses between each few words, as if he was being ever so reasonable when all around him were acting like lunatics; the anger came across more strongly because of it.

At the friar’s cell, Paris was oozing confidence, and perhaps showed a little impatience with the friar when he questioned the speed of the marriage? When Juliet turned up, we could see that Paris was in the same mould as her father; he regarded her as a possession, and she would have been as miserable as her mother if she’d married him. The friar gave Juliet the same phial he had shown us earlier during his lecture, and with the clock showing a time around 7p.m. on Tuesday, Juliet returned to her father to apologise for her behaviour.

The pace really speeded up after this, with her father deciding to have the wedding a day earlier and Juliet taking her poison after her mother and the nurse left her alone. There was a tender moment when her mother came in to see if she could help with the preparations; she touched Juliet’s face so gently, and was clearly feeling more sympathy for her daughter than ever before. She was sad to be sent away this time.

Once Juliet drank off the phial, she sat back down on the bed, upright against the back with her eyes open, and then the weird effects started. They used projected video to show the preparations going on, but with the voices slowed down and accompanied by jerky images, as if Juliet were on some strange drug trip, which in a sense she was. These images covered the whole back of the stage, and then the nurse was sent in to wake Juliet. Her image loomed large on the screen, and we heard her lines as if they were far away. After the discovery of Juliet’s ‘death’, there were only a few lines of dialogue in the background, and then the bed was moved back (not even a sniff of the musicians) so that Romeo could appear in Mantua. Benvolio brought him the bad news, and then Romeo quickly bought the poison from the apothecary. This man was remarkably well dressed; he wore a smart grey suit and stood at the front of the stage on the left while Romeo stood on the right, and they made the gestures of passing the money and poison to each other without actually doing it. As Romeo was about to leave, he came face to face with Mercutio, as it seemed, but he turned out to be Friar John, the messenger who failed; these scenes were overlapped. Friar Laurence was suitably angry for once about the letter not being delivered, which brought out the importance of Romeo being informed of the situation.

The final scenes were kept very simple. No Paris arriving at the monument with flowers, no hidden servants, no friar arriving late, nothing but the bed with Juliet lying on it, crosswise this time. Romeo spoke several lines over Juliet’s body before drinking his poison, and as he cradled her, she started to move her arm. As he lay back, she was brought round to mirror his position, and so she woke up with Romeo dead beside her. His knife was lying on the bed, and she used that to stab herself, falling back so they lay dead together. After this, we went straight to the prince’s admonishment – “Where be these enemies” – followed by Capulet and Montague almost vying to honour the other’s offspring, then hugging. The prince’s final lines brought the performance to a conclusion, a more abrupt end than I was expecting, I must admit, but still it was a tremendous experience and one of the best versions of the play I’ve seen.

The performances were all excellent. I’ve already mentioned Keith Bartlett who played Capulet. He was crystal clear all the way through and was willing to show us the unpleasant side of this male-dominated society. He also got quite a few laughs with the funny stuff. Caroline Faber was superb as Lady Capulet. It’s such an underwritten part, yet she brought out so much of that character’s suffering through her expressions and her hesitations that I was much more aware of her story tonight. Her arranged marriage was unhappy so she took comfort from another relationship, and I think her inability to do anything to change her circumstances spoke volumes about the nature of that society.

Simon Coates was excellent as the friar with his authoritative manner, and Stephen Fewell was good as Montague and the apothecary. I didn’t realise who he was during the first scene; assuming they weren’t just giving him another part, it was Montague himself who asked about the thumb biting. I wasn’t sure about the lack of colour coding for this production; on the one hand it can make it more confusing knowing who’s who, but on the other it emphasises that these people aren’t actually different from each other, and only the long-standing feud separates them. Once I got to know the characters it wasn’t a problem, and given that they were using modern dress it would probably have been harder to colour coordinate, so on the whole I’m fine with this choice.

Daniel Boyd as Romeo was a bit gawky all the way through, which did fit with his youth but wasn’t the most effective style for delivering the lines. He did well enough though, and I appreciated the youthful aspects of the performance; it felt very fresh. Catrin Stewart was a very good Juliet, demure to begin with but toughening up later on in response to the changes in her world. Her delivery of the lines was very good, and her journey very clear. It’s always a difficult choice to make with these parts, whether to go for experience or youth, and this time it worked well. Some aspects weren’t brought out so much, but the sense of these two young people being destroyed by a combination of chance and the prejudices of their elders was very strong.

The nurse (Brigid Zengeni) was another great performance. In the early scenes she came across as more Juliet’s mother than Lady Capulet, and while the cuts made it harder to see the changes in this relationship, she was still an important presence. Paris (Tunji Lucas) and Tybalt (Okezie Morro) were also good in these small but important parts, and Steve was disappointed not to see Paris being killed in this version. Tom Mothersdale was a more unpleasant Mercutio than most, but gave us the lines pretty well, Danny Kirrane did a fine job as Benvolio, and David Hooke was an entertaining Peter.

The music was interesting. The fateful day of Tybalt and Mercutio’s death, and Romeo and Juliet’s marriage, is a Monday according to the chronology of the play; from the fight scene onwards they played a gentler version of I Don’t Like Mondays (no credits in the program) which fitted very well. There was disco music for the party scene, mostly in the background, and other good choices during the play, though I don’t remember the details now.

There was so much in this production that I’m hoping we can fit it in again so I can catch even more of the detail. My lasting impression is that it was all Mercutio’s fault – if he hadn’t insisted on fighting Tybalt…..

© 2012 Sheila Evans at ilovetheatre.me

Less Than Kind – February 2012

7/10

By Terence Rattigan

Directed by Adrian Brown

Venue: Yvonne Arnaud Theatre

Date: Saturday 18th February 2012

From the program notes, this play had originally been intended as a star vehicle for Gertrude Lawrence, but went through considerable changes when the Lunts became involved. Alfred Lunt led Rattigan to make so many subtle changes that it was effectively rewritten to make his part bigger and more attractive, along with other changes. The title was also changed, to Love In Idleness, and I reckon Steve and I must have seen a production of that many years ago as the plot was so familiar. This was the original version approved by the Lord Chamberlain, although there had already been some changes as the Cabinet Minister was Canadian instead of British, and certainly wasn’t unpleasant as far as we could see.

The set for the first two acts was a drawing room in a fairly posh London apartment. Given that it was a touring production, the furnishings weren’t lavish, but then there was a war on, so that fitted. The main door was centre back, there was another door off to the left (study), a window on the right, a piano on the left wall and a sofa and chairs with the necessary tables. The final act was in a small upper flat in a rundown part of London; doors off left, right and in the centre, the piano on the left wall, a small table and two chairs left of centre, and a small desk with the telephone and a typewriter front right. The ceiling was missing, and we could see the outline of a bombed building behind, and with that, the searchlights, and the smoke which invaded the living room, I was momentarily distracted by the idea that the house we were looking at had itself been bombed and was missing a chunk of the roof. Sara Crowe kept going through the mist, and we didn’t miss anything, but it was a weird moment.

The plot was based on Hamlet. Rattigan had been challenged on how he would handle the situation Hamlet finds himself in, and this play was his response. The connection isn’t just obvious, it’s frequently commented on by the characters in the play, and we enjoyed the humour of the parallels. It’s just a shame The Mousetrap hadn’t opened at this time, as it would have been even funnier if Michael had bought tickets for that instead of Death In The Family, or whatever it was. There was also a passing reference to the Lunts as dinner guests, although whether that was in the original or added for this production I don’t know.

This version of the story concentrates more on the Gertrude character, Olivia, as she negotiates her way through the return of her son from Canada, where he’d been sent to school for safety on the outbreak of war, and her relationship with a very prominent Cabinet Minister, Sir John Fletcher, who’s in charge of tank production. Her son, Michael, knows nothing of her relationship with the Cabinet Minister; his father died while he was away in Canada, and his mother has mentioned Sir John in her letters, but as a good friend, nothing more.

The play begins with Olivia arranging the guests for a dinner party. Her devious cunning is revealed early on, as she tells two reluctant invitees that the other is dying to meet them. Then we meet Sir John as he returns from work, and the arrival of her son is discussed. Sir John agrees to stay away for a day or so until she can bring Michael up to speed; Sir John favours the forthright approach, while Mummy still thinks her little boy – who may be seventeen(?), she can’t really remember – won’t be able to handle such difficult news.

And in a way, she’s right. Arriving earlier than expected, the objectionable little prig who turns up appears to have no sense of the world and sadly no sense of humour either. Michael has become indoctrinated in the new left wing attitude to everything – not communist as such, but still convinced that the order will be swept away once Herr Hitler has been beaten. Capitalism is dead, long live the revolution, that sort of thing. He’s appalled to find out that his mother’s taken up with a class enemy, a rampant capitalist, and is living the high life off her ‘immoral’ earnings. He argues with Sir John, and despite his warning about the ‘closet scene’, persuades his mother to leave Sir John and move back to respectable poverty.

So to the final scene in the flat. The relationship between mother and son is still fine, despite their lack of money, her unhappiness with their lifestyle and his insistence on reading ‘improving’ literature. We soon find out that Michael has a girlfriend, and when he heads out to spend the evening with her, Sir John turns up to try and win Olivia back. When Michael and his girlfriend arrive unexpectedly, Sir John hides in the next room while Olivia goes off for a bath, and the ensuing revelations lead to a satisfactory outcome for all concerned.

The play isn’t Rattigan’s best, but it’s still an enjoyable evening at the theatre. Naturally it’s a bit dated, and I reckon the changing attitudes between then and now may account for Sir John seeming more sympathetic to us now, banking crisis notwithstanding. The left-wing ideas which were taking hold at that time seem naïve and unrealistic today, though that may just be hindsight. The references to Hamlet were very funny, especially when Sir John had a little tirade about Michael’s behaviour, wearing a black tie and looking all mournful. He was too, wearing a big floppy black tie, which made us laugh. There was plenty of humour all round to keep us happy, and while I felt the audience didn’t respond as much as they could, the cast did a very good job and I wish them well on tour.

© 2012 Sheila Evans at ilovetheatre.me

Neighbourhood Watch – January 2012

7/10

Written and directed by Alan Ayckbourn

Stephen Joseph Theatre Company

Venue: Yvonne Arnaud Theatre

Date: Monday 23rd January 2012

This was an enjoyable evening which ended rather unfortunately. A memorial statue which was meant to be revealed at the end refused to drop into place – looked like it was hanging the wrong way up – and so the cast had to take their bows without the punch line having been delivered, a real shame for them after their hard work. And it was hard work with this audience; we both felt, despite it being one of Ayckbourn’s darker offerings, that there was more humour in this play than the audience response indicated. It may be that the subject matter was a bit too close to home for comfort; we noticed that several jokes about Daily Mail readers received a lukewarm chuckle, but a similar disparaging remark about Guardian readers a few lines later got a huge laugh.

The play covered current concerns about security, and the trend towards high-security compounds for the ‘posh’ folk to protect them from the ‘yobs’ from the sink estates. We followed the experiences of a brother and sister, newly arrived at the Bluebell Hill development, from their housewarming party to the memorial service for the brother, Martin, after his sad demise while fighting to protect the standard of life for the local residents. The opening scene, and what would have been the last had it worked, were set at the memorial service; the rest of the scenes were in chronological order.

The set was straightforward. There were black walls at the back with gaps right and left, and two curved sofas on either side covered in a plain fabric with large flower outlines and with three matching cushions on each. In the centre was a fake circular fireplace with a flicker effect which they turned on whenever there were guests, and a large rim which doubled as a table. There were also two side tables on the audience side of the sofas. An extra chair was brought on for some of the meetings, and there was carpet on the floor up to the patio door on the right, where a section of the stage had been tiled to show the outside area. They acted the patio door, thank goodness.

The characters were a lovely mixed bunch. Martin and Hilda, brother and sister, were very prim and proper, with a strong moral and religious streak. Actually she was much more rigid than he was, and during the course of the play he even developed a relationship with another woman and planned to leave his sister. His death shortly afterwards meant she could ignore this inconvenient fact in her eulogy, while freeing her up to develop her own unconventional relationship.

Rod was one of their neighbours who was retired from some kind of security job, and was positively rabid about the threats they faced from the scum who lived in the estate nearby, across a field. He had even forced his way into someone’s house to retrieve a hedge trimmer which he knew this man had stolen, searching the place while the man was there. He eventually found his hedge trimmer and walked off with it, only to find himself in trouble with the police! His hedge trimmer was now in custody as it was evidence, and he was livid about the whole incident. He certainly showed us the potential for violence and law-breaking from the self-righteous, aggrieved middle classes, who feel everyone else is out to get them.

Dorothy was another retired neighbour who used to work on the local paper. We were led to believe she was a reporter, so there was a good laugh when she finally admitted that she worked on small ads. She was a good source for the local gossip which allowed us to find out a lot about the situation and the people, and she took on the media work for their neighbourhood watch scheme when it attracted lots of media attention.

Luther and Magda were the next door neighbours. He was a bully and a wife beater, she was a woman who had been abused from an early age and who ended up staying with Martin and Hilda for protection. Luther was the one person who spoke up against the rather extreme measures taken by the neighbourhood watch committee, and he was also the Guardian reader, but he seemed a bit underwritten compared to the others. Magda was a musician who also gave lessons, and her description of her early experiences was quite hard to listen to. Her final choices indicated that she’d found another strong character to take charge of her life.

Gareth and Amy were the final two characters. He was an older man who liked tinkering in his shed, but his main motivation for supporting the neighbourhood watch was that his wife, Amy, was a total slut, sleeping around with every man on the development regardless of their marital status. She’d married Gareth on the rebound, and he’d been regretting it ever since. It did give him an interest in various forms of public punishment, including the stocks, the pillory, scold’s bridle, etc., and the committee made good use of his woodworking talents and this interest. Amy wore very fitting dresses with very high hems with red hair and lots of makeup. She was very interested to find that Martin and Hilda were siblings rather than married, and we weren’t surprised to find Martin’s attitudes changing a bit over the course of the play.

The housewarming scene led to the inaugural meeting to set up the neighbourhood watch scheme. When the police were unable to attend to give advice, and someone threw Martin’s garden gnome through the window, destroying it completely, Martin decided they should go it alone and include some people who weren’t keen to be involved if the police were part of it. These turned out to be the local crime boss and his two thuggish sons; patrols were very effective and crime was slashed, but their methods were rather drastic, and when a house on the estate was burned down when they went to ‘have a word’ with its occupant, the police turned up at the Bluebell Hill security gatehouse demanding to get in to arrest the two sons.

After making sure that the stocks weren’t visible, Martin authorised the security chief (Rod) to radio the gatehouse to let them in. Unfortunately, they only caught one of the sons, which meant that an angry armed sociopath was hiding within the security fence, waiting to get his revenge for being shopped to the police. Fortunately he was too stupid to count properly, so it was the house next door to Martin and Hilda’s that went up in flames, and it was when the fire service and police were trying to deal with that problem that Martin, armed only with a statue of Jesus, went out into his garden and met his fate.

The final scene showed us the aftermath through the preparations for the memorial service, and then a curtain came down to shield the fireplace from our view while they lowered the statue chosen to commemorate Martin’s life. Being so close, we could see a bit of it, and at first it looked like a giant dildo which made us laugh to ourselves. But then we realised it was the hat of a large garden gnome, about three feet high I would guess, and gold coloured, which had slipped onto its side and just wouldn’t come down onto the fireplace. A stage hand came on at the back and realised he couldn’t do anything, so they just had to leave things there and take their bows. We felt for them; it was clearly meant to be a funny punchline as Hilda’s opening speech had claimed this was not only a fitting memorial, but also a symbol of much greater and higher things. A garden gnome would have been very funny, but alas not tonight.

The performances were all fine, and there was plenty to enjoy, but the audience, like the gnome, weren’t as cooperative as we would have liked.

© 2012 Sheila Evans at ilovetheatre.me

Henry V – November 2011

9/10

By: William Shakespeare

Directed by: Edward Hall

Company: Propeller

Venue: Yvonne Arnaud Theatre

Date: Thursday 10th November 2011

A typical Propeller production, this – lots of energy, good music, a clear telling of a trimmed down story, and some lovely touches in the performances. Even though it’s early in the tour, the performances were well established, and the whole evening was powerful and very enjoyable.

The set was very familiar – all of the metal framework from Richard III was in place, along with the balcony-on-wheels, but we didn’t get the plastic sheets or hospital trolleys this time. Instead there were large wooden boxes, a pair of wheelie steps and a couple of punching bags either side for the second half. They also brought on a bath for the first scene with Katherine, just after the interval – her maid had to sign for it – and there were thrones and chairs, etc. as needed.

The performance began with the cast all done up in modern military gear tramping through the auditorium, singing a song. Like a bunch of soldiers arriving at a temporary shelter, they sat around the stage having a well-earned break. Then one of them, given a crown out of one of the boxes, started the play’s opening chorus – ‘O for a muse of fire’ – and we were off. The cast shared the chorus work, which gave us all a chance to not only see each actor but hear his voice too. For the first scene, two of the soldiers put on clerical robes, and with still grimy faces gave us the conversation between the Archbishop of Canterbury and the Bishop of Ely. After this, I think there was a song to cover the cast changing the set slightly, and then Henry himself appeared for the first time. I hadn’t seen Dugald Bruce-Lockhart in the opening bit, and since he also disappeared off before the closing lines of the play, it made me think that the soldiers, who were enacting the play in their break between skirmishes, had invoked the ghost of King Henry, the epitome of the heroic military leader, to complete their cast.

The discussion with the clerics was quick and pretty much to the point, and with the defence of the kingdom sorted, we could settle down to watch the French ambassador. He was very haughty, wore a scarf so we would know he was French, and carried a wooden box, holding it high as he came in and stood in front of Henry. The king used the slighting ‘dolphin’ pronunciation, and was clearly goaded by the references to his wayward past. He managed to control himself, though, which was just as well, because the floor of the stage was soon covered in tennis balls – a few even escaped into the auditorium – and he could have given himself a nasty injury if he’d let his anger get the better of him.

However, before the balls arrived, the ambassador, emphasising the correct way to say ‘dauphin’, offered the wooden box to the king, claiming it contained ‘treasure’. Henry signalled his uncle to inspect the box, and as the actor playing Exeter is on the short side, there’s a lovely moment when the ambassador, realising that Exeter won’t be able to see into the box, lowered it down for him. Exeter took the box, and as he poured out the ‘treasure’, two big bins full of tennis balls were emptied from the balcony onto the stage. Henry was livid, and soon we were off to war with the French.

There was a brief attempt at ball-clearing during the next chorus bit, but plenty still remained on stage for the rest of the first half. As the chorus introduced them, we were shown the three traitors, and then the discovery of their plot. One of the three had a hip flask, into which a chorus member put several drops of a liquid, which we naturally assumed was poison. This flask was offered to the king, but Exeter, knowing of the plot, indicated that he shouldn’t drink it. The ‘commissions’ given to the three men were in manila folders, and their execution was swift and nicely staged. After Exeter arrested them, tearing off their epaulets in the process, they were taken up to the balcony area, made to kneel, and were then blindfolded. Meanwhile a wooden stump was brought on to the front of the stage, and a man wearing a black executioner’s mask came on with an axe. When all three were ready, he swung once at the block, burying the axe in it, while all three traitors slumped as one up above. After the gore-fest of Richard III, this was simpler and very effective. Henry snatched up the axe and held it while giving us the closing lines of the scene.

The next scene combined the two on either side of the traitors’ discovery, and started with London Calling and the shaking of many a beer can (they like it messy). The argument between Pistol and Nym was still pretty incomprehensible, as usual, and Mistress Quickly didn’t have much to say, while Falstaff was completely expunged, which is fair enough as he’s not really relevant to this play on its own. When Pistol left, he gave his Nell a red heart, which she treasured.

Now to France, and to inform us of the change of scene, the cast sang Chanson D’Amour – very entertaining, and some of the audience were joining in by this time. The French king, played by John Dougall, was a gloomy personality, not keen to do anything in haste, and the previous French experience at Crecy was clearly preying on his mind. The Dauphin was also clearly fed up with this old story, turning away from the king and mouthing ‘Crecy’ when he could see the subject coming up, yet again! The messenger who brought news of the English ambassadors spoke with a strong English regional accent (forget which one) and I remember him saying more lines than I have in my text – don’t know what happened there.

When Exeter turned up, he was accompanied by another soldier who stood on top of the wheelie steps holding a scroll which he unfurled at the appropriate moment. It was a long scroll, and all we could see was ‘Edward III’ in large letters at the top, and ‘Henry V’ in equally large letters at the bottom – the details were too faint to make out. When passing on Henry’s message to the Dauphin, Exeter marched over and stood nose to chin – the Dauphin was slightly taller – and delivered the speech right in his face. The French king was reluctant to commit himself at this point, while there was a strong reaction, from the Dauphin at least, to the news that Henry was already in France.

More chorus work, and the soldiers delivered a lot of the lines crouched behind a couple of wooden shields. The ‘Once more unto the breach’ speech was OK, and then Bardolph, Pistol, Nym and the boy were left behind in the rush for the battle. After Fluellen caught them, there was a pause moment – the other characters held their positions while the boy told us what villains and knaves his three masters were, slightly edited. The scene with the Scotsman, the Irishman and the Welshman (Fluellen) was completely cut, so we moved briskly on to the surrender of Harfleur.

For this, the main body of the English army was on stage, pointing several spotlights at the left hand balcony in the auditorium, where the Harfleur representative was standing. Henry talked at length about the dire consequences if the town didn’t surrender, but he’s really wasting his breath, as the hoped-for French relief hasn’t arrived, and the townsfolk have already decided to concede defeat.

With Harfleur won, Henry and his men headed off for some well-earned rest, and we got our break as well. But this time the cast were out in the foyer, standing on the stairs, entertaining us all with some songs and a plea for money. Apparently they raise money for charity on each tour, so the bucket soon came round. The songs were good fun – we joined in The Wild Rover and Sloop John B – and then they walked up the foyer stairs and down into the auditorium for the second half, still singing.

Meanwhile, back on the stage, Katherine had been getting herself ready for the opening scene of the second half. Karl Davies, in an off-white negligee, was sitting in front of a mirror on the left of the stage. His face was white, and he was applying some more makeup while everyone else got settled for the restart. Actually, once the soldiers arrived, Katherine started flirting with them, even letting them take her picture – terrible sluts, these Propeller men. Her maid, Alice, was Exeter in drag, i.e. he wore a skirt instead of trousers, and still had his pencil moustache – quite a sight.  Alice signed for the bath when it was delivered centre stage, and then when the scene actually started, she checked the water temperature was acceptable for the princess, who got into her bath still dressed. The dialogue went pretty well; when Katherine attempts ‘neck’, she comes out with ‘nick’, and as Alice was shaving her legs at that point, there was an unfortunate correlation between the words and the action.

I think the next bit had two overlapping scenes – the French court preparing for war and Fluellen reporting that the bridge has been held – no Gower in this version. Bardolph was taken up onto the balcony for his execution, and the masked executioner simply twisted his neck to signify the hanging. Bardolph’s corpse lingered there, draped over the bars, for Henry to see when the matter was reported to him later. By the time Mountjoy arrived to ask what ransom Henry’s prepared to pay, the French court had left the stage. Henry had been given Bardolph’s pendant by Pistol; when he told Mountjoy ‘There’s for thy labour’ he handed the pendant to him.

The wonderfully funny scene with the French court preening themselves and boasting about their armour, horses, etc, was cut to the bone, and only took a couple of minutes up on the balcony, which was now towards the back of the stage. The chorus then took us into Henry’s camp at Agincourt, and with a few small pans of flame we got the camp fires and Henry’s meetings with the ordinary soldiers, starting with Pistol. Fluellen and Gower were next, then the two soldiers with whom Henry discussed the responsibilities of a king towards his soldiers. (There are actually three soldiers in the text, but apart from the opening line, one says nothing, so two will do fine.) I always find Henry’s arguments a bit specious here. When he compares the actions of a king with those of an employer or a father, claiming that they don’t intend the death of the people they send on various errands, I reckon it’s a bit different to starting a war when there’s a very good chance some of the soldiers you take with you will be killed. Death is part of the package. However, his point about the soldier cleaning up his soul so that either his death or his life will the better for it, came across clearly this time, and made more sense of the end of that argument. When Erpingham has called him, Henry’s final prayer ditched the first part about his men, and he went straight into ‘Not today, O Lord’, emphasising Henry’s remorse over the killing of Richard II.

Then there’s another round of the French, and then back to the English camp, where Westmoreland rashly wished for more men to help fight the French. Well, that was a red rag to Henry’s bull, and yet again we get the long, long speech to raise his troops’ morale. This one worked really well, though, and as the audience were included in the throng, we were all ready to fight by the end of it. Mountjoy’s final request for a ransom offer was delivered as if he was really worried that the English were all going to be killed, and Henry was strongly defiant.

As the battle started, the punch bags were released, and two men in masks came on wielding baseball bats. As the French attacked, the few English soldiers left on the stage responded to each blow of bat on bag as if they’d been hit, and soon it looked like a French victory. However, these soldiers got up and left and Pistol came on stage, dragging a French prisoner, and accompanied by the boy with a couple of large bags. Pistol held a bar or bat himself, and struck the bags from time to time, all of which his prisoner felt. At the end of the scene, the boy was left in the middle of the stage, a bag on either side, and when the French ran on, alarmed at the state of the battle, they slew the young lad by hitting the punch bags. Another two men had also come on holding spray guns, and they squirted red colouring all over the dead boy. When Henry and his men got back, he held the boy in his arms for a short while, and he was clearly angry. There’s another scene with Fluellen, but I don’t’ remember where it came, and then the French herald turned up again to ask for permission to search the field for the dead and wounded. He looked shell shocked, as he would have been with so much carnage all around.

The king’s argument with Williams was resolved without getting Fluellen to wear the glove in his cap, which cut out a lot of dialogue, and then Mountjoy returned with the body count. The figures were truly amazing, and after Henry has commanded that only God is to get the credit, the cast launch into a Te Deum for the next scene change. While the chorus talked us through Henry’s return to England and next journey into France, a table was made out of the boxes, with a blue cloth placed over the left side for the French, and a white cloth with a red cross over the right, for the English. A silver crucifix was placed in the middle, and Fluellen stood guard. Shortly after, a hand reached up from behind the table, and groped its way to the crucifix. Fluellen launched into ‘God pless you, Aunchient Pistol’, and soon Pistol was munching his way through a large leek. Fluellen happily took a bite out of another – greengrocers must love it when Henry V comes to town – and with Gower still missing we’re left with Pistol mourning the loss of his wife. He took the heart he’d given her out of his rucksack, and I almost felt sorry for the man. But then he headed off to England to cheat and con the population out of their money, so no chance of sympathy for him.

For the final scene, a throne had been placed on the right hand side of the stage, and a plain chair on the left. This was the chair the French king sat in during the ‘negotiations’; he also looked stunned and shocked at what had happened. Henry sat on the throne, and after the French king and the others had left, he wooed Katherine like a man not well equipped in the words department. So often these speeches are delivered in a way that makes the man out to be liar, but tonight I could well believe what he’s saying, that he would much rather fight than woo a woman. His attempts at French had Katherine in fits of giggles, and the kissing was done by each character kissing their own fingertips and placing them on the other’s mouth. When the French king and the rest came back, the peace treaty and the marriage were soon settled, and with his final lines, Henry left the stage. The chorus then finished the play, and we applauded mightily for such a good evening’s entertainment.

There were other songs during the play which I don’t remember specifically now, and the whole energy of the performance, plus the clarity of most of the dialogue, made the play seem fresh and new. Dugald Bruce-Lockhart seemed a little weak in some of his speeches, especially the earlier ones, but his performance grew as the evening went on, and I wouldn’t fault his portrayal in the second half at all. Tony Bell was great fun as Fluellen, and did a nice cameo as Mistress Quickly too. Chris Myles was very good as Exeter and Alice, with some lovely reactions in both parts, and I really enjoyed Gunnar Cauthery’s Dauphin – an arrogant hothead with no redeeming qualities whatsoever (although he did play the accordion very well). All the rest of the cast contributed strong performances too, making it a very powerful production. And this is just the opening week! We’re already checking the tour dates to see if we can fit it in again – I’d love to see how something this good can improve.

I was delighted to see the Yvonne Arnaud theatre packed out for tonight’s show; Propeller have established a great reputation for enjoyable productions of Shakespeare (Taming of the Shrew aside). We even had Jon Trenchard and Dominic Tighe nearby during the performance, both of whom had been in the Richard III from earlier this year. I hope the cast get as good a response on tour – they certainly deserve it.

© 2011 Sheila Evans at ilovetheatre.me

Three Days In May – October 2011

7/10

By: Ben Brown

Diretced by: Alan Strachan

Venue: Yvonne Arnaud Theatre

Date: Friday 14th October 2011

This is a play of two halves. The first half was a bit slow, introducing historical characters that needed no introduction for many of us, and setting up the central dilemma: with France nearly taken by the Germans, should Britain’s government consider negotiating a peaceful settlement, or should they focus entirely on resisting the Nazi advance? The official history held that they never thought about negotiations at all, but the reality appears to be that there were three days in May 1940 when the War Cabinet did debate such a possibility. Their final choice, to fight on, shaped our world in ways we probably haven’t fully appreciated yet, and by looking at this ‘wobble’, the play brings the importance of that choice into greater focus.

The set kept things relatively simple. The back wall was covered by a vast map of Europe, which obscured the two entrances to the Cabinet room. The entrance on the left was double doors, while there was a single door on the right. The raised platform in front of the wall held a long table, and there was a drinks table behind this. In front of the platform was a space which held the chairs at the start but was otherwise empty, and Jock Colville’s desk was front right. The costumes were naturally of their time, including Chamberlain’s Edwardian frock coat which he continued to wear.

The play was narrated by Jock Colville, Winston Churchill’s secretary at the time. We were shown the five Cabinet members – Churchill, Chamberlain, Halifax, Atlee and Greenwood – at prayers on the Sunday, followed by a meeting between Churchill and the French Prime Minister, Paul Reynaud. This triggered the Cabinet debate, with Halifax and Chamberlain keen to avoid the bloodshed of another war, and Churchill temporarily uncertain. Atlee and Greenwood didn’t push the matter initially, although they spoke up later on about the importance of keeping the momentum going so that the British workers (for these were Labour men) would be up for a fight. With Halifax threatening to resign if the negotiation option was ruled out, Churchill has to put pressure on Chamberlain to keep the War Cabinet together.

The second half started with Churchill and Chamberlain having a little meeting before the rest of the War Cabinet arrived. This scene contained most of the play’s humour, and livened things up a lot. Despite his natural inclinations, Chamberlain finally agrees to support Churchill, and keeps his word in the Cabinet debate. The play ends with Churchill smoking and drinking in typical fashion, while Jock gives us a brief update on the history, ending with a quote from Stalin. He leaves, and Winston is left in the spotlight for a moment, then they fade to black.

It was a good ending to an interesting play, as Ben Brown’s usually are. I did think the first half could do with being beefed up a bit; I felt we could have done with more background on just how much these men had been put off war from their experience of WWI (well, not Churchill, obviously). It’s hard to get into the mentality of the time when no one knew the outcome of these choices, while us knowing how things turned out automatically removes any possibility of suspense. But the second half made up for the first, and I thought all the performances were very good. Robert Demeger was not in the original cast, but was excellent as Chamberlain, while Warren Clarke did a very good impersonation of Churchill’s voice and delivery, so good in fact that I couldn’t make out what he was saying a few times early on. But I soon tuned in, and his stage presence was reassuringly strong. Jeremy Clyde was equally as good as Lord Halifax, and the rest of the cast were fine, though they didn’t have as much to do. It will be interesting to see how this gets on in the West End.

© 2011 Sheila Evans at ilovetheatre.me

Fiddler On The Roof – July 2011

9/10

By: Joseph Stein,  Sheldon Harnick and Jerry Bock

Directed by: Kenn Oldfield

Musical direction by: Martin Waddington

Company: Guildford School of Acting Graduate Company

Venue: Yvonne Arnaud Theatre

Date: Friday 15th July 2011

This was a three-hanky production, and very enjoyable with it. I started sniffling during Tevye’s first monologue, and then I was wiping my eyes loads of times. The graduates from the Guildford School of Acting were superb, and I do hope they go on to have good careers; they certainly have a lot of talent.

The set was the regular one, with lots of wooden slatted buildings, a milk cart and the marvellous sewing machine. The choreography also seemed traditional, appropriately enough. The cast involved us in the story right from the beginning, and although it was obvious that a number of them were much younger than the parts they played, I wasn’t put off at all by the false beards. Of course the music is fantastic, which helps, and the small band also did an excellent job, which made the evening just about perfect.

There was plenty of humour, although I do find myself wondering with this musical whether I should really be laughing at some of the jokes, especially between Tevye and the Constable, but the spirit of the piece and the resilience of the characters are just too infectious. Despite their suffering, I always feel uplifted at the end of Fiddler. Long may it be performed.

People to single out – Jacob Baumila as Tevye did a very good job. I was just a little distracted at first because he looked so much like someone I know, but his singing was excellent, and he delivered the lines very well. Natalie Lipin played Golde, his wife, and she was very good, though it took me a little while to spot that she was the mother as she looked a bit too young to begin with. The daughters, Tzeitel (Alia Grace), Hodel (Alys Metcalf) and Chava (Charlotte Mason-Apps) were all good. Alia Grace had more acting to do, and was very good at that, Alys Metcalf was a very good singer as well as actor, while Charlotte Mason-Apps danced as well as sang and acted – she should go far. Of the rest, I particularly liked Ben Riddle as the rabbi, ever ready to say absolutely nothing, Joe McCourt as the student, Pieter de Groot as the young Russian soldier who falls in love with Chava, and Louise Olley as the matchmaker. They were a great ensemble, and it was a very strong production.

© 2011 Sheila Evans at ilovetheatre.me

Verdict – May 2011

6/10

By: Agatha Christie

Directed by: Joe Harmston

Company: The Agatha Christie Theatre Company

Venue: Yvonne Arnaud Theatre

Date: Monday, 30th May 2011

This was a perfectly reasonable touring production; nothing spectacular, but decent performances all round. I’m an Agatha Christie fan myself, and although I recognize that she’s not the greatest writer, I do think she’s better than her critics admit. That said, there were one or two areas which I felt didn’t work so well tonight, and I’ll start at the beginning with the whole idea of using tableaux. It’s a dated style of theatre, and one I don’t particularly care for, as it can often lead to confusion. The play tonight started with Mrs Roper, the cleaning lady, standing centre back, spot lit for several seconds while the rest of the set was in gloom. I had no idea who she was at this point, so what was that for?

I’ll describe the set now, to save complications. It’s an unusual layout, so pay attention. To the left was a huge set of shelves crammed with books. Leaning against this was a wide ladder, and when the lights go up after the opening tableau, there’s a chap sitting at the top of the ladder, reading a book. In front of the shelves stood a pot plant stand and another table, which was next to Anya’s wheelchair when she was on stage. To the right of the shelves was an opening showing more bookshelves – this led to Anya’s room. To the right of this the stage was split into two levels. On the same level middle right was a desk with two chairs, one behind and one in front, and there was another chair and side table to the right of it. Behind these stood a dresser(?) of some kind with a drinks tray on it.

Across the middle of the stage stretched two wide steps, with a raised area behind. There was an opening off left which led to the front door, another opening in the middle which led to the rest of the house, and a large window to the right. There was a dividing door which was normally pulled back, but for one crucial scene it was drawn almost fully across the top of the stairs. There were books everywhere, a tray with water jug and glasses on the side table front right, and a telephone on the desk. Now read on (or not if you don’t want to know the plot).

The opening scene between Mrs Roper and the young man on the ladder, Lester Cole, set the scene a bit, so we know we’re in Professor Hendryk’s study (no idea what subject he teaches), and that he’s somewhat charismatic. When Lisa Koletzky turns up (Susan Penhaligon), we also learn that she’s chosen to look after Anya Hendryk, who’s been an invalid for five years, although Lisa’s training as a physicist would allow her to get a job anywhere. With her accent, it’s clear she and the Hendryks are middle European, and without knowing the time period accurately, images of them fleeing Nazi persecution flitted across my mind. However, the period is 1958, and anyway this isn’t a political play, it’s about the destructive possibilities of kindness and compassion.

It turns out that the professor’s kindness to a colleague he didn’t even like meant that he and his wife, Anya, had to leave their comfortable home and friends and move to London, where she is housebound, lonely and fretful (to put it mildly) and he has to work long hours to keep them in some degree of comfort. It’s not helped by his principled choice of providing extra tuition to poor students who show promise, and turning down rich students who may not be so able.

One such rich girl is the catalyst for his downfall. The professor has already turned Helen Rollander down, but she turns up, well, barges in really, while the professor, Anya, Lisa and Doctor Stoner, Anya’s doctor, are having a cup of coffee together. Helen demands that the professor take her on for extra tuition. She’s beyond tactless, this girl, with hints of budding sociopathology (we watch too much TV) and an obvious crush on the prof. The visit upsets Anya, who goes back to her room, and although the professor finally gets Helen to leave, her father, Sir William Rollander strolls in shortly afterwards with a much more persuasive offer.

Anya suffers from something-or-other sclerosis, which is apparently incurable. She’s confined to bed or a wheelchair, her hands have started to shake more, and she naturally gets cranky and depressed, with a side order of guilt because she feels she’s a burden to everyone. The prof still loves her, though, and it’s this that Sir William uses to get what he, or rather his daughter, wants. He can guarantee access to a select trial of a new antibiotic which has had good results in treating Anya’s disease in the US. The prof will do anything to help his wife – he’s still feeling guilty that he caused them to leave their former home – so he reluctantly agrees to take Helen on. She pops back in to pick up some books – she’d been waiting in the car while daddy worked his magic – and we suspected the massive volumes the prof gave her wouldn’t be read as thoroughly as he might wish.

That’s pretty much it for the first act, apart from confirmation that Lisa, a cousin of Anya’s, is also in love with Hendryk herself, which is her main reason for choosing to be there, and that the prof loves her as well, desperately but unattainably. In the second act, we see Helen confirming that she’s not much of a student, just a selfish, spoilt girl with the hots for the professor and a neo-Nazi attitude towards culling the useless members of the population, such as the professor’s wife, for example. With everyone else either out or about to leave, Helen uncharacteristically volunteers to sit with Anya till Lisa gets back – alarm bells are ringing. The doctor gives the prof a lift to his lecture, Mrs Roper pops out for yet another packet of tea (she’s the only one who drinks it), and so the cute cuddly bunny is left alone with the hungry python. What will happen next, we wonder?

It doesn’t take long. After a short exchange, where both women seem to find something in common, the clock chimes, and Anya exclaims that she needs her medicine. Helen offers to get it for her – four drops in a glass of water – and Anya obligingly tells her that it’s dangerous stuff and she mustn’t take too much, only four drops. Helen may not be the greatest intellectual on the planet, but she can add two and two, and so we see her tip the whole bottle (it’s a small one) into the glass. Anya comments on how strong it tastes, but Helen assures her it was only four drops, so she obligingly knocks it back. Within a couple of minutes, she’s dead.

Now Helen has to cover her tracks, which she seems to do pretty well. She puts her gloves on, takes the glass and empty bottle over to the table by the wheelchair, wipes them clean and then puts Anya’s prints on them. Then she heads off, only to return a few moments later, perhaps in response to our silent screams of ‘you’ve forgotten the water jug’. She puts that right, then leaves, and from the way she sets herself up to walk out of the door – head high, calm, self-assured – it’s clear she’s headed for a life of crime in the future, killing anyone who gets in her way. Always assuming she gets away with it this time, of course.

Shortly afterwards, Mrs Roper returns, and fails to notice the dead body cluttering up the living room. (Honestly, you just can’t get the staff nowadays!) She heads into Anya’s room to do some work (yes, I know, it shocked me too), so when Lisa gets back and does realise that Anya’s dead, Mrs Roper hasn’t seen her come in. There may well have been another tableau before the interval, but I don’t remember the details.

The second half begins with a tableau of the doctor, Lisa, the prof and young Cole, all standing on set with their coats on. When the action starts, they’ve just come back from the inquest into Anya’s death, which recorded an open verdict. Other than Cole, who’s come back with them to try and help, no one believes it was suicide, and the prof in particular believes it was a tragic accident. Lisa heads into Anya’s room to start clearing out her stuff – may sound cold, but she was just being practical – and later she and Cole take a couple of parcels to the mission, that period’s version of the charity shop. The doctor also leaves, and so the prof is alone when Helen comes to call. She’s nervous at first, but soon bounds back to full confidence as she declares her love for the prof and that there’s nothing to keep them apart now that his wife’s dead! She’s said some breathtakingly callous things already, but this takes the whole biscuit factory. He’s dismissive of her at first, so to show him how much she deserves his love, she confesses all to him – crazy, or what? When he realises what she’s done, he’s horrified, of course, and finally shows some anger. He makes it absolutely clear that he has no feelings of that sort for her, and she’s terribly upset. For once, when he tells her to leave, she goes, in tears.

Now you, I and the next person would probably call the police immediately if we found ourselves in this situation, but the prof is made of finer stuff. He reckons the poor child (who’s twenty-two, by the way) has never had a chance to develop such qualities as compassion, etc., but that there’s still a good person underneath her insensitivity, selfishness and murderous intent. The doctor sums it up more accurately later on, I feel, when he describes Helen as a cruel little bitch – that brought a small gasp from the audience.

This is where the central theme of the piece is brought out. Lisa comes back, and the prof tells her about Helen’s confession. She’s insistent that he call the police straightaway, but he points out that grassing up Helen (he didn’t use that actual phrase) wouldn’t bring Anya back, so to avoid blighting a young woman’s life, he won’t say anything. Why she doesn’t just pick up the phone herself, I don’t know, but soon the two of them turn their attention to their own, unacknowledged love for each other, and at long last they embrace each other for the first time. Unfortunately, Mrs Roper spots this through the translucent glass of the dividing door, which had been moved across at the start of the scene, and the tableau here has the two lovers, moving apart when they realise she’s there, and staring at her as she watches them.

In the following scene, the prof has just returned with the doctor a few hours later, and both Lisa and the doc go through the arguments again to try and persuade the prof to report Helen’s confession to the police. He’s still adamant that he won’t, and so, like some Greek tragedy, the consequences of his choice kick into action. A police inspector arrives, with his sergeant, and asks some more questions. They now reckon it was murder – any idea who could have done it? That sort of thing. The prof still refuses to implicate Helen. As a result, the police arrest Lisa. Mrs Roper has reported what she’s seen between the two of them, plus she found Lisa standing over the dead body with no alibi for what happened before that. Now the prof decides to come clean, but it’s too late. Not only does it sound bad, that he’s trying to implicate another woman when his lover is under threat, but it turns out that the evening paper he bought when he was out with the doctor earlier carried the story of Helen Rollander’s death! She’d been so distressed by the prof’s rejection that she’d run out into the road without looking and been flattened by a lorry. You couldn’t make this stuff up! (Um, actually……)

With Helen not available to change her story – that she left at Anya’s request before Mrs Roper got back – Lisa is arrested and tried for murder. The final scene shows the prof, doctor and Cole waiting for the eponymous result of the trial. The phone keeps ringing, but it’s always the press looking for something to print. There’s speculation about the verdict, but ultimately this scene is about the final confrontation between the prof and Lisa after the doctor and Cole have headed back to the court house.

Despite the evidence, somewhat miraculously Lisa was acquitted, and now she’s come back to collect a few things before starting a new life somewhere else. The prof is devastated – he wants to develop their relationship – but the writing was on the wall in the earlier scene when the professor allowed Lisa to be arrested without immediately offering the Helen option to the police. It still wouldn’t’ve worked, but at least he would have demonstrated loyalty to her instead of to his idealised principles. Ah well. She leaves, the doctor comes and goes, and then the prof is left alone to endure the anguish he’s created for himself. He puts on a record of the Tristan And Isolde song that was an integral part of his first meeting with Lisa, and sits down on the floor to weep.

That’s the end of the action, but the final tableau involves Lisa coming back on to stand at the rear of the stage, still in her coat and carrying her suitcase, with her and the prof spot lit. Curtain. This final tableau caused some confusion within the audience. Some thought she’d come back, some that it was just his fantasy, while others, like me, thought it was just to emphasise the final situation – that’s what these tableaux usually do, after all. I have no objection whatever to ambiguity, but in this case I felt the confusion undercut the resolution of the play, and we’d have been better off without it. Still, we did enjoy ourselves, and the rest of the audience seemed appreciative too.

So what else didn’t work so well? Writing this, I’m aware how creaky the plot is in places, but the writing and acting were both good enough to keep the ship afloat. Cole’s character was a bit of a puzzle. His purpose in the opening scene was to show the professor’s compassionate nature; when Cole finally confessed to selling one of the books the prof had loaned him, so that he could take a special girl out on a date, the prof lets him off the hook, glad that he’s owned up to it, demonstrating his unusual approach to ethics. Fair enough, but thereafter Cole is a bit of a spare wheel, always hanging round, and frankly without much reason for it and with very little to contribute. No reflection on the actor, of course – Agatha has to take responsibility for this one.

The part of Mrs Roper, on the other hand, is a little gem; a nasally charwoman who likes helping herself to the prof’s cigarettes as well as the tea, and ready to bitch and pry at a moment’s notice. It was a lovely performance from Elizabeth Power, and as well as the comic relief, she instigates one of the crucial turning points of the story.

The other performances were all fine, and the play built up a nice degree of tension towards the end. Although we’d seen this play back in 1984, I didn’t remember it as such, though I was confident about which way the story was going, so perhaps the memories were closer to the surface than I realised. I found the delivery a little patchy at times, so I missed some of the dialogue; I think that was mainly down to the accents, although Susan Penhaligon was fine throughout.

© 2011 Sheila Evans at ilovetheatre.me

The Reluctant Debutante – February 2011

7/10

By: William Douglas Home

Directed by: Belinda Lang

Venue: Yvonne Arnaud Theatre

Date: Tuesday 15th February 2011

Despite a quiet start, this became a rollicking good comedy, with a marvellous final act leaving us well pleased with our evening. The performances were all fine, although I find Jane Asher doesn’t manage scatty or neurotic very well – she always seems so organised and self-contained. Even so, the part came across well enough, and with good performances from the younger actors, and a great comic turn from Clive Francis as the reluctant father-of-the-debutante, we had a great time.

The set was a large sitting room in a London apartment, hired for the season by the Broadbent family, father, mother and seventeen year old daughter, Jane. Colours were basic cream, there was a table on the right and a sofa and chair on the left. The front door was off back right, bedrooms off back left, and the door to the kitchen was on the left behind the sofa. The telephone was prominent, sitting by the back wall beside the wide entrance to the sitting room. The costumes were naturally splendid, as befits a summer season with young ladies being presented at court.

The story worked itself out nicely. Jane isn’t keen on the young men she’s had to spend time with at the numerous balls and events so far. In fact, to her mother’s great concern, she doesn’t seem interested in young men at all, preferring her horse, Thomas, instead. Since William Douglas Home is a safe pair of hands, we can be fairly sure there’s no likelihood of lesbianism making an appearance, and sure enough it simply needs a misunderstood rakish sort with a preference for water and biscuits to change Jane’s mind. She’s fortunate enough to have two men after her though, both of them called David, the aforementioned rakish type and a Guards officer whose conversation is limited to car routes, and who has a nasty habit of grabbing young woman to try and kiss them. He’d tried it on before, at a weekend party, and when the young lady in question fled his embrace, she sought help from Jane’s other suitor, leading to the misunderstanding which brands him as a ne’er-do-well. Fortunately, he’s also the heir to an Italian Duke, and when his great-uncle dutifully pops off, leaving him with a title, Mr Broadbent soon takes advantage of the situation to change his wife’s mind about the Italian gentleman’s suitably as a husband for their daughter. We’re left with Mrs Broadbent, blissfully ignorant of the young man’s change of fortune, telephoning the new Duke to invite him to dinner, positively gushing in her excitement at Jane landing such a great prospect. I wonder what her expression will be when the Duke turns up for dinner.

I enjoyed a lot of the comments about the debutante production process, with references to the white slave trade and cattle markets. And the obvious mistaken identities were good fun too, along with Jane’s precocious understanding of sexual relationships, although she doesn’t quite grasp the idea of a ‘working girl’, probably to her father’s relief. Steve felt the audience were slow to get going, finding himself laughing at a lot of lines pretty much on his own; I just felt it was a bit of a slow-burner in the first act, but I still found several funny lines which weren’t getting the recognition they deserved. Anyway, it all turned out well in the end, so we went home happy.

© 2011 Sheila Evans at ilovetheatre.me

Quartet – June 2010

6/10

By Ronald Harwood

Directed by Joe Harmston

Venue: Yvonne Arnaud Theatre

Date: Friday 25th June 2010

It’s early days still for this new play by Ronald Harwood, and although there’s some excellent material here, there’s still scope for further polishing. The four hugely experienced actors were all fine – Timothy West in particular seemed to relish his part – though I felt a few funny lines missed their mark, whether through audience inattention or a slight mis-timing I wasn’t sure.

The set was quite impressive. To right and left were two imposing walls, with a door in the left one. At the back were some large arches with light coloured curtains or blinds in front of them. A baby grand was back left, some chairs and a table front right, with another chair front left. There was a sofa centre back in front of the curtains, and on either side just past the performing area were some hospital screens.

The story took place in a retirement home for musicians, and the four characters we meet are former opera singers, now in their twilight years and living in the home through necessity or, in one case, choice. All four know each other, though as it turns out not biblically, and all sang together in a production of Rigoletto, the recording of which has just been reissued.

One of the home’s traditions is to hold a gala performance on October 10th, Verdi’s birthday, to honour the great man. These four are asked to sing together, and the play is mainly about how they get over their ‘professional’ and personal difficulties to perform the famous quartet from Rigoletto as the gala’s star turn.

Along the way there’s a great deal of humour, mostly to do with the ageing process, and of course we come to know the characters very well as past secrets are uncovered and some kind of peace made with both the past and the present.

For the finale, the stage is cleared of all but the side walls, as the quartet take to the stage to demonstrate the talent of their earlier days. They do this by miming to the CD of their greatest hit, although I didn’t realise that was what was going on until the next day. I mean, I knew they were miming, I just didn’t register that it was a deliberate choice on the part of the characters at the time. In my defence, I will point out that Rigoletto is one of the few operas I have seen staged, it was a magnificent production – the set for the final act received a round of applause on its own – and it’s also one of the most moving experiences I’ve ever had in the theatre (i.e. I cried a lot). So naturally the music brought back the memories, which brought back the sniffles…… So I was clearly in no state of mind to grasp what was going on, m’lud. The defence rests.

There was a bit of (planned) heckling from the audience just before the final song, and when the music ended, so did the play. While I think that there’s still more to come, we did enjoy ourselves, and I hope the tour does really well.

© 2010 Sheila Evans at ilovetheatre.me

Stop Messing About – June 2010

6/10

By Brian Cooke and Johnnie Mortimer

Directed by Michael Kingsbury

Venue: Yvonne Arnaud Theatre

Date: Friday 11th June 2010

This radio series originally followed on from Round The Horne, just as this show is building on the success of that program’s stage tours in previous years. Unfortunately, it’s not quite as funny as the earlier shows; the humour seemed more dated, with references to products and radio stations, etc. that folk younger than us might struggle to recognise, and the lack of an ‘authority’ figure like Kenneth Horne weakened the mix. And of course, there was no Julian and Sandy sketch.

Even so, there were a number of very good sketches, such as the legal chap reporting on recent cases, the phone-ins and the film adaptations. The presenter for this show was Douglas Smith, and he and Joan Sims flirted with and flattered each other outrageously throughout the evening, while Kenneth Williams threw his usual strop in each half, and Hugh Paddick also inserted some of his other work, as well as taking over the important special effects, per Equity regulations, from the lowly presenter – another bit that worked well. The set was similar to the Round The Horne ones, but updated to reflect the Sixties style. All in all, an enjoyable night out.

© 2010 Sheila Evans at ilovetheatre.me