A lot of dance this month, starting with Birmingham Royal Ballet’s Stravinsky triple bill. Petrushka was a bit of a museum piece and in The Firebird they allowed the spectacle to overtake the ballet (but the music’s always lovely), so it was the newer production, Le Baiser de la feu which we enjoyed most; the [...]
Archive for November, 2008
The Rest of November
Posted in Art, Classical Music, Contemporary Music, Dance, Film, Opera, tagged Art, Classical Music, Contemporary Music, Dance, Film, Opera on November 30, 2008 | Leave a Comment »
Any Which Way
Posted in Theatre, tagged Theatre on November 30, 2008 | Leave a Comment »
Yet another unique experience on the fringe. This is a short drama about knife crime performed as a promenade production by prisoners and ex-offenders in a converted chapel near Kings Cross. It is excellent realistic story-telling and the performnces and staging were exceptional by any standards.
Daedalus & Icarus
Posted in Theatre, tagged Theatre on November 26, 2008 | Leave a Comment »
An Iranian theatre company with the story of Icarus, but you’ll be hard pressed to make any sense of it (even with supertitles).
Full marks for originality, but also full marks for irritating, dull and pointless.
Surrealism with Beckett and Ionesco influences and a touch of Chaplin!
Bizzarre and a rare BITE dud.
Sweeny Todd
Posted in Theatre, tagged Theatre on November 24, 2008 | Leave a Comment »
After great productions of The Pyjama Game and The Mikado, the Union Theatre now give us a Sweeny Todd which looks like it was created for this space.
I saw the first outing (on the London fringe) of the Christopher Bond play which inspired Sondheim and it seems so appropriate that his musical comes back to [...]
Imagine This
Posted in Theatre, tagged Theatre on November 21, 2008 | Leave a Comment »
Who on earth decided to put this on?
It’s really well staged, there are some great performances, the music is always listenable and occasionally lovely (if rather derivative of Lez Miz et al) and the idea of linking the Warsaw ghetto with Masada is a good one…..
…..BUT a musical is absolutely the wrong vehicle for [...]
Othello
Posted in Theatre, tagged Theatre on November 19, 2008 | Leave a Comment »
This is a highly original shortened version of Shakespeare’s play from Frantic Assembly with lots of movement / dance and a loud music soundtrack.
I’ve loved most of their work, but when I heard they were to attempt Othello I thought it a tad over-ambitious. How wrong!
Transferered to a Leeds pub in the present day, the story [...]
Rain Man
Posted in Theatre, tagged Theatre on November 18, 2008 | Leave a Comment »
This iconic film about autism transfers to the stage surprisingly well. The relationship between the brothers becomes more moving close up live. It’s well staged and I liked the poignant unresolved ending.
The audience is full of movie actor Josh Hartnett’s young fans, but the real reason for seeing the show is another terrific performance from Adam Godley.
Calendar Girls
Posted in Theatre, tagged Theatre on November 16, 2008 | Leave a Comment »
After the mediocre reviews of its run at Chichester, I saw this is Cambridge expecting mediocrity.
Actually, it transfers to the stage rather well, well balanced between ‘moving’ and ‘funny’ with a great set of performances by ladies of a certain age, including Patricia Hodge and Linda Bellingham
The cast’s enjoyment was infectious and the the audience [...]
To Be Straight With You
Posted in Dance, Theatre, tagged Dance, Theatre on November 16, 2008 | Leave a Comment »
It’s a welcome initiative to make a show about the homophobic excesses of other minorities – those that consider themselves persucuted persecuting others.
It blends terrifying verbatim stories with stylised movement. It’s not DV8’s best work, but it’s an important subject handled well with a few terrific moments. I’d have liked as much dance / movement as is [...]
Creditors
Posted in Theatre, tagged Theatre on November 11, 2008 | Leave a Comment »
This staging of Strindberg’s timeless drama has a great design but I found the performances rather mannered (in the ‘Les Liasons Dangereus’ style of it’s director Alan Rickman).
I love the Donmar but on this occasion spending 90 minutes in the comapny of a bunch of thoroughly unpleasant and irritating characters didn’t make for a good night out.
