Truth and Fiction

Not really a proper post - more a gem courtesy of Francis Alexander at The Chelsea Theatre today - but thoroughly worthwhile nonetheless.

"Theatre is a fiction concerned with the truth, while live art is a truth concerned with a fiction."

It makes an awful lot of sense and sounds great, so I like it a lot.

Review: Crocosmia, Battersea Arts Centre

Another week, another award-sweeping Edinburgh show at the Battersea Arts Centre. Where Between the Devil and the Deep Blue Sea proves an accomplished debut reliant on a strong, original concept well-applied but under-interrogated, Little Bulb Theatre’s Crocosmia is an accomplished debut lovingly crafted from microscopic details into something simultaneously heart-warming and heart-breaking.

At first glance the Brackenberg family seems a tightly-knit, quirky unit with the sort of chirpy romanticism usually reserved for Disney films. Quaintly resourceful and imaginative, the children – Finnley, Sophia and Freya – gnaw goldfish from carrots and learn to trim shaving-foam beards with razor-fingers, while their parents revisit Paris via an overhead projector. However, such idiosyncratic wholesomeness disintegrates once we learn that the Brackenberg children were orphaned in a car accident.

Accordingly, perspective slides and the children’s actions slip from kooky to coping mechanisms. The nauseating niceties of their parents become the mistaken whimsies of a child’s eye view muddled with faint, fond memories. Finnley, Sophia and Freya – played faithfully, delicately and fidgety by Dom Conway, Shamira Turner and Claire Beresford – seem caught between simultaneous pressures of maturity and regression. Indeed, there is something totemic about their taking on the parental characters; a notion furthered by their devouring of Battenberg cakes used to represent the choicest of family memories in the inspired Brackenberg Battenberg Puppet Theatre.

If that all sounds cutely sentimental and overly intellectual, Crocosmia balances itself out superbly through a constant sense of muted mania. With surrealist snippets such as ‘Freya Knows Best’ and the “Superfishy Underwater Orchestra”, director Alexander Scott has imbued the rhythm and energy of a television magazine show, accompanied by an eclectic soundtrack that manages to combine precision with seeming arbitrariness. Furthermore, the use of language of display is delightful. Sentences stumble and stagger clumsily creating such childish gems as; “Before you shave the beard, you must first have the beard.”

All in all, Crocosmia marks Little Bulb Theatre Company as a company to be watched with the beadiest of eyes. It is a petite, fragile and beautifully original piece of work that will set the sturdiest of chins aquiver – even as it raises a pursed smile. Utterly enchanting.

Love/Hate Relationship

I was recently asked, as part of an application form, to write 80 words on what I hate about theatre. Unexpectedly, I found myself having far more to cram in than with regards my loves. I thought I'd pop the text down here: partly, because I quite enjoyed writing it; partly, because somehow it serves as a useful introduction to everything that surrounds it on this blog and partly, because I'd be interested to see what others will come up with in response to the same question.

What do you hate about theatre?

I hate theatre that neglects form for content; theatre that places too much emphasis on cause and effect, believing audience reactions to be universal, mechanical and, therefore, predictable; theatre that assumes us blind to its cracks and shortcuts; theatre that wishes it were television; theatre that forgets that fiction only exists as created by the imagination and investment of the individual spectator. Essentially, I hate theatre that gives itself too much credit and treats its audience without due consideration or respect.

The Perfect Filling

For the lone theatre-goer, foyers are menacing halls of hubbub. You stand there, drink in hand, rooted to the spot, surrounded by conversing clumps. You are out of place, an isolated asocialite in the midst of a nightmarish drinks party. You flick through the programme and feign interest in the jazz; you make for corners and stare mindlessly at production stills. And then, mercy of mercies: the house opens.

I love little more than finding myself alone in a large auditorium before a show. It allows for a strange, gradual immersion, much like sitting in a bath while you run it. It allows the senses to adjust and the real world to fade to a distant, forgotten shadow. Just as a deep-sea diver must pause at regular intervals to avoid decompression sickness, so too must the audience member occasionally ease himself into a performance. Where walking into a bustling auditorium involves an immediate sensory shift – like the marked temperature change on entering a sauna – to sit through that warming process is to appreciate the magic of a space transformed. It is a remarkably relaxing experience.

An empty theatre is a void that exists in contented stability - all around you is an impervious stillness. For the majority of the day, the space has sat in idle equilibrium, mulling time, reminiscing. It need not wheeze into life but for the expectations of those gathered outside in the foyer. It hears them approaching and attempts to look lively. You enter into a sea of monochrome grey or red velvet; an insignificant blot on a constant colour scheme. The air feels heavy and deadened, any ripples through it absorbed into padding and disappearing entirely inconsequentially. Like walking through a church, your eyes drift upwards, but there is no click-clack of heel on stone. All is muted by carpet.

In the auditorium’s doorways the slightest of leaks appear, as droplets of humanity squeeze through. A handful of bodies speckle the seating, breaking its silence with whispered conversational nonentities. Gradually, the leak worsens and an irregular trickle appears in the aisles. The first suggestions of ritual emerge, as coats are shed and bags are tucked. There is a hesitancy about people. They stand at the end of rows, clutching ticket stubs to which they refer meticulously. “G19. This is us.” It’s said with a nervy confidence – almost a staking of territory.

A strange half-dance begins, as shambolic, broken conga-lines side-shuffle along rows. Now all around you is noise, soft and comforting. Through it pop phrases, snagging in your ears: “yesterday afternoon,” “Oxford Circus,” “Alan Bennett.” Then, to your immediate left, one rings louder. A simple “‘scuse me” interrupts the haze of sound. Looking to your left, you see a middle-aged couple – sideways on, of course – peering down with sycophantic smiles. You swivel to let them pass – a generous act repeated courteously, customarily deemed an inconvenience, but somehow empowering.

The trickle has become a stream, which will soon develop into patient clots around doorways. Rows of previously empty seats are now reduced to patches of bare material. Air kisses take place over their backs. Waves are thrown from one side of the room to another. The gentle babble has grown into a constant rhubarb, vibrant and warming. Then, you are joined to your right and joined a second time. Suddenly, you are in the middle of something. The words, “So this is dance is it?” tumble over your shoulder, quickly followed by the reply, “Well, dance-theatre.”

Suddenly, the room is a patchwork quilt of hair and balding crowns. Bodies lean around each other, mouths talk over one another. Rhubarb is clamour. You can no longer tell where one cluster ends and another begins. In front of you are chains of shoulders and behind, an amorphous plane of expressions. Clamour peaks at restless expectancy as doors are unhooked and the room is sealed. Waistcoated ushers melt unnoticed into corners. The lights dim and with them the noise descends to silence, broken only by the strains of another world.

Review: The Snow Queen, New Wimbledon Theatre Studio

Written for The Stage

With its sense of expedition and an array of fantastical characters, The Snow Queen makes perfect material for small-scale visual theatre. However, Finger in the Pie’s Lecoq-inspired production is little more than a series of set pieces strung clumsily together that subordinates storytelling to stage trickery.

A quaint metaphor for adolescence, Hans Christian Andersen’s fairy tale recounts Greta’s quest to rescue her best friend Kay from imprisonment at the Snow Queen’s arctic palace, encountering rivers, robbers and reindeers en route.

Aiming for a cutely continental production, director Alexander Parsonage commits a host of elementary errors. While his direction starts brightly and displays sporadic flashes of neat invention, too often it boils down to physical illustration of a clunky, over-simple script and dressing-up box literalism, whereby grandmothers wear bonnets and seductive horticulturalists floral dresses.

However, thanks to the rosy-cheeked energy and wide-eyed enthusiasm of Ana Mirtha Gutierrez as Gerta, the piece’s misgivings never result in tedium. Even as Greta’s travels reduces to a generic sense of journeying, Gutierrez is quirkily humorous and charmingly watchable throughout.

Without wanting to be cruel, The Snow Queen is an amateurish effort, altogether reliant on its leading actress and the charity of its audience.

Review: Between the Devil and the Deep Blue Sea, BAC

Written for Culture Wars

Given the garlands and praise heaped upon 1927’s debut production, it’s difficult to approach Between the Devil and the Deep Blue Sea without expectations of brilliance. Thankfully, at its core is a partnership so snug and dexterous that it delivers with stylish aplomb. Susan Andrade’s deliciously wicked texts combine with Paul Barritt’s animation to create morsels as moreish as the darkest of chocolate truffles.

Essentially, Between the Devil and the Deep Blue Sea is a series of pop-gothic vignettes, akin to Improbable’s Shockheaded Peter, telling of faceless tooth-fairies and gingerbread revolutionaries. The trick up its sleeve lies in the seamless interplay of live action and projection, whereby cartoon arrows pierce performers’ heads and sepia-toned lithographs spring to life. Served alongside Lillian Henley’s piano accompaniment, it resembles a silent film possessed and running amok in an empty auditorium.

Andrade and Esme Appleton perform with the utmost of dainty vulgarity – their carefully placed looks of mischief and plummy RP accents elevate the infantile cruelty of Andrade’s bittersweet poetry. They are at their best as orphaned twins so coldly courteous that butter is more likely to freeze over than melt. Having cremated au-pairs and cemented lodgers, the pair turn ominously to the audience in search of a replacement grandmother ripe for torment.

For all the aesthetic delights of Barritt’s delicately homespun animation and Andrade’s text, however, Between the Devil and the Deep Blue Sea needs a touch more variety of content and interrogation of form to really dazzle. In relying on sensory titillation and wry humour alone, it can, at times, seem an extended cabaret act teetering dangerously close to smugness.

Nonetheless, with its slick accomplishment and gossamer gore, Between the Devil and the Deep Blue Sea is a sublime antidote to sugary festive cheer.

Review: Peter Pan, Richmond Theatre

Written for The Stage

It’s panto by numbers down in Richmond, where Family First Entertainment’s Peter Pan ticks all the boxes without much individual flourish. While it’s well-balanced festive nutrition, it emerges somewhat flavourless, needing just that bit more sauce and seasoning.

If Bonnie Langford will ever grow out of the boy who wouldn’t grow up, she shows no signs of it here. Her perennial Peter Pan is a chipper young buck with more showbiz glitz than boyish mischief, as she mixes some fearless aerial tumbles with a flashy white smile. By comparison, Simon Callow’s diaphragm-busting Captain Hook makes something of a gentle nemesis, having to actively seek disapproval from his audience. Sterling work from Tony Rudd as Smee injects humour, life and - mercifully - pace into proceedings.

Peter Denyer and Fenton Gray’s adaptation is light on Barrie’s plot, with Hook submitting rather easily to his own plank and little exploration of the Darling family home. While there is plenty of (stocking) filler, 2008 gets off rather lightly. Aside from the rotting carcass of Jonathan Ross at Marooner’s Rock, the preference is for televisual references over topical ones.

This, however, provides the evening’s musical highlight as the pirates indulge in a five-part harmony of catchphrases, featuring Bruce Forsyth, Peggy Mitchell and a Dalek.

Terry Parsons’ pop-up book design elevates professionalism, but production values get in the way of spirit. Projecting Tinkerbell removes the magic of make-believe and an unnecessarily realistic crocodile loses its comic menace.

In lacking real character of its own, Richmond’s Peter Pan only flies with an abundance of good will.

Playing with, not by, the rules

In life, I am a stickler for rules. I have always struggled to break curfews, miss deadlines, lie to figures of authority, walk on the grass or commit adultery - primarily on account of never having married. I cannot stand the possibility of my being late for anything that matters. At the merest chance of stepping over a line of some sort, apologies tumble out of my mouth and I sweat volumes that could close the M25. Perhaps, as with many of my character traits, it has to do with being 5’6”. Perhaps, I just believe rules are there for a reason. Perhaps, I just leave the breaking of them down to others.

When it comes to performance, however, I turn anarchist, or, at least, the equivalent of a smoker lurking behind the bike-shed.

Just over a week ago, I went along to the BAC to catch Mind Out, the latest performance/theatre piece by Station House Opera. Mind Out attempts to break the connection between body and mind, whereby each performer’s actions must conform to the instructions of another’s mind: “You pour the milk”; “You stir the tea”; “You want to ask a question but think better of it.” Lyn Gardner described the result as “akin to watching a group of marionettes trying to exert their free will”. For me, the opposite was true – the performers seemed human in form but not in essence, devoid of free will and control. I was reminded of the emptiness of those children that underwent the intercision process in Phillip Pullman’s His Dark Materials, separated from their daemons and utterly broken.

Over the hour and a half of Mind Out my interest almost entirely waned. Where I began pricked with interest and tickled by the apparent irrational and counter-intuitive dislocation of action and motivation, I found the overall event tiresome, draining and tedious. For me, Mind Out was crippled by its use of the rules it set itself. Put simply the game was one person commanding, another obliged to carry out that command. However, since the ‘game’ is not actually played out in the moment, the performance resembles an improv exercise set in stone by virtue of being scripted. A minor quibble is that the chain of command becomes murky. At first, it follows an obvious circle – A commands B, B commands C, etc – but this soon shifts wordlessly, such that any rule seems to disintegrate.

My main problem, however, is that for the majority of the time Mind Out plays by the rule rather than with the rule. In doing so, it becomes somewhat monotone; a limited sphere of possibility whereby peaks and troughs barely register on the Richter Scale. It is little more than a series of actions, often knowingly comic in themselves, performed by stick-men and women. Only rarely does the rule set actually cause challenges or twist itself in knots. The deconstructed making of a cup of tea, shared and split between five performers proves difficult and, as such interesting. When Julian Maynard Smith commands an absent performer around the space, the same rules allow for distortion and, crucially, difference.

In sport, rules exist to set boundaries. They exist to be played by in order that the game is fair, that both sides are on the same pitch and page, that all is equal. However, it is worth noticing that the papers pick up on the rules breaks – the dives, the dissent and the disputes. As much as moments of brilliance within the rules, sport’s drama rests in its human and ethical controversies. Theatre, given that its concern rests with aesthetics as well as ethics, need not concern itself with equality. It can and, indeed, ought to tip the balance and break the rules. Theatre must rely on opposition, on the drama of struggle and the spark of solution, by foul means or fair. It is in the rule-breaks or clever reinterpretation of the rules that theatre can vary its rhythm. Moreover, given that its rules are self-created and self-imposed, theatre can be totally free to break those rules. A piece owns its own rule system and can do with it what it will.

Returning, then, to Mind Out – I needed to see ambiguous commands that left interpretation down to the performer. I needed to see commands that could not be followed. I needed to see a series of commands that got in the way of each other, clashing and conflicting – the one preventing the fulfillment of the other. I needed to see performers commanded into dangerous situations, whereby dissent and refusal was the only possible reaction. I needed to see rebellion and risk, break downs and break ups, military coups and constitutional reform.

Not just four people eating the same biscuit between them.

Photograph: Tristram Kenton

Review: Brilliant, Lyric Hammersmith Studio

Written for Culture Wars

Brilliant is to children’s theatre what Picasso and Pollock are to visual art. Dispensing with the usual rules of narrative, character and interaction, Fevered Sleep has created something altogether more responsive and gloriously freeform. It borders on live art; almost post-dramatic theatre for pre-schoolers. If that sounds overly highbrow, the work itself is not, since the shift in form registers neatly with its young audience, delighting the senses and sparking the synapses.

The final part of Fevered Sleep’s trilogy that delves beyond everyday routines to the magic therein, Brilliant hones in on bedtime or, more precisely, on the threshold between waking and dreaming. Having bid goodnight to the universe and all it contains, performer Laura Cubitt settles down to bed with her toy stag and slips into sleep. Behind curtains that open and close like heavy eyelids, Cubitt emerges into a dream-world of light that plays around the space.

What follows is almost a pas de deux between performer and light, whereby the interplay of performer’s body and intangible beams is fascinatingly otherworldly. Cubitt pops through luminous membranes into shady hollows and dances softly in radiant droplets in front of the glow of an enormous moon.

As the sturdiness of waking reality gives way to a dreamy fluidity, the scene’s logic blurs with it and Cubitt takes on elements of a bemused Alice in a shimmering Wonderland. As switches and mirrorballs plop from above, her dream becomes a causeway of cause and effect, each switch responsible for a stream of light, or a maze of reflection and refraction.

Yet all of this is temporary and fleeting, closed off and shut down by the curtains that draw her back into bed with a bump.

Director David Harradine displays a careful layering within the piece, which functions simultaneously as titillating light-show and physical poetry. With a soft score from double bassist David Leahy that captures the rippling fragility of the dream portrayed, Brilliant proves an aptly named exploration that drifts between dozy calm and ticklish dream.

Review: The Time of Your Life, Finborough Theatre

Written for The Stage

Beginning with a burp and proceeding with equal delicacy, Max Lewendel’s tedious production saps the metaphor and melancholy out of William Saroyan’s Pulitzer-winning portrait of the Great Depression.

Saroyan’s play is more observation than action, sketching the layabouts, prostitutes and directionless masses propped up in a San Francisco dive-bar, as they search for meaning and dream of love. Amongst them are Joe (Alistair Cumming), an unshaven, champagne-swilling hangover of the Roaring Twenties, and Kitty Duval (Maeve Malley-Ryan), an escort with jaded ambitions in burlesque.

By placing us within Nick’s bar, seating audience members at tables within the scene, designer Christopher Hone immerses us in the location. However, Lewendel struggles to reconcile production with design. Stagnant blocking undermines the traverse formation and much of the acting is over-pitched. Moreover, the audience’s place in the scene is confused – alternately acknowledged and ignored.

Lewendel’s production is crippled by its lack of nuance in performance. Several characters are reduced to stock for cheap laughs and dialogue is delivered with Hollywood iconicity. Other than Brett Finlay (Nick) and Payman Jaberi (The Arab), the best one can say of the cast is that it is the largest to have squeezed onto the Finborough’s stage.

Icarus Theatre Collective has served up a sparkling vintage gone absolutely flat.