Review: Othello
February 19, 2009
Date reviewed: 18 February 2009
Venue: West Yorkshire Playhouse
For any vegetative, bed-ridden hermits who’ve nailed down the lids to their unmolested letterboxes but somehow read Whatsonstage.com: the West Yorkshire Playhouse and Northern Broadsides production of Othello stars Lenny Henry. Media reactions have formed a cauldron of confusion, scepticism and curiosity. Several explanations have been hinted at: an admirable and brave but perhaps foolish display of affection for The Bard’s work; an insult to the integrity of theatre; a parable about the decadence that ensues if a celebrity takes leave of his or her self-awareness. However, in dusting Broadsides out of the way to permit an undisturbed focus on Henry, an important point has been ignored: that Broadsides wouldn’t do a production of Shakespeare that it didn’t feel confident would be taken seriously.
Review: The Hounding of David Oluwale
February 6, 2009
Date reviewed: 4 February 2009
Venue: West Yorkshire Playhouse
Considering how I might respond to The Hounding of David Oluwale before I saw it ushered me toward the question of what theatre’s purpose is. There’s a canyon between what seems an appropriate response to fictional and factually-grounded tragedies. When you see a great production of Hamlet, for example, it moves you, and you derive pleasure from, and feel admiration for, its ability to move you. However, it would surely be frivolous to treat a dramatic account of a real man’s downfall purely, or perhaps even primarily, as entertainment. To be moved seems fitting; to enjoy the fact that you have been moved does not.
Review: Only When I Laugh
February 4, 2009
Date reviewed: 3 February 2009
Venue: Harrogate Theatre
After an initial week at Greenwich the Love & Madness Ensemble is touring Jack Shepherd’s new play, Only When I Laugh or A Class Act, through Scotland and the North, with its first stop at Harrogate. Sadly there is no sign of the play living up to its sub-title.
Review: Let ‘em Eat Cake
February 1, 2009
Date reviewed: 29 January 2009
Venue: Leeds Grand Theatre and Opera House
The Gershwins’ Of Thee I Sing was one of the hits of 1931 and became the first musical to win a Pulitzer Prize; the follow-up, Let ’em Eat Cake, caused barely a ripple in 1933. Maybe by 1933 the Depression had just got too depressing and audiences wanted Ginger Rogers singing “I’m in the money”. Maybe the absence of potential hits counted against it: despite the through-composed style of much of both operettas, Of Thee I Sing still had the title song, ‘Love is Sweeping the Country’ and ‘Who Cares’. But my guess is that its cosmopolitan creators aimed too much of the satire at European targets for an American audience of the 1930s which was quite happy with Ruritania on stage, but balked at fascist dictatorships. Read more
Review: Company Along the Mile
January 27, 2009
Date reviewed: 23 January 2009
Venue: West Yorkshire Playhouse
Tom Bidwell doesn’t lack ambition. For his first full-length play, he has written a piece that effectively consists of two extended scenes inhabited by three characters without an interval. Not only this, but he cited Harold Pinter, Joe Orton and Tennessee Williams as the writers from whom he took inspiration. However, it’s fair to say that Company Along the Mile is in little danger of approaching the sort of hubris that might lead some of the country’s less restrained student theatre companies to ask for its hand in marriage. It is, after all, a personable comedy set in a Blackpool hotel room.