34 replies to this topic

[mallardo]

Ah, yes, the car.  That interminable opening scene - and then they went back to it!  I pretty much agree with you re the play but I thought Kate O'Flynn was sensationally good.

[xy_whitefaerie]

Latecomer, I think we were in the same show- I thought I had missed something when the man laughed during the scene (I was cringing, initally because of the violence in the scene then because of the inapproapriate laugh).
I was in row H and heard the dialogues fine when the girl had her back towards the audience in the car scene , though I did wonder whether people sitting further back could hear her clearly.

Rather disappointed with the play as I had quite high hopes of it. The opening scene was too draggy that it got a bit annoying. After that it became slightly better and I quite liked the scene between Racheal and Danny. But it had to end with the car scene again... I guess it didn't help that I was tired on that day- struggled to stay awake in some scenes and follow the story. My friend got us the free cast list during intermission, which helped put things in perspective a little as it had the characters' age and the settings.
Kate O'Flynn was probably the only redeeming factor in the play. It was wonderful watching her grow into the adult Racheal.

[Latecomer]

I found the changes of scene and time quite distracting....spent the time going "oh so that has happened, so must be x years later. Ah so the brother is x years old, that means he was y years old at the start. Right so it's the millenium that means she is z years old" This distracted me and not in a good way. I thought Kate O'Flynn was great and there was the occasional interesting bit in the play, or bit where the dialogue was good, so perhaps I am being a bit harsh, but I was definitely bored, never surprised and frequently distracted by mental arithmetic!

[Laughingmonsta]

I thought this was sensational  - and I loved sitting in teh midst of 100s of tutting middle class National goer's who thought that this couldn't really be what living in Stockport during the 80s & 90s was like...guess what, It was!

[mallardo]

Point taken, but is verisimilitude really the issue?

[Honoured Guest]

I'm blown away when I see some theatre that strikes as being really true and personally relevant. It stops me in my routine theatregoing tracks and makes me question why I bother seeing all the other stuff which may be excellent in some ways but which doesn't address me directly. The specific location of a show and the nature of its audience also plays a big part in a show's effect. The Lyttelton at the National Theatre of the South Bank with its habitual regular attenders doesn't seem the ideal choice for a play about growing up in Stockport. I suspect that Simon Stephens's primary intention wasn't to construct a showpiece for an excellent emerging actress to delight the jaded bourgeoisie of South East England. But that's where it's playing, so that's where I'm going.

[xanderl]

I enjoyed this, there were a few walkouts when I saw it

I was surrounded by a school party who were impeccably behaved unlike the trad nt types!

[Cardinal Pirelli]

I'm not usually a fan of realism but I really liked this.

I come from near Stockport and the dialogue and situations rang so true that it was painful at times. It's so good to see the National being, you know, National.

[PaulT]

Latecomer, on 17 February 2013 - 03:46 PM, said:

Mediocre. Didn't like this at all. All very predictable and not particularly well done. I hated the car at the beginning...couldn't hear dialogue when the girls head dipped behind the dash and I was in 2nd row. Acting was ok but this felt very dated and I got bored. Sorry.
Things were livened up a bit when a spotlight fell out of the set, mid scene, from above the dressing table mirror but not for long....

I agree with everything (and we both really like Simon Stephens' work).
The only funny thing was when the mobile phone fell off the stage.  A chap in the front row put it back on stage as the lead looking for it: this was the best part of the play.

[Nosferatu777]

I thought it was absolutely bloody atrocious, easily the worst thing I've seen at the National since "August: Osage County". This was yet another production that proves beyond any doubt that you should never, ever, under any circumstances, cast adult actors as children in a "serious" piece (I guess it works well enough in panto or comedies where the bad acting is part of the humour). You often hear that we have some of, if not the, best Performing Arts schools and colleges in the world - so bloody well use them then!

I'm really not getting the praise for O'Flynn but then I was so annoyed with her shouty, screechy, OTT scenes in the first half that I may have missed a better performance in the second. Not that she was the worst though - the actress playing the Grandmother appeared to be doing a "turn" from a bad 70s sitcom, "Billy" was never above a caricature at any age and even a usually reliable acftor like Calum Callaghan as "Danny" couldn't seem to hold his accent properly (I sympathise with the commenter who was annoyed by having to do the mental arithmetic, actors who can't sustain a proper accent is my equivalent of that - incredibly distracting). The only actor that came across as remotely believable or "real" in his role was Jack Deam as the Father.