Florian Zeller’s The Forest – review

Toby Stephens and Paul McGann share the honours as a man on the edge

★★★

Production photo of Toby Stephens and Gina McKee in Florian Zeller's The Forest at Hampstead Theatre in London 2022 — Toby Stephens and Gina McKee in The Forest. Photo: The Other Richard

French playwright Florian Zeller’s work has become familiar to British audiences thanks to plays like The Truth, The Lie, The Height Of The Storm and the trilogy of The Mother, The Father and The Son. His new play The Forest is the first to receive its world premiere in the UK, and comes on the back of the award-winning film of The Father with Anthony Hopkins.

So you probably know Florian Zeller’s approach to playwriting. It started as an innovative way of getting inside people’s minds. In The Father, it was a brain confused by dementia, in The Mother, a mid life crisis, in The Son a depressed teenager. He achieves this by having the characters act out their lies, self deception, false memories, fears and desires, often repeating scenes with variations of dialogue or even characters, and none of it is necessarily in a linear narrative. So it’s both exhilarating and exhausting. Throughout his plays, we are asking ourselves What is the truth? What actually happened? For which there may or may not be an answer.

As time has gone on, what was surprising and original has become a signature style. It may even be in danger of becoming a cliché- but not yet! Once again, Zeller brings alive a potentially mundane story.

In The Forest, the subject is a married hospital consultant who has been having an affair with a younger woman. As she demands that he legitimises their relationship, he is overtaken by fear about what that would do to his marriage and career (the two of which are tied together, at least in his head), not to mention guilt at betraying his wife.

From the start, we are in familiar Zeller territory. We are plunged into a confusing jigsaw of scenes in which we see the adulterer’s changing memories, fantasies and fears. The title refers to a story about a prince out hunting, who in pursuit of a stag that ultimately disappears, becomes lost in a forest.

Each of the three acts (there’s no interval by the way) begins with the same or at least a similar scene. The first scene sees Pierre, referred to in the cast of characters as Man 1, and played byToby Stephens, arriving home. His wife is clearly agitated. Their daughter’s long term boyfriend has been having an affair. Pierre talks to the girl about his indiscretion. ‘Don’t worry. Everything’ll work itself out’ he says. Pierre uses a conversation with the daughter to talk about his thoughts about a man having affair. Perhaps his memory is playing tricks because on the second occasion, the daughter isn’t there and he talks directly to his wife. This time he’s talking about their child’s reaction, indicating that he is concerned about his wife’s reaction to his own affair. The third time, the daughter barely gets a mention but the room has filled with flowers.

The no-strings affair is now tied up with his marriage and career

Then there’s scene two. A middle-aged man, referred to as Man 2 and played by Paul McGann, is in bed with a young woman. We’re not in doubt for very long that this is also Pierre. I’m guessing that, in his mind, Pierre has separated his affair from the rest of his life. In other words, he becomes a different person, a kind of alter ego. Before long, we are seeing the same or a similar scene but with Toby Stephens, just as Man 2 is Pierre in the third iteration of the opening scene. This indicates I think that the once no-strings affair is now tied up with this marriage and career.

Toby Stephens is brilliant as Man 1. His ready smile becomes a nervous grin. He leans back which at first seems relaxed but eventually looks like he’s reeling from blows. Paul McGann holds his own as Man2, showing a brittle harshness that soon collapses into panic.

Pierre’s character is complex and rounded. The other characters less so, perhaps because they’re part of his memory and imagination.

The treatment of the Girlfriend in the first bedroom scene is a case in point. When she gets out of bed and you see her partly naked before she puts on a shirt. Perfectly normal in real life of course but these days, you rarely see gratuitous nudity on stage, so we must assume there is a good reason for this. Actually, in the script, she is fully naked for the whole scene. I take it that this underlines that Pierre saw her as no more than someone he has sex with. She’s only given a name later as he starts to take her threat more seriously. Excellent as Angel Coulby’s acting is, there is little personality for her to get her teeth into.

Gina McKee makes the most of her limited role

Despite the limitations of the script, the glorious Gina McKee shows fine acting skill in managing to suggest there’s a lot going on the Wife’s head. Through a combination of strangled speech and sideways glances, she conveys a lack of passion that might have been a reason why Pierre strayed, insecurity, and the possibility that she suspects something.

Anna Fleischle‘s set is in three parts: a living room, a bedroom above the living room, and an office to the side. Each setting is invisible until the lights come up on it. The first two are built with tremendous attention to detail, and this naturalistic setting helps suggest that all that is going on in Pierre’s brain is happening while he continues to live out an everyday life.

The office is the exception. It’s pretty bare and seems to be where Pierre’s conversations with his conscience take place, or possibly interrogations by the police. He is being held in the room by a white faced man in black, chillingly played by Finbar Lynch. He looks like a character from an early horror film and wheedles Pierre with questions as he alternates between a good cop and bad cop style from a police procedural. The biggest question being ‘What happened?’

So what did happen? How did the affair end? What was the fate of the Girlfriend? Well, we can never be quite certain. There are some dramatic and shocking moments which turn this play into almost a thriller as well as a who-dun-it. Director Jonathan Kent is to be congratulated for the pace, and imbuing all that goes on with an almost Hitchcockian suspense, helped by Isobel Waller-Bridge‘s edgy sound design.

By the end, we have been given some explanations (or are they?). The problem for this and other Zeller plays is that the truth, if and when it’s discovered, may not be as interesting or exciting as the process that led to the revelation.

The Forest continues at Hampstead Theatre until 12 March 2022

Paul was given a complimentary review ticket by the producer

Click here to watch this review on the One Minute Theatre Reviews YouTube channel

February 2, 2022May 4, 2023

Spike by Ian Hislop & Nick Newman – review

An entertaining look at a comic genius but without his anarchic spirit

★★★

Production photo from Spike by Ian Hislop and nick Newman at The Watermill Theatre in Newbury UK — Spike at The Watermill Theatre. Photo: Pamela Raith

Spike by Nick Newman and Ian Hislop at The Watermill Theatre is a labour of love. Spike Milligan had a long association with Private Eye and the authors, both from the magazine, clearly feel great affection for him. However, they faced three challenges in conveying his comic genius, and weren’t entirely successful in overcoming them, despite devising an entertaining play

Firstly, I’m not sure that many people under 60 will know about Spike Milligan or remember The Goon Show. He was a brilliant comic writer and performer, best known as the writer of The Goon Show. Trouble is, the last Goon Show to be transmitted on what was then called the BBC Home Service was back in 1960, followed by a couple TV specials over the next decade or so.

It was Milligan’s surrealist and absurd humour that made The Goon Show a phenomenal hit. He was an acknowledged influence on future comedies and comics including Monty Python and Eddie Izzard.

After The Goons, Milligan continued to be a fountain of anarchic humour. He wrote poetry, plays, and books, and appeared in a number of TV programmes through the 70s and 80s. He died twenty years ago.

The Goon Show is still what he’s best known for and that’s what this play concentrates on. We see the early resistance from the BBC to the Spike’s revolutionary and rebellious style, through to the show becoming hugely popular. We also learn about Spike’s difficult personal life, his traumatic experience as a soldier in the second world war and his mental illness, and how the pressure of writing the Goon Show took its toll.

Secondly, the actors playing Milligan and his fellow Goons Peter Sellers and Harry Secombe cannot hope to recreate their genius: their voices, their timing, their understanding of each other, the way they perform as if they have just seen the script and are enjoying it as much as the audience.

Sensibly the cast don’t try to do impressions of the originals. Instead, they act out their own interpretation of these characters. Which makes it an interesting story about three friends but nothing like as funny as you might expect from a show about The Goons. The jokes are there, of course, particularly plays on words- a sign on Milligan’s door says ‘Do not disturb, I’m disturbed enough already’- but they cannot hope to deliver them with the power of the actual Goons. The voices can never be quite as ridiculous nor the irony as sharp.

Production photo of John Dagleish in Spike at The Wtermill Theatre in Newbury — John Dagleish in Spike. Photo: Pamela Raith

I’m not in any way denigrating the actors. John Dagleish as Milligan is an excellent comic actor with a great plasticine face and he plays his part with verve, giving a strong impression of a man on the edge. George Kemp as Sellers and Jeremy Lloyd as Secombe provide excellent support. Robert Mountford represents the stiff voice of authority very well. Margaret Cabourn-Smith, James Mack and Ellie Morris complete a talented cast.

The tortured comic genius is a familiar trope. Stories of artists rebelling against and being rejected by the establishment until they are finally embraced are familiar too. But, in the case of Milligan, it’s a tale still worth telling.

To beef up the laughs, the writers cleverly weave in an almost discrete story about the sound effects. Sound effects were an important part of The Goon Show. Spike Milligan set the challenge of producing surreal sound effects. Margaret Cabourn-Smith, in Joyce Grenfell mode, humorously explains how they were achieved. Perhaps because the audience has no ‘original’ to compare this with, she gets the most enthusiastic response of the evening.

Director Paul Hart, who is The Watermill’s Artistic Director, keeps up a good pace, so you won’t be bored. Katie Lias helps with a set designed to change quickly from a recording studio to various offices, a battleground, a pub and Spike’s home. She uses the back of the stage well. Often there are Milligan-ish cartoons telling us the location of the scene, and projections high up suggest the state of Milligan’s mind.

Which brings me to the third challenge. In a play mainly about Milligan’s mental state, how do you convey his exploding mind? Yes, John Dagleish sparks with happiness and crumples with despair, and yes, the story tells us how, in his mind, his battle with army officers becomes a battle with the BBC authorities. It’s an interesting observation of him but the play doesn’t get inside his head. It’s conventional in a way that Milligan would never have been. In producing a tribute to Spike Milligan, maybe Nick Newman and Ian Hislop should have injected their play with more of their hero’s anarchic spirit.

Spike is at The Watermill Theatre in Newbury until 5 March 2022

Paul received a complimentary review ticket from the producers.

Click here to watch this review of Spike on YouTube

January 27, 2022May 4, 2023

Elizabeth McGovern in AVA The Secret Conversations – Riverside Studios

McGovern is terrific, shame about the script

★★★

Productyion photo of Anatol Yusef & Elizabeth McGovern in AVA The Secret Conversations — Anatol Yusef & Elizabeth McGovern in AVA The Secret Conversations (Photo: Marc Brenner)

It might have been best if the conversations in AVA The Secret Conversations (Riverside Studios) had stayed secret. Having said that, there is one major strength in this production: Elizabeth McGovern. She may never have been a sex goddess like her character Ava Gardner but she sure can act. Best known today as Lady Cora in Downton Abbey, she has been a regular on screen and stage for her whole adult life, and it shows. She conveys brilliantly a woman in later life struck down by illness, looking back in puzzlement, at what she had and what she still retains.

Elizabeth McGovern is also the writer. On the strength of this play, she might be better to stick to acting. It’s based on a book by Peter Evans in which he wrote about his experience as a ghostwriter working with Ava Gardner on a planned autobiography. That’s both its strength, in that we get insights into her character from the way she interacts with him, and its weakness, in that the interview format prevents a deeper look at what actually happened in her life.

I’m going to assume that a film star (even one of the sexiest in cinema history according to Empire magazine), who hit the heights in the 50s and 60s, isn’t going to be of that much interest to today’s audiences. Maybe lovers of old movies will have a soft spot for The Killers, The Barefoot Contessa or The Night Of The Iguana, but any new play about her has to excite because of the character created here and now on the stage.

The play, directed by Gaby Delial, does establish that Ava is (or was) an interesting woman. She came from a poor country background and stumbled into Hollywood almost by accident. She clearly had something that the camera loved. This quality goes beyond being physically attractive to conveying an image that suggests ‘sex’ to large numbers of people. Whatever it is, she had it, and the studios exploited it. It seems her many lovers were attracted to her image more than her. Her marriages to Mickey Rooney when she was still a virgin, bandleader Artie Shaw and most famously Frank Sinatra were crammed with sex, which she says she greatly enjoyed, but they were short-lived, suggesting that sex could only sustain her relationships for so long. Interestingly divorce or the end of a sexual relationship didn’t stop her from having long-lasting friendships with some of her lovers, Sinatra included.

I didn’t feel much wiser by the end as to what made Ava Gardner a sex symbol, whether her failed relationships were due to bad choices, whether her enjoyment of sex clouded her judgement of character, or why so many people became attached to her as a friend and she to them.

Peter’s publisher, whom we hear on the phone, is particularly, and repeatedly, keen to know the size of Frank Sinatra’s penis. Apparently Ava had alluded to it in a previous interview. We never find out, and that seems true in this play of so many of the questions we might ask about Ava.

Ava Gardner is the only rounded character

The problem I think is in the writing. Anatol Yusef is an excellent actor but I never felt he was at home in the role of Peter Evans, the would-be novelist who doesn’t really want to write a pot boiler biography. And when he enacts scenes as Ava’s various husbands, none came to life. The script didn’t seem to me to create a rounded picture of Peter Evans or the husbands, in the way that it did of Ava. Mickey Rooney is reduced to ‘child like’, Artie Shaw to ‘controlling’, Frank Sinatra to ‘a hot headed drunk’. It seems like Ms McGovern wanted to write a play about Ava Gardner but Peter Evans got in the way. However, since this whole edifice is built on Peter’s interpretation of his conversations with Ava, it might have useful to gain more insights into him. I couldn’t detect any chemistry and therefore I had no reason to believe they would develop a close relationship, which is important to understanding why and how she fell in love with other men in her life.

There is a dramatic climax but the structure of the play doesn’t really lead up to it. The curtain goes up on their first meeting and comes down with their last. In between, their relationship does develop and we do get to know Ava a bit, but mainly we are given a parade of tantalising glimpses into the life and career of a fascinating woman who as she puts it (and I paraphrase here) ‘made movies, made out, and made a mess of her life. But never made jam.’

What we most certainly do get is a poignant picture of a person in her twilight years, full of memories but unable to understand what they add up to. And that is thanks to an impressive performance by Elizabeth McGovern. She starts as something of a wreck, before gradually gaining confidence, until by the end she regains the glamour and power of old.

AVA The Secret Conversations. Photo: Marc Brenner

There is one other star of the show and that’s the set. It’s credited to 59 Productions who specialise in integrating projection into live performances, but it’s not so much the way clips of Ava Gardner’s films are layered into the show, it’s the actual use of the proscenium arch by their designer Hannah Rozenberg that caught my eye. It starts with a small aperture on the right revealing Peter Evans answering the phone to Ava in the middle of the night. To the left, a larger oblong opens to show Ava’s flat (and it is a flat in London, not a Los Angeles apartment). That pros arch opening varies in shape to match various cinema screen formats that she worked in. Eventually, as the star and her ghostwriter become closer, the two sections join into one large set. Almost worth seeing for the set alone.

AVA The Secret Conversations is running at Riverside Studios in Hammersmith London until 16 April 2022.

Click here to watch the review of SAVA The Secret Conversations on YouTube

January 12, 2022May 4, 2023

Pride & Prejudice* (*sort of) – review

The Funniest Show in The West End

★★★★

Production shot featuring the cast of Pride asnd Prejudice Sort Of at the Criterion Theatre London — Pride & Prejudice* (*sort of) at The Criterion

Some critics have acclaimed Pride & Prejudice* (*sort of) as the funniest show currently in London’s West End. I was late seeing this little gem at The Criterion, but I can’t disagree.

It is an outstanding achievement by Isobel McArthur. She not only wrote it, with a little help from Jane Austen, she also co-directed it with Simon Harvey, and stars in it.

What’s particularly clever about her take on Pride & Prejudice is that, although it’s a spoof, it is extremely faithful to the story. Much of the comedy derives from the same situations that are funny in the book, and it is, at key moments, quite moving. I was surprised at how touched I was by the ending.
So, she has paid homage to the qualities of the story and some of the dialogue, while extracting a great deal more lol.

It’s funny before it even starts, when we’re presented with the concept of five modern working class women playing early 19th century maids who recreate the story with makeshift costumes and props. So we have the bathos of this classic story and its characters being presented from today’s perspective. There’s 21st century language, including a lot of swearing: Darcy is described as a ’twat’ (and that’s one of the milder insults). Elizabeth tells Mr Collins exactly what he can do with his marriage proposal. So, there’s the shock of seeing Jane Austen’s reserved characters, who normally use sensitive language, mouthing expletives. But there’s also the anachronism of party food at a ball being Pringles and Wagon Wheels.

Is there no end to Isobel McArthur’s talents?

Of course, the basic material is great. Pride & Prejudice is not only Jane Austen’s most popular work but one of the most read novels written in the English language. That’s thanks in no small part to the character of Mr Darcy, played over the years on screen by Laurence Olivier, Colin Firth and Matthew McFadyen. To that pantheon, we can now add Isobel McArthur.

There have been many excellent takes on Pride & Prejudice, like Lost In Austen, Bridget Jones’ Diary, Pride & Prejudice & Zombies and a Bollywood musical Bride & Prejudice. It is without question a crowded market, but Pride & Prejudice* (*sort of) manages to stand out.

To add to the enjoyment, it’s actually a musical comedy. The story is interspersed with moments when the characters grab a microphone and sing classic romantic pop songs like Will You Still Love Me Tomorrow, Holding Out For A Hero, Young Hearts Run Free and You’re So Vain (about Darcy of course). And Lady in Red, a song by Lady Catherine de Bourgh’s relative Chris de Burgh! It’s tremendous fun, a bit like karaoke at a hen night.

The cast of five take on all the parts. Isobel McArthur is a wonderful Darcy. She conveys very well the stiff reserve that conceals a romantic heart. In addition, she plays an even more coarse than usual Mrs Bennet. Tori Burgess creates a truly obnoxious Mr Collins, Christina Gordon plays Lizzie’s sister Jane and the appalling Lady Catherine de Bourgh.

There were two understudies on the night I saw it, which is par for the course at the moment in theatre, mainly because of the Covid. I had been looking forward to seeing Hannah Jarrett-Scott and Meghan Tyler who are both highly experienced actors and were very well reviewed. However Annabel Gordon did well as quietly desperate Charlotte trapped in her hellish marriage, as well as playing the soppy Charles Bingley. Leah Jamieson acquited herself well as the strong-willed but annoyingly self-satisfied Elizabeth Bennet.

Sometimes the characters are too much of a caricature and I did expect, having set the idea in motion, that the play would give us more of the maids’ angle on events than it actually did. But it is rich in ideas and displays non-stop creativity.

I particularly liked the moment when Elizabeth looks at a painting of Darcy and Isobel McArthur slides behind the empty frame to pose as the portrait, whose eyes then follow Lizzie round the room.

There is one simple set, designed by Ana Inés Jabares-Pita, that suggests a rich household, not dissimilar in décor to the lovely Criterion Theatre, using minimal props, and with books as a motif. It features a magnificent centrepiece of a wide staircase that winds all the way up to the flies, with steps supported by books.

This is a light hearted and lightweight play. It doesn’t have the depth of Laura Wade’s Austen inspired comedy The Watsons, which I saw at The Menier, and which was due a West End transfer before Covid struck. Nevertheless, it’s just what you need to cheer you up in a year that has started as depressingly as the last one ended.

Covid is scaring audiences away from theatres, which is a shame, because this is a show that should be selling out, and looking forward to a long run, rather than closing prematurely. I recommend you to see it while you can.

Pride & Prejudice* (*sort of) is performing at the Criterion Theatre in London until 6 February. An autumn 2022 tour is planned with a possible return to London in 2023.

Click here to watch this review on YouTube

December 14, 2021May 4, 2023

Best Of Enemies at Young Vic – review

The best new play I’ve seen this year

★★★★★

David Harewood and Charles Edwards in Best Of Enemies by James Graham at the Young Vic in London. — David Harewood and Charles Edwards in Best Of Enemies at the Young Vic. Photo (c): Wasi Daniju

Best Of Enemies at the Young Vic is the best new play I’ve seen this year. James Graham’s writing is vivid, funny, and shocking. There are towring performances by the two leads David Harewood and Charles Edwards. And the production directed by Jeremy Herrin with a set by Bunny Christie is perfect.

Given the subject matter – the 1968 presidential election and in particular some televised debates between the influential conservative thinker William F Buckley and the liberal writer Gore Vidal – you might think Best Of Enemies is not for you, but you’d almost certainly be wrong. I know it sounds boring but believe me, in the hands of writer James Graham and director Jeremy Herrin, it becomes electrifying theatre.

Best Of Enemies may tell us a lot about the polarised society we live in today, but it does so in the form of a gripping entertainment that takes us inside the heads of two protagonists, narcissistic to the point of recklessness.

The play begins with the immediate aftermath of one of the later debates. There is anger and shock at language that has been used, although at that point we don’t know what’s been said or how it’s come to this. We then go back and see that the story began with ABC TV News, in a race for ratings, deciding to have well known intellectuals talking about the Presidential conventions, at which the Republican and Democratic candidates are elected.

This is about the corrupting influence of TV and there are three big screens high up at the back of the stage to remind what viewers are seeing, as well as showing us the studio control area. We see how the participants both take part because they see it as a way of promoting themselves. We then see over a series of debates how the confrontational format generates more heat than light.

We and they realise that how they come across is more important than what they say. Buckley’s wife Pat says: “That’s all this is. Who do I like the most?’ At the end, Vidal prophesies that this means that one day a candidate could get elected because he was more likeable rather than having the best policies. Don’t we know it?

Okay, that’s the bones of it but what James Graham has done is flesh that skeleton with bits of verbatim speech from the debates and lots of fictional dialogue that brings to life the two protagonists.

Electrifying performances by David Harewood and Charles Edwards

The two leads charge the production with electricity. David Harewood plays William F Buckley. You might be surprised that a Black actor is playing a right-winger whose whiteness was part of who he was, but a good actor inhabits the role. In this case, the role is of a man not comfortable in his own skin. Mr Harewood relishes the part, not only the external mannerisms, tics and lip licking and other nervous affectations, but also the inner person- the loneliness of the outsider, the devoted husband, the foundation of his beliefs, and the desperation to win. He does a remarkable job of making us feel sympathy for someone who could so easily be the villain, because of his racism and homophobia. When the first debates go badly for him under an onslaught from Vidal, I actually felt sorry for him. Then we see him planning to raise his game.

Charles Edwards conveys the smooth charm, razor wit, the insufferable superiority, obsession with power, and the vulnerability of Vidal. He was a patrician and his sense of superiority, while insufferable, helps him dominate those early debates. Then Buckley prepares better and starts to score points, and as Vidal squirms, so do we.

They are both intellectuals and they’re both narcissists. They want to win the debate so they can be more influential in the world of politics. Each of them is delighted when they’re recognised by leading politicians. They’re not portrayed as bad people, their extreme views seem to be more like an academic exercise than something from the heart, but they do have hearts and it’s their pride, and above all their desire to win that drives them from civilised conversation to conflict to playground name calling. Both seek out each other’s weaknesses, initially of their arguments but eventually personal ones, and you find yourself not wanting to look, as their feelings are exposed.

They live in ivory towers, not what most of the electorate would recognise as the real world. Obsessed by their personal dislike of each other, they don’t even anticipate the effect of their clashes on the world of politics, which is moving from compromise to polarisation. In the real world things fall apart.

We are shown something of what’s going on in that real world of 1968: Robert Kennedy and Martin Luther King are assassinated; an extreme feminist shoots Andy Warhol; there are protests about the Vietnam War. Looking back, we see that this was the beginning of the end of consensus politics and the start of polarisation: Left v right, young v old, plus conflicts of gender, race and sexuality. And on the other hand, there’s the so-called silent majority which Presidential candidate Richard Nixon appealed to. So tempers are rising, creating a sense of a pressure cooker.

The set itself is a small open stage surrounded on three sides by audience, turning the protagonists into gladiators in an arena.

All the other actors are first class. Among them, there’s Clare Foster as Buckley’s cheerful wife Patricia, Syrus Lowe as the angry but expressive James Baldwin and John Hodgkinson who plays the chair of the debates, revelling in the viewing figures but out of control of the wild horse he is riding. It’s only a cast of ten but they take on many characters, all well delineated, so you might think there were twice as many actors. It seems like every one of the characters has a contribution to make and every line has something to say.

Under the direction of Jeremy Herrin, this production zings along. As with the Wolf Hall trilogy or James Graham’s This House, which he also directed, he uses movement to add a physical excitement to the dialogue. I like the way he and James Graham make politics exciting. Because politicians shape our country and it’s a crying shame we find them boring or see them reduced to personalities.

Why were they the ‘best’ of enemies? They needed one another and they’re really quite similar.

Best Of Enemies is performing at the Young Vic until 22 January 2022. Performances will be streamed live on 20, 21, 22 January, 7.30pm, and 22 January 2.30pm GMT. Tickets from youngvic.org

Paul received a complimentary review ticket from the producers.

Click here to watch this review on YouTube

November 25, 2021February 16, 2023

Andrew Lloyd Webber’s Cinderella – review

Ignore The Butcher Of Broadway, this is a winning show

★★★★

Production photo from Andrew Lloyd Webber's Cinderella featuring Carrie Hope Fletcher and others at the Gillian Lynne Theatre London — Carrie Hope Fletcher (left) in Andrew Lloyd Webber’s Cinderella. Photo: Tristram Kenton

Andrew Lloyd Webber’s Cinderella opened to largely positive reviews but more recently the production has been butchered by the New York Post’s Johnny Oleksinski, potentially scuppering a Broadway launch.

According to Britain’s leading showbiz reporter Baz Bamigboye of the Daily Mail, Milord Lloyd Webber is so concerned that he is considering revising the show. So what did the new Butcher of Broadway (Baz’s description) say about Cinderella, and why do I disagree with him?

I don’t need to sum up Johnny’s opinion because he does it himself: ‘Bibbidi-bobbidi-cut 30 minutes! Bibbidi-bobbidi-scrap the set and costumes! Bibbidi-bobbidi-more jokes and dancing!’

The Butcher Of Broadway (Baz’s description) first buries his cleaver into the writer of the book and original story, Emerald Fennell:

‘Problem is this revisionist “Cinderella” isn’t dark and brooding like “The Phantom of the Opera.” With a book by Oscar-winning “Promising Young Woman” scribe Emerald Fennell, it fancies itself a musical comedy, like “Guys and Dolls” or “Hairspray.” But at the matinee I attended, the silent crowd might as well have been watching Ibsen.’

An audience can enhance or dampen your enjoyment, and I’ve sat through a few ‘dead’ matinees in my time. So, the ‘silent crowd’ could have affected Johnny’s appreciation of the show. At the performance I attended (which was a Sunday matinee, by the way) the audience laughed, cheered and clapped throughout, ending with an almost universal standing ovation. I can’t deny that the atmosphere added to the pleasure I got from the show.

The Transformation scene just before the interval did leave me feeling underwhelmed (it’s no Wicked or Phantom in that respect) but the Ball at the opening of act two more than made up for that.

Too long? I enjoyed every minute

‘For a straightforward tale, the show takes its sweet time — a good two hours, 45 minutes all told,’ continues Johnny.

First of all, that timing includes a 20 minute interval so it’s actually well under two-and-a-half hours, which is quite short for a musical. I guess any new show can be tightened up, once the audience’s reaction has been gauged, but I myself would be hard pressed to know what to cut since I enjoyed every minute.

So what is this apparently longwinded ‘revisionist’ story? You don’t need me to tell you that it concerns a ‘Bad Cinderella’, that earworm has been widely played. She lives in Belleville, a tourist destination whose attraction is based on the physical beauty of its citizens. Cinderella is a rebel whose activities undermine the town’s reputation. She’s in love with her best (and only) friend, the heir apparent Prince Sebastian. Not Prince Charming who has been lost, presumed dead, in a war. Sebastian loves her too but neither will admit it for fear of damaging their friendship.

She falls into the trap of believing he wants a glamorous beauty queen and undergoes a transformation at the hands of a nip-and-tuck Godmother. Inevitably her plan goes wrong and there are a few twists and turns before the happy ending.

The so-called ‘revisionist’ message is that you shouldn’t judge by appearances, and that character is more important. There is a wonderful moment when a macho male character reveals that he is gay and introduces us to his fiancé. There was a spontaneous roar of approval from the audience which made me feel delighted at the way in which public attitudes have changed since I was a lad, a feeling tempered only slightly after the show when I heard a woman say: ‘I didn’t know where to look when the two men kissed.’

So, for me, an interesting story, with plenty of twists and fun.

Scrap the set and costumes? This is a fairy tale, not a concert

‘Scrap the set and costumes… drab and forgettable,’ moans Johnny. His recommendation seems to be a ‘bare stage’, or at least that’s when he says this production was at its best. I expect he’s looking forward to the concert version. There is a short time when the stage is bare but I totally disagree that this was an advantage. This is a fairy tale, even if it’s been turned on its head, and it needs a fairy tale look. And, for me, that’s what we get with Gabriela Tylesova’s set which is a mixture of the rococo style of 18^th century France and Bavarian castles, reflecting the time when the version of Cinderella we know and love was written. At the same time, it is not done in icing cake colours and is surrounded by slightly sinister thorns, suggesting that all is not well in Belleville.

Production photo from Andrew Lloyd Webber's Cinderella featuring rebecca trehearne and other members of the cast at the Gillian lynne Theatre — Rebecca Trehearne and other members of the cast of Andrew Lloyd Webber’s Cinderella. Photo: Tristram Kenton

Her costumes are clever too. We have bare-chested, muscular men in tight lederhosen, evoking the mid-European period setting while emphasising their macho narcissism. The women are given sumptuous, brightly coloured gowns but with sexually suggestive splits, underlining their shallow attitude to relationships. Except, of course, for the rebellious Cinderella , who is clothed like a Goth with a black dress and Doc Martins.

‘More jokes and dancing,’ pleads Johnny. It’s hard to understand why he would want more jokes because Cinderella is full of innuendoes. Maybe he just doesn’t find that kind of joke funny. Admittedly some hit the mark, some missed, and some were deliberately designed to make you cringe. For example, one of the hunky knights invites Cinderella to ‘polish my sceptre’.

Rival mothers Rebecca Trehearn as the Queen and Victoria Hamilton-Barritt as Cinderella’s stepmother got plenty of laughs for their Ab Fab haughtiness and sly bitchiness.

David Zippel‘s lyrics have wit and feeling. Take Bad Cinderella:

Yes I’m bad Cinderella, I will not say goodbye
You’ve been hateful since I met you
Barking mad Cinderella, flying high in the sky
And I hope I have upset you
Well, forget you!

As for dancing, they never stopped moving from the opening number of villagers going about their business- and admiring the baker’s buns (more innuendo)- to the Finale. Joann M Hunter‘s choreography is imaginative, energetic and stage-filling, and totally in tune with the varying moods.

The Butcher Of Broadway also takes the boning knife to the director Laurence Connor, declaring that his ‘plodding, one-note direction is the production’s biggest offender’. If you find a show dull, it’s likely the blame lies with the author, the director or the cast. These are not always easy to separate. I found the production had plenty of pace, and struck many different notes between energetic ensemble numbers, comic routines and the pathos of love gone wrong. I would attribute this to the director bringing out the best of the book, cast and music.

Johnny praises the cast but, as I said, it can be hard to separate direction and cast, so, if the show was plodding on the day Johnny attended, it is possible that some of the performers were having an off day. It does happen that a cast, especially at a matinee, just don’t generate the energy needed for a show like this. Baz Bamigboye reported that Andrew Lloyd Webber had had a go at the cast, following Johnny Oleksinski‘s review, so maybe he thought some of their performances needed sharpening, rather than the direction. I obviously don’t know and I can only say the cast were full of energy and commitment when I saw them a few days later, and gave some excellent perofrmances.

Carrie Hope Fletcher leads an excellent cast

Carrie Hope Fletcher plays Cinderella. She has such an open-faced smile and sweet, powerful voice that’s it’s hard to imagine anyone else playing the part. However, her alternate Georgina Onuorah has had many favourable comments, and that’s who Johnny saw, and liked.

Ivano Turco as Prince Sebastian has a good singing voice and conveyed well this shy, sensitive, good-hearted lad.

And then there’s the music. Here Johnny and I agree. He praised Lloyd Webber’s ‘heart-racing ballads’. He’s right. Bad Cinderella is a stand-out song but the slower, plaintive, soaring ballads Only You, Lonely You sung by Prince Sebastian and Cinderella’s I Know I Have A Heart represent Andrew Lloyd Webber on top form. I’ve never been a big fan of his lush light operatic music but I freely acknowledge he can write a good tune. In this case, his traditional melodic style and big orchestral arrangements seem perfect for the subject matter.

Johnny Oleksinski feels ‘There is a satisfying musical buried somewhere in Andrew Lloyd Webber’s “Cinderella”. ‘ Once they’ve added more jokes and dancing, cut half an hour, and changed the story, script, sets, costumes, and director, presumably.

I wonder if there is a clue in the way Mr Oleksinski writes his review as to why he is critical of so much of the production. Right at the beginning, his reference point is the 1950 Disney film Cinderella. ‘Bibbety Bobbity’ he quotes. Could it be the British lord inadvertently trampled on an American child’s happy memory?

We British on the other hand have been brought up with Cinderella pantomimes in which subversion (and innuendo) are the norm. There’s no Buttons in this production, a character who traditionally loves Cinderella for what she is rather than her shoe size, even if his love is unrequited. However, that panto character prepares us nicely for Prince Sebastian’s attitude. Then there are the panto traditions, derived from 19th century music hall, of men playing female characters like the wicked stepmother and the ugly sisters, or women playing the so-called principal boy part of Prince Charming. We’re well used to a bit of rule-breaking, which is what this Cinderella celebrates.

To be clear, this is not a pantomime, it’s an excellent musical with Andrew Lloyd Webber on good form, a satisfying story and a scintillating production. I hope those involved don’t take too much notice of Johnny Oleksinski. After all, he didn’t like Caroline, Or Change with Sharon D Clarke either. And that was one of the best British productions of the last decade, winning her an Olivier Award.

Watch the video of this review on our YouTube channel

Andrew Lloyd Webber’s Cinderella is currently performing at the Gillian Lynne Theatre in London. For more information and tickets, click here.

November 8, 2021November 10, 2021

Paul Nicholas: Musicals, Marigolds & Me – review

A story of an impressive showbiz career

★★★
If you’re fascinated by show business, you’ll definitely want Musicals, Marigolds & Me, the new autobiography by Paul Nicholas, in your Christmas stocking.

He’s already given us one slice of his life back in 1999, so his latest contribution concentrates on his career as opposed to his personal life, and in particular brings up to date with his 21^st century life producing shows, touring in musicals, and his newfound stardom as one of the inhabitants of TV’s Real Marigold Hotel.

Since the latter is what many people now know him for, Paul sensibly starts with a few stories about his experiences on the programme, which I’m sure will amuse the show’s many fans. I haven’t seen the show but this did tempt me to watch it.

The most interesting part of the book, for me anyway, is the behind-the-scenes story of what it’s like to be a producer. In particular, his greatest successes Grease and Saturday Night Fever.

During my time in theatre management, I worked with Paul on a number of occasions and his book is very like himself: he rarely boasts, he doesn’t upset anybody, and he keeps most of his life private. And this is where the book falls down a bit. You get very little sense of what it feels like to be a star or to be in the middle of the world of show business.

After many little stories about making the Marigold programmes, there are also very few anecdotes about the rest of his career. And when he does come up with a story, he doesn’t exaggerate or add comedy, as some would, to make them more memorable. He certainly doesn’t reveal any secrets, sticking religiously to the unwritten rule that what happens backstage stays backstage. I’m not saying I was looking for juicy scandals and salacious gossip, just some colourful stories about the people and things that happened behind the scenes.

We learn about his progress in the world of pop music which included some chart hits, and touring with the likes of Screamin’ Lord Sutch and Del Shannon and The Who. I mean, how can you tour with The Who and not have a colourful story or two? Has he really nothing to report on meeting David Bowie beyond ‘he didn’t strike me as a happy-go-lucky person’?

When he embarks on his lengthy career as a musicals performer which includes starring roles in the original London productions of Jesus Christ Superstar and Cats. This section of the book reads like a Wikipedia entry: I did this, then I did that; I met this person then I met that person. Even though you may not get much feeling for what the life or even the people were like, you do see how show business works, and Paul shares some of what he has learned. For example, ‘ If you try and short-change the public, they will catch you out.’

When he gets into producing, the book goes up a gear. He is rightly proud of his achievement in this field, including two outstanding West End musicals Grease and Saturday Night Fever. It started in 1990, when he teamed up with David Ian to put together a touring production of the Joseph Papp version of The Pirates Of Penzance. There are many insights into the difficulties of raising money, casting and marketing (I never knew he was responsible for the iconic Grease logo).

When he had the idea of reviving Grease in 1993, he dumped the original theatre show and transformed it into a stage version of the film by incorporating new songs that featured in the movie. It proved immensely popular, especially with young people.

In 1998, he co-produced the first stage version of Saturday Night Fever. The details of his contribution to making the show the success it was, from the original idea to stage the show, the negotiations with Robert Stigwood who owned the rights, his rewriting of the script, his discovery and mentoring of the leading man Adam Garcia, the difficult decision to invest his own money, will fascinate anyone who is interested in the business side of show business.

But still no juicy gossip. After his huge success as a co-producer of Saturday Night Fever in the West End, it’s clear he was annoyed that Robert Stigwood went on to produce the show on Broadway without him. But he continues to talk well of him. I think part of the reason may be that Paul is a very nice man who genuinely doesn’t want to be unkind to anybody, even someone no longer with us.

One thing that emerges very clearly from his book is the basis of his success. He is of course talented, but so are many entertainers. He is certainly good looking and charming, and he has a good stage presence. He was a born singer but he had to learn to act, and to dance. Although he was never the greatest at any of these, what he did do was work hard. He is a supreme example of the saying that success is 1% inspiration and 99% perspiration. His work rate is hugely impressive. For Singin’ In The Rain, he had to learn to dance well enough to play a role made famous by Gene Kelly. When he starred as Barnum, he learned juggling, unicycling, trampolining and tightrope walking. He certainly deserves his success.

Paul displays his gentle sense of humour, as when he says that, even as an old man, he still has fans, including a stalker. ‘I just have to walk very slowly,’ he writes.

And that’s typical of Paul Nicholas. It is no surprise that he is growing old gracefully. By dint of talent, determination and hard work, he has had an impressive career, but all with good grace and self effacement. And that’s what you get in his latest autobiography.

Musicals, Marigolds & Me is published by Fantom Publishing

Paul was given a copy of the e-book to review

Watch this review on the YouTube channel One Minute Theatre Reviews

October 21, 2021May 4, 2023

Brief Encounter – The Watermill – review

An enjoyably theatrical show based on Noel Coward’s iconic romance

★★★★

Production photo of Callum McIntyre & Laura Lake Abedisi in Brief Encounter at The Watermill Theatre in Newbury — Callum McIntyre & Laura Lake Abedisi in Brief Encounter at The Watermill. Credit: Pamela Raith Photography

If you’re expecting to see a straightforward stage adaptation of the film Brief Encounter, you may be disappointed. If you’re expecting to see Emma Rice’s legendary multimedia production of Brief Encounter, you may be disappointed.

If you go without ever having seen the film, or at least without any expectations, you should enjoy an evening of humour, passion, poignancy and great theatricality.

Let’s take the lack of similarity to the film first. Part of the issue here is that in writing this play, Emma Rice has combined elements of Noel Coward’s screenplay with his original short play Still Life on which the film was based. A great idea but this means it isn’t pure Brief Encounter.

As to Emma Rice‘s adaptation, the original Kneehigh production from ten or so years ago,included a big screen with a movie showing that imitated the David Lean version but featured the stage actors, who then interacted with it. In this production, the screen has gone.

The story of the chance meeting of two married people in a railway station buffet and their subsequent, hesitant, guilt-ridden affair is still centre stage in this production of Brief Encounter but, there is much more about the relationship between Myrtle the café manager and Albert the station guard than you see in the film.

This is especially true in the first act where their flirtatious and at times vulgar chatting up is given almost equal weight with the more reserved and cautious romance between Alec and Laura. There is a strong and, I suggest, elitist suggestion that middle class equals repressed and serious, while working class equals liberated and comic. Indeed Kate Milner-Evans and Charles Angiama are funny as Myrtle and Stanley, and the former is a particularly strong singer.

As well as those two couples, there is a third romance going on between a more innocent younger couple Beryl the waitress and Stanley who sells food from a tray on the platform. There are nicely judged performances by Hanna Khogali and Oliver Aston. Although the ‘compare and contrast’ is very interesting, this made the first act very bitty. It was quite a challenge to get to know Alec and Laura.

Although the screen has disappeared, much of Emma Rice’s inventive adaptation remains in this production directed by Robert Kirby. Songs and dance are used to dazzling effect, with all seven actors singing and several playing instruments as well. The songs are by Noël Coward, sometimes his music and lyrics, sometimes his lyrics with music by Eamonn O’Dwyer. They are well chosen to reflect the mood of each moment. For example, Beryl sings an appropriate Mad About The Boy and, at the end, to match the poignancy of the parting, Alec (Callum McIntyre) sings A Room With A View with lines like ‘A room with a view / And you / And no one to worry us / No one to hurry us / Through this dream we found’. And beautifully sung.

There is also mime and dance. It is pure theatre, which I mean it couldn’t be done in any other medium and it is what we love about being at a live performance.

The Watermill stage is small so Harry Pizzey’s set design leaves it open and cleverly uses a few pieces of scenery to convey the locations. The café counter doubles as a piano; armchairs and tables roll smoothly on and off as the scene changes from the café to a flat to Laura’s home. Which is where we meet her husband Fred, also played by Charles Angiama. You can see why she might want someone less solid, a lot more exciting.

There may be no big screen but the production does use a nice and very amusing device to remind us of its cinematic connection, namely sound effects. As Myrtle mimes pouring tea, one of the cast in the corner pours water into a jug in front of a microphone.

The second act is much more focused on Laura and Alec, and the better for it. This is a classic love story and well told in this version. Their blossoming romance, their growing love that becomes increasingly reckless, the agonising over the rights and wrongs of their affair, the ecstasy and the heartbreak.

As Laura says at one point, their love has made her ‘a stranger in her own home’. The most interesting, because the most conflicted, character is Laura. Played by Laura Lake Abedisi, it is the more difficult role because she has to express herself from behind a mask of repressed feelings and the kind of strangulated accent that you will be familiar with from films of the 1930s and 40s, or the Queen in The Crown. Ms Abedisi does a splendid job and, by the end, I was totally in tune with her anguish.

Callum McIntyre is excellent as Alec Harvey, combining charm, confidence, humour and profound feeling.

This may not be what you would expect if you love the film, but if you accept that it has been taken apart and reconstructed as a piece of theatre, I think you will have a great evening.

Brief Encounter continues at The Watermill in Newbury until 13 November 2021

One Minute Theatre Reviews was supplied with a press ticket by the producers

Watch this review on the One Minute Theatre Reviews channel on YouTube

October 12, 2021

Is God Is – Royal Court – Review

Aleshea Harris’ bloodbath thriller is a bit anemic

★★★

Production photo of Cecilia Noble, Tamara Lawrence and Adelayo Adedayo in Is God Is at the Royal Court theatre in London — Cecilia Noble, Tamara Lawrence and Adelayo Adedayo in Is God Is. Photo: Tristram Kenton

Is God Is by up-and-coming American playwright Aleshea Harris is a revenge tragedy, or perhaps tragicomedy, in a tradition that dates back to the Old Testament and takes in Jacobean tragedy and Quentin Tarantino along the way. Perhaps it most resembles the plays of Martin McDonagh, but, in any comparison with them, I’m afraid Is God Is comes off worse.

17 year old twins find out that their mother, whom they thought had died in a fire when they were small children, is actually alive but finally succumbing to her injuries. The reunion is not entirely joyous because she wants them to kill the man responsible for her condition, her former abusive partner and their father. She wants him ‘dead. Real dead. And lots of blood is fine’. The young women, who were also scarred by the fire, don’t really question whether this is moral or legal or even practical. As far as they are concerned this is a mission from God, since their mother created them. They are driven by the need for vengeance and so is the plot.

So begins a killing spree.

Aleshea Harris’ play won the Relentless Prize in the USA and the relentless speed is helped by the device of the characters introducing themselves in the third person, rather than reveal their characters through their words and deeds. The killing spree leaves no time for a pause for thought about morality, family, class and race, which are all touched on. And the play’s high speed drive straight down the highway gives no opportunity for a twist or a turn, like the sudden slamming on of brakes and or a hairpin bend, except perhaps at the very end when you might be left wondering whether vengeance is worth it. Compared with all the plays by Martin McDonagh that I have reviewed in the last couple of years, The Lieutenant Of Inishmore, Hangmen, A Very Very Very Dark Matter and his early work The Beauty Queen Of Leenane, seen recently in Chichester and at the Lyric Hammersmith, there are no shocking twists or unexpected revelations, of the kind which enrich his work.

No blood but real fire

The older more extrovert sister Racine acquires a rock- which is thought to be the weapon with which Cain killed Abel- and proceeds to use it against all she comes into contact with, even after the slightest offence.

Unlike, I believe, the original New York presentation of Is God Is, there is no blood splattering Ola Ince’s production. So much for ‘lots of blood is fine’. The violence, while plentiful, is so stylised that it neither shocks nor is any more convincing than the characters’ motives. The horrific scars become symbolic tattoos. Once you take both horror and nuance out of the equation, you’re not left with much.

There might not have been any blood but there was real fire in Chloe Lamford‘s design. I liked her simple cartoon-like sets, with the titles for each scene like Going West and Showdown from the script writ large, encouraging the sense that we were watching chapters of a pulp novel being acted out.

I also enjoyed the acting. Out of a uniformly strong cast, I’ll mention in particular Cecilia Noble as the mother or God or, as in the cast list, She. It was a chilling moment when she conjured up what happened to her on the fateful day of the fire, and her powerful command to ‘make him dead’ was like the word of God.

Her two twins, the older Racine played by Tamara Lawrence and younger Anaia played by Adelayo Adedayo were a great double act. Their repartee was sharp and funny, made more so by the use of the Southern States vernacular and rhythms of speech.

It’s clear that Aleshea Harris is a writer to watch. She has a poet’s ear for dialogue. She is also able to make subtle homages to past masterpieces of the vengeance genre without laying it on thick. I’m sure we’ll be seeing a lot more from her but I don’t think she’s quite there yet.

Is God Is runs at the Royal Court Theatre until 23 October 2021

Click here to watch the video of this review on YouTube on the One Minute Theatre Reviews channel

October 11, 2021October 11, 2021

What If If Only by Caryl Churchill – review

A surprisingly funny play about loss and grief

★★★★

Production photo showing Linda Bassett and John Heffernan in What If If Only at the Royal Court Theatre in London — Linda Bassett & John Heffernan in What If If Only at the Royal Court. Photo: Johan Persson

At the beginning of What If If Only, we meet a man referred to in the cast list as ‘someone’. He’s sitting at a table in a small room talking to himself or rather to someone who isn’t actually there.

His first words are about a man who spent ten years trying to paint an apple so that it looked just like an apple, then seven years trying to paint an apple so that it looked nothing like an apple. Given that Caryl Churchill’s new play is less than 20 minutes in length, I assume she wouldn’t waste words. So what’s the significance of the apple fable? I’ll come back to that.

We immediately discover that his partner has died but that he still likes to talk to his beloved and wishes he could get in touch with them, beyond the grave, as it were. John Heffernan’s portrait of grief is touching, it’s so quietly sad. A bit too quiet actually in terms of being heard at the back which is a shame because James Macdonald’s production savours every word.

Our ‘someone’ wonders ‘what if’ his loved one had lived, and wishes ‘if only’ they had lived. He longs to see a ghost. Designer Miriam Buether’s cube-shaped room, which is a metaphor for being contained by the present, rises to let in a ghost from outside the present moment.

Thought provoking and cleverly told

What follows in this short comedy about loss is both thought provoking and unexpectedly funny. Much to our surprise, and that of the protagonist, the ghost that appears is not wished-for dead figure from the past but a ghost from the future, then more futures. All are represented by a smiling and occasionally stern Linda Bassett who has great fun switching between characters in some packed monologues.

Actually, we do meet one more character- a child who could be part of this man’s future. ‘Child Future’ was confidently played on the occasion I saw it by Samir Simon-Keegan who may well be part of the future of acting.

It’s a play about dealing with grief and the theme that emerges is that you can’t bring back the past, only take one of many possible routes into a future that is certain to be different from the past. Not a hugely original idea, but cleverly told.

So what about the apple? Is the apple a metaphor for the present? While his loved one was alive, each new moment resembled the previous moments in his memory, so was he at that time painting an apple that looked like an apple, but when his loved one died, the present was no longer matched his memories, so he was trying to paint an apple that looked nothing like an apple.

Maybe I’m reading too much into the apple. What if I hadn’t tried to analyse the meaning of the apple story? If only I hadn’t mentioned the apple.

What If If Only continues at the Royal Court Theatre until 23 October 2021

Click here to watch the video of this review of What If If Only on YouTube