Clouds, created by Time & Again Theatre Company, is a most unique performance in both the content it presents and the energy it presents it with. It is rare on today’s stage to find a period performance like this that retains such a high level of dynamism, intrigue, depth and relatability. Clouds is most certainly a delight. Unfortunately, though, I shall start this review rather negatively. The first thing the audience are greeted with on entering the house is a gentleman who presents a cast list to each audience member and tells them — despite his attire — that the date is 1913 and that they may sit anywhere they wish. He then proceeds to stand awkwardly with a nervous smile until the next spectator arrives, hiding his moving, tapping hands behind his back. Here, I already have some personal issues with this performance. I fail to see what this adds to our entry into the play, given that the box office staff have already informed the audience of the unreserved seating and could have given out these lists then, before the performance, and that the time period should be evidenced by the play’s content, the music during the overture and the publicity preceding the performance itself. It is an unnecessary feature that particularly irks me. Not only does it somewhat prepare the audience for an interactive piece of theatre, where no other interactions actually occur throughout the play, but, with the presentation of a cast list, the initial message becomes “Welcome! This is all fake and just a theatre performance! Enjoy!” and this is not the illusion one would hope to create, unless intentionally. It turns out that this gentleman is not actually part of the performance and is, in fact, an usher of sorts. This would explain the uneasy and faltering demeanour — another reason why the overture would benefit from his absence. Personally, I would quite simply recommend a spotlight on the airplane accompanied by that evocative jazz music. This brings me on to set (designed by Laura Crow). Set is extremely static, composed of only a toolbox and an airplane. This does not prove problematic, however, for the momentum of this play is so well kept both within the dramatic text itself and by actors, as I will detail later. What it does do, though, is contextualise the action of the play to one particular location, meaning that scenes outside of this are not too well differentiated. Whilst the spotlights on the airplane fade down in such scenes to mark such a change, and whilst there is very little disruption of the play’s legibility and fluidity, if not none whatsoever, I would just be wary of this stagnancy when considering what effect each separate scene should have independently to the rest. As for the airplane itself, I feel that it is perhaps a little too inelaborate and could have more interactive features. I write this because Laura Crow (playing Winifred) and Ben Hynes’s (playing Philip) characters regularly interact with the model, yet there is very little for them to do beyond tightening imaginary screws, wiping it down with a cloth, and dusting it with their hands. Hence, their interactions seem awkward or fruitless, particularly as there is a slight downward bend on the bottom side of the nose of the plane, meaning that tightening a screw really does not do anything. I did notice that the front propellor does rotate — whether or not it is supposed to do so or can do so all the way around, however, I am not so sure — and more features like this could make these moments and the model itself more believable and impressive. In its sheer simplicity, though, this set becomes vastly emblematic of the skies and hence evocative of the themes of freedom (or emancipation) and escape, and it also forces us to concentrate on the characters themselves. In all, the set helps to both focus and expand our imagination where appropriate very successfully. As with the airplane model, I found costume (provided by Crow) to be sufficiently evocative of character and time period, but not without its definite faults. Whilst being quite historically inaccurate, there were features of the costume that could have been ameliorated, like the drooping sash on Sylvia’s (Jessica Balmer) dress or Lady Fitzmaurice’s (Julie Burrow) much-too-short umbrella — and not a parasol… I also found it strange that Winifred would refer to the single, grey plume on Lady Fitzmaurice’s hat as a ‘red pigeon’; either the text or costume needs to be modified here. All this considered, costume was enough to allude to an earlier time period and to sustain imagination; it could just be stronger with these more meticulous items in mind. I enjoyed the fact that aspects of Winifred’s costume change, becoming more and more dishevelled as her illness worsens, and I would have liked to see something similar evoked in the costumes of the other characters, not to evoke illness, of course, but change of time or day. Not only would this be true of the period, with women in particular required to wear varying dresses throughout the day to match morning, afternoon or evening as well as occasion type, but this would also accentuate the play’s chronology. On a similar note, I would like to quickly mention the efficacy of the use of makeup in this performance. Though this was used rather sparingly, where it was utilised, it was impeccable. Crows’s makeup in particular manages to capture fatigue and illness in Winifred’s face splendidly and, above all, realistically. This is most successful. I would just recommend a few top-ups now and again, as the heat of the stage lighting slowly saw the death of it. On to the writing. The writing demonstrates a keen understanding of the period and filters historical events and featurettes into the narrative seamlessly and effortlessly, making for a rich and convincing text. Whilst, I must admit, not a lot really happens in this play, there is nevertheless a ruthless momentum and intrigue to this dramatic text. This is not because it is particularly dramatic or vitalised, though, but because it deals with relatable matters close to the human heart, investigating identity, purpose, social standing and desire — amongst other poignant themes. Its characters become representative of key characteristics of the human condition: obsession, mortality, sociability, pride, etc., making them both relatable and immediately comprehensible. However, this also makes them rather caricaturistic, as though stereotypes of aspects of human personality, and this is definitely translated into the acting style. This is not a particularly naturalistic play, both where speech and delivery are concerned, but it is consistent throughout, meaning it generates its own language and style. Acting could still benefit from more variation, however. Lines and action aside, emotional range remains rather limited across the actors, and the caricatures presented become rather stagnant over time. This is the difficulty with creating caricaturistic characters, for they are also very fruitful in their quirks and patterns of speech or behaviour. I would just urge more consciousness of repetition with respect to this, as I did find it particularly grating in places to see these same quirks overworked again and again — for example, Theodore’s (Kieran Palmer) nervousness or expressed interest in nephrology, or Lady Fitzmaurice’s garden party (this latter being more excusable, if studied alone, given its impact on the action of the play). There remain some irregularities in the writing. As a principal example of this, it is difficult to understand exactly why and when the other characters take so much to Freddie. From very early on in the play, it is clear that Freddie is not favoured by any of the characters, and Philip and Sylvia make this particularly clear with their bitchiness and spite towards her in the first scene. Lady Fitzmaurice is the most concrete example of Freddie being disliked, nay detested, by the others, and yet all of them, including Lady Fitzmaurice, seem to suddenly gravitate towards her, almost idolising her, even. Surely that which the other characters deem as ‘determination’ would, in fact, irritate them as grinding persistence or as proving them wrong. As for acting, whilst certain gestures, movements and reactions were, again, much too repetitive, all actors were very good in this performance, maintaining energy and character very well. They were each sure of and confident in their characters, delivering lines appropriately, despite a few, excusable trip-ups, and were hence convincing and enjoyable to watch. As mentioned before, I would have liked to see a more successful emotional range from the actors, Jessica Balmer aside. Whilst I understand that the text itself limits this, there are definitely moments that could be more effective on the actors’ behalf, as primarily the case with Crow who struggles to present anger, frustration or distress cogently. Entrances and exits start to feel highly repetitive, particularly for Winifred who always seems to appear behind other characters, mainly Philip, without them noticing, joining in with their conversations or songs, or making remarks that grab their attention and alert them to her arrival. There is not much creativity beyond the dialogue itself, one might say. There are also some irregularities where topography is concerned. There are moments when characters exit, around the curtain Upstage, that characters watch them go ‘from a distance’, and yet they start to stare up the staircase, just to the right, even when characters have not quite left yet. This makes for an inaccuracy where the play’s architecture and geography are concerned. In general, all actors could be a lot quicker during transitions which often feel clunky and long. Although, this is not particularly helped by the use of lighting (designed by Tim Cooper). Primarily consisting of spotlights and fades, I find the lighting’s simplicity, overall, to be sensible and reflective of the mood and world of the play. However, especially as transitions are quite awkwardly lengthy, fades seem to become overused and repetitious, and this makes transitions seem monotonous but also disruptive with the fallible addition of music, which I shall detail shortly. However, as mentioned earlier, lighting does aid for a sense of location change and for the employment of motifs, primarily with the spotlights on the airplane model, and retains pertinence to the performance. I would just add, as a final note, that the fuchsia wash backstage needs to go. I have no idea why it is part of the lighting memory in the first place, attached to the other cues, fading and lifting along with them, and see it as highly distracting and disruptive of illusion. I found music (also by Cooper) to be very coherent, providing a relevant variety of Edwardian jazz. However, its use in transitions was often very fallible and awkward as well. Transitions were far too short for music in general, let alone music containing lyrics as was often the case. I understand the tendency to fill transitions with music, as, otherwise, they can seem rather bare or unseemly, but this is most likely because the transitions are not slick and tidy enough, not because silence is inherently a bad feature of a performance. If music has to be used, I would urge it be simply instrumental or that the transitions be long enough to allow the music to settle in the space. It takes a while for the ear to catch on to a rhythm, and so the music needs time to make its mark amongst the audience. Ironically, I do feel that certain transitions could be longer, just for permission of this effect, but only those between scenes that really demonstrate a change in tone, rhythm or plot. Perhaps this could help better an understanding of the characters’ sudden admiration Winifred, for example, with a sense of the passing of time. Overall, with the pedant within me aside, this performance remains very articulate and entertaining. Actors make for a believable world, and the variety of their characters make for intrigue. This is a very gripping and rather fruitful performance. “A captivating and empowering performance but with many irregularities and items to be buffed.”

Written by Justin Butcher and directed by Ian Talbot, Scaramouche Jones is…simply awful. In fact, it is hugely problematic, riddled with cultural, racial and historical insensitivity. I fail to see how creatives, fellow reviewers and critics of the past and present are overlooking the social implications, orientalism, lack of cultural sensitivity and downright racism that this performance gives way to. This dramatic text should be an error of the recent past, not one revived for a modern stage. Described as ‘international’, its content presents stereotype, cliché and caricature. Racial and cultural profiles are exaggerated, dramatised and unrealistic and become a means of entertainment to the detriment of the races and cultures with which they deal. When we have organised events like this in place, where a celebrity is making money off of such work, along with an entire team, where audiences are funding the work, watching the work, celebrating the work, where critics and television presenters are blindly commending the work, this becomes what is termed systemic racism. An entire infrastructure now surrounds a [perhaps unintentionally but still inexcusably] orientalist work. This is unethical. Arabian snake charmers riding camels; people of colour, or “swarthy Ethiopes” or men with faces “as “brown and shrivelled as a walnut”, as referred to in the text, eroticised or obsessed with mangoes; foreign gypsies actioning child weddings, enabling paedopilic practices and able to identify one other through songs… These are all incredibly damaging, inimical, regressive and unfavourable caricaturisations serving only to satisfy the gaze of the self-esteeming and hedonistic “Western World”. Take, for instance, the scene describing the angered cobra, after Richie’s insanely racist chanting at 39:35. ‘Ramool’ by Manzoor Khan Langa, Dhodhe Khan and Pathan Khan is played to ‘set the scene’, as it were. This is Indian music, not Senegalese, and shallow research reveals that the artists have another album entitled ‘Discovery of India: Snake Charmer’. It is clear that the creatives simply searched for snake charmer music, and after flicking through the artists’ work, ‘Ramool’ is what they finally decided upon. So, now we have a Senegalese snake charmer using Indian music in Dakar to enchant his audience. This conflation of cultures and music, used nonchalantly to create an entertaining, exotic and otherworldly [i.e. orientalist] atmosphere is the exact lack of education and care towards culture and cultural specificity of which I am writing. And this is without mentioning the lack of research demonstrated in the text: a cobra does not have a “poison sack” but a venomous gland; it would not shed only six times in the space of twenty-five years, for, on average, a snake sheds between four and twelve times annually… It is one thing to tell these orientalist tales, but it is an entirely different thing to have an actor melodramatise them, perform races and cultures, and exaggerate aspects of stereotyped identities. With no evidence of vocal and accent training, Shane Richie’s caricaturisations are not only awkward and uncomfortable but, again, incredibly insensitive — put even more bluntly, racist, making a mockery of cultural ‘identities’. No work has been done to represent these profiles well, and there has been no refinement where his accents, particularly Jamaican, are concerned, meaning that his evocations remain simple dérisions with no serious thought or critical thinking. Really, it parallels a racist telling a joke in a pub and acting out his ‘funny’ versions of non-white individuals. Repeated exaggerative gestures and an increase in volume combine to represent the Other as animalistic, primal, uncivilised and ruthless, and this is a direct manifestation of the dramatic text which places intense focus on licentiousness, violence, brutality and paedophilia within a foreign context, all whilst representing the Englishman as regal and principled, white skin as precious and beautiful, and English culture as civilised, moral and supportive and with an established judicial system, unlike all other countries detailed in the text. The writing of the dramatic text itself is overly verbose and bombastic, demanding an intense concentration — and also allowing it to get away with those many fleeting orientalist remarks, and misinformations, with its content more likely to fly over the audience’s head. Furthermore, Richie’s lack of transformativity is no visual aid to help the text lift from the page. I will admit that caricatures are distinguished well and energised — but then, the caricatures should not exist in the first place! — but Richie’s characterisation of the clown is incredibly lacking. I do not see a clown; I see Shane Richie playing a clown. This is disappointing. The voice he chooses for the clown falters regularly, and hearing a halfway point between Richie’s ‘real’ voice and that which he has chosen for the clown is a constant issue. Physicality and gesticulations also remain limited, unaided by a lack of use of space. This lack of use of space becomes one of the many repetitive hallmarks of the illness and fallibility of this performance’s structure. At the end of each ‘chapter’, Richie pops a balloon, he is then almost always seen next seated at his dressing table, gazing into the mirror or drinking from a flask of tea. The rest of the performance simply entails him walking pretty much on the spot and lifting his arms in a weak display of performativity. Visually, then, in terms of Richie’s performance, there is really not that much. That is besides the few props Richie uses and the odd shifts in perspective that happen every now and then, such as him lying on the floor in the drowning/swimming scene or staring out into the void in the Nazi grave-digging scene…and here we find the next huge display of insensitivity. Described by the British judge as restoring humanity, Scaramouche, working as a gravedigger for the Nazis, attempts to make the children in the adjacent concentration camp laugh and feel more ‘at ease’ moments before their death. Scaramouche describes his making fun of the guards, pulling funny faces, and, most significantly, reenacting the executions — the same executions that the children will see in their own fates — through comedic mime. This is presented extremely superficially, in that there is no doubt or question of this act and no further examination or deeper thinking about its effectiveness or effects. But let’s think about it ourselves for a moment… You’re a child in a Nazi concentration camp who is traumatised from being wrenched from your home, family and friends, and you’re being led — if not dragged — by Nazi soldiers to what you know will be your death, and you’re watching men and women and other children be shot and hanged to death next to you. Now, let us put a clown in that setting who is reenacting the deaths you can see before you in a comedic mime. Would this give you relief? Especially given that you are a child? Of course, it would not! In fact, it would do the opposite: you would be terrified that a strange man in your periphery is practically teasing your fate, making a light mockery of the terrors and sheer carnage before you. It would be a surreal and extremely perturbing display. So, now that we know that this is not at all a realistic, and, in fact, an incredibly evil, thing to do, the superficial compassion and feeling this scene offers is completely removed, and we are left with a clown making a mockery of Holocaust victims, those which are referred to as ‘clowns’ — and the mere fact that their faces are covered in lime does not constitute the right to label them thusly. Accompanied by ‘Cold’, a melancholic strings and piano composition by Jorge Mendez — which makes me question the copyright issues involved in potentially having snapped up a composition by an unknowing musician — an intense tragic mood for this scene seems to come out of nowhere after blazing ‘comedy’. And just when we have really settled in the [misused] tragedy of the Nazi regime, the shot quickly changes, and Richie is having another swig of tea, ready to continue his comedy. This lack of consideration towards mood management and timing completely subverts any emotion and sensitivity — if any, indeed, existed. Again, deplorably unthinking and, ultimately, heartless. I mentioned the issue of space use, and this also combines with another: audience perspective. Sometimes, the camera placement (production design by Andrew Exeter) allows us to feel as though we are looking over Richie’s shoulder into the mirror; other times, we are shown footage shot from above with an overlay suggestive of CCTV or a hidden spy camera; sometimes, we view Richie ‘through the video camera he has set up’; and, lastly, other times, we are presented an ordinary eye-level view of Richie without this aforementioned overlay. All of this makes it incredibly difficult to discern our function as spectators (are we spying voyeurs? Distanced spectators? Active witnesses?), and there is nothing to unite these very disparate vantage points, especially given that the overlays suggest two different cameras are being used, with the timestamps, and footage and battery information being presented differently between the high-angle camera and the video camera Richie sets up. There is simply no thought behind this at all. And this is without mentioning Richie’s terribly awkward close-ups wherein he approaches the camera intrusively close for no reason at all other than to quirkily interact with the audience — again, for what reason and to what effect? What does this say about our function as spectators? Set, however, was very attractive and well organised. In fact, it was almost perfect [but then, what salvation is this, considering the rest of the performance’s success?], barring two main issues. The first is the television displaying a green screen throughout, having absolutely no purpose in the text and only standing in as a completely jarring eyesore against the contrasting red set. This should have been either switched off or, at least, set to show only white noise, which I believe would have been nearly equally as distracting but, at least, would have worked in terms of the set design’s palette. The second is the grass on the floor… Why is there grass in the basement of a theatre? Honestly, I have nothing else to add on this point; it speaks for itself. Bizarre. I admit that most of the issues I have mentioned refer to the dramatic text in itself, but the problem lies in the mere idea of a revival of this text. To use this text in education, in racial and cultural studies, in anthropological studies or in literary criticism is a very different thing from bringing it to its feet in a completely unthinking way and, as I said in the early paragraphs of this performance, to provide, albeit perhaps blindly, an infrastructure for the continuation of detrimental racial profiling and, of course, the resulting misinformations and prejudices. This is a huge problem. This text should remain on the page and is not to be performed; the very act of doing so is rather revolting. All of this being said, I shall now quickly focus on the final theatrical constituents of this production itself, starting with sound. The voiceover audios are an odd decision. Sometimes Richie delivers the line; other times, an extra delivers it through the speakers. This is inconsistent. Volume often fluctuates, making for an unsteady listening, and the audio itself is far too plain and deliberate. Their use becomes too repetitive, structured and forced, and unnecessary and literal at times where audience imagination could be permitted to flourish, instead. We do not need to hear the gunshots, for example, or the little exclaiming, ‘Mama?!’ after Scaramouche himself has just already said, ‘My ‘mother is dead’. I should mention here as well the inconsistency of the beginning ambient sounds of the public upstairs. The sound of the public fades completely with their applause and is suddenly revived when they are leaving the building. Either they are constantly there at the beginning, or they leave indefinitely early on. Decide which one, and stick with it. The inclusion of the balloons becomes negligible, as they lead up to nothing. If they had to be included, for whatever reason, I would have perhaps done the opposite and blown up them at the end of each ‘chapter’, making for a surreal and powerful final image when Scaramouche sits dead as New-Year celebrations roar from the TV. The celebratory balloons would have intensified his ‘saddening’ — although, I would say, “Relieving!” — death in this way, through juxtaposition. However, as it stands, they served no purpose, other than to signal the end of a scene. The use of props or set elements was too minimal; Richie could have done with a lot more to aid his overall lack of physicality. And moments like the magic lights trick were lacking, primarily, in this instance, because the colour grading applied post-production (editing by Stream.Theatre) oversaturated the red of the set and the red of the balls, and the filter blurred the scene, meaning the trick was difficult to see clearly and thus appreciate. Nevertheless, it was a fallible idea from the very beginning, as, other than his bald clown wig and costume — which was certainly fitting and wonderfully designed — there was very little actual clownery present in this performance. It seemed out of touch with the otherwise unresourceful character we are presented with. Overall, ignoring, if I can, the sociopolitical implications of this performance, Richie’s performance was simply very lacking. Ignoring the disturbing mood change in the gravedigging scenes, this play is monotonous and dull, and the overarching characterisation of the clown — or lack thereof — is simply pitiful. Relationships with the audience are confused, and technical elements are inconsistent. A devastatingly regressive insult of a watch masquerading as ‘comedy’. “A revival…better labelled ‘Do Not Resuscitate’!” Photography credit: Bonnie Britain

The three performances considered in this review, Nuclear War, Buried, and Graceland, are currently performing alongside one another as part of a so-called triptych at the Old Red Lion theatre. I will start with a summary of the night overall and then proceed to consider each play separately. In this review: Summary Buried Graceland Nuclear War I find it difficult to comprehend why these plays were presented together, for there is very little to relate them to one another besides the very loose and inadvertent theme of suffering or the more blatant and explicit yet very superficial theme of sex [very distinctly the by-products of average male writing]. Clearly, the concept of a triptych was misunderstood in this way. The plays present such starkly different material, with great disparities in content, performance style and level of intrigue or imaginativeness, that it is somewhat difficult not only to consider them all as interrelated pieces of theatre but to evaluate the enjoyability and strength of the “triptych” overall. The very first image we are presented with is highly erroneous. In entering the house, we enter the set for the first play, Buried (all sets designed by Anna Kezia Williams). All four of the actors that will perform are scattered around the stage, yet these actors, barring James Demaine, of course, have no place in this context; their characters have absolutely nothing to do with this first play, so why are they here? This is a cheap, ineffective and struggling way to unite the three plays, and this most certainly needs to be changed. Using an apparent school janitor to clean the stage after the close of the second play, Graceland, however, is a quirky and endearing decision, though I would recommend a more vigorous transformation, a better change of set between the plays. Throwing a white sheet over the set pieces, rubbing chalk off of the wall and calling it a new design is not particularly a sign of artistic intelligence… These plays each demand a severe amount of attention, forcing the audience to be responsive or obedient and requiring a high level of engagement and concentration, for varying reasons subject to each performance. Unless the right conditions are met [as they are, on the whole, for Graceland — and Graceland only], this is usually not a good thing for one play, let alone three. There is very rarely a chance for the audience to breathe on this evening, other than in the interval which overran…because of the high complexity of the set change, no doubt! For this reason, pacing –– in both the written texts and the performed –– is an issue across all three plays. I will say, however, that each retains a definite sense of originality, presenting materials in dimensional and, for a good amount of the time, refreshing ways. Each has a very clear and individualistic use of space and imagery and a very clearly defined mood, tone and style, though this is not always to the play’s advantage, as I will detail further below. Many choices for content and style remain rather repetitive, and the manner in which materials are communicated becomes rather predictable and unvaried. I would have liked to see more variation in all texts. “An evening of performances in dire need of cogency, clarity and stylistic refinement.” Buried Written by David Spencer and directed by Alexander Knott and Ryan Hutton. Ignoring the highly questionable presence of the other actors, as detailed in the introduction above, the very first image we walk into is most remarkably atmospheric. Mist is controlled wonderfully and has been permitted to build and settle in the air for the perfect amount of time. Such control is commendable and surprisingly rare. The set for this performance has dimension and expanse. Visually, this is a very stimulating image…until time progresses and we notice that set pieces are being used neither sufficiently nor coherently and that the large rocks that constitute a great portion of the set are simply very ill-painted and slightly crushed cardboard boxes. As soon as the lights permit a clearer view, one notices that, beyond the basic symbolistic palette of earthy browns and dark blacks, there is very little logic to be found in the pieces that constitute this design. What is the topography of this set? What do these set pieces represent all together? Dilapidation, debris and earthiness certainly remain clear motifs, but what else does this set facilitate beyond rudimentary visuals? And what specific practical functionality does it provide, other than providing various levels for a rudimentary sense of a changing visual perspective, and how does this progress plot or narrative? A most tacky design. On to the action of the play itself. This play demands an incredible amount of brainpower from its audience. The eye is commanded to follow James Demaine (Max) around the stage as he covers its entirety, darting from wall to wall and corner to corner; the ear, to listen to an unending and uninterrupted soliloquy; the mind, to piece it all together. There is not a single moment for respite or reflection as the play meanders through an extensive list of material, of Max’s detailings of memories and life events. The text is most suffocative in this way — and not in an artistic sense, drawing on the theme of live burial… This is even echoed by the lighting which remains exhausting in its sheer number of states. I will say, however, that the lighting, if a little literal in its symbolism, does retain some efficacy, successfully intensifying moments such as Max’s evocation of a KO in boxing or drowning in water, complemented by deep and timely coloured washes. For the early burial scenes, the dim and unfocused spotlight directly above Demaine makes for a very powerful visual, obscuring Coezens’s legs and aiding our imagination away from the fact that he is simply standing on a platform, very effectively. One principal reason behind why this play is so overwhelming is its propensity towards [needless] audience interaction. When audience interactions and participations genuinely drive the performance along, or when they have a particular impact or add a certain je ne sais quoi that absolutely no other technique can produce, only then are these 1) required and 2) effective. From the moment they are made, audience interactions immediately cause us to become aware of ourselves, the unspoken performer-spectator contract and the “real” world that exists beyond the play, and so this must be used only when specific to the chosen theatrical mode and style. With such an overuse of this in this performance, we become forcedly aware that this is an actor, and the only impact generated in these moments are either awkwardness or a long-awaited spotlight for the singled-out spectator and an interest amongst other spectators in how this spectator will react. Thus, interactions in their sheer, exhausting volume are completely unnecessary in this performance. Demaine consistently singles out one audience member and delivers his lines to them, and this becomes so particular to the play that it begins to subtract from any poignancy or illusive realism. These forced recognitions do not facilitate the action in any way whatsoever and should be omitted completely. A terrible and most amateur decision. Related to Demaine’s audience interactions, we have his expansive movements. Demaine covers the stage most unnaturally, often quite conspicuously darting from one side of the stage to the other simply to interact with yet another spectator across from the last. This has that dreaded tennis-match effect in theatre, where our heads are forced from left to right to follow about an overly energised performer. Then, we have the relationship between Demaine’s movement and the stage’s topography. It is clear from early on in this play that certain areas of the stage have certain significations –– Centerstage, for example, is where Max’s live burial is repeatedly portrayed. Yet, this becomes lost very quickly in the latter half of the play when, for instance, Demaine simply raises his arm stiffly to his cheek as he normally does for these burial scenes, and portrays the burial but whilst situated elsewhere, far from Centerstage. Moments like these, which become far too frequent, make for a great disruption in our reading of the stage’s geography, and these designated areas start to lose their significations and qualities. Overall, movements remain highly repetitious and outlandish. In a play of this length, such rigidity can easily be avoided. Another reason behind this sense of over-animation is the number of characters that Demaine is forced to represent. Whilst he remains transformative and proves rather good acting skill, there is already far too much for the senses to take in in this play, and these shifts in character make for further such complications. Demaine’s direction and the nature of the text do seem for a good part of the play to be in conflict with one another, and I would recommend revisiting the text and acknowledging the role of pace, how scenes could be better brought to life through a more self-contained approach [i.e. with less audience interaction] and how space and set can complement the action in a less crude way. The overall content, however, becomes rather bipartite, alternating between these burial scenes and Max’s expressions of nostalgia, for which he details his memories of relationships and interactions with relatives and friends such as with priests or the oft-mentioned Charlie. With music –– which came to premature halts far too often –– persistently marking the transitions between these, this grating sense of bipartition is much accentuated. Yet, the material presented within these two parts are endlessly permitted to bleed into one another; it is sometimes difficult to gauge when one ‘segment’ has ended and another has begun. This should be reworked [again, perhaps this is a matter of pacing]. Structure and style aside, there is a certain allure to this text. It is at points comedic and flippant and, at others, heartfelt and rather profound. The text develops a good sense of character and character background, and themes of emasculation, suffering and endurance certainly ground its content. I would just be aware of over-fragmenting the narrative, as this is certainly an issue for this play, rendering it rather stylistically predictable and hence less impactful. “An evocative and rather poignant play utterly lost to over-performativity, poor structuring and a weak use of imagery.” Graceland Written by Max Saunders-Singer and directed by Sonnie Beckett. This play is the shortest of the three. It begins with the unmarked entrance of an unpunctual and buffoon-like teacher, Mr Crichton (Anthony Cozens), who trips over and falls onto the floor after losing his footing. With no change in the natural lighting state and no significant introduction, this remains a very clever anti-illusory beginning that contextualises and stresses the immersion that is to follow. The audience are treated as though this teacher’s secondary school students. They are asked questions, reprimanded or commended, given names and identities, and even provided lines. This is done in a most impressive and seamless way, with real science textbooks being passed around the audience who will have to read from them –– only, these are no ordinary readings; lines have been stuck onto each page, and these will be read as if we “students” are asking questions, making jokes or, more rarely, following along with the lessons. This setup, and, certainly, the control that Cozens demonstrates over the text and his audience, are definitely most remarkable and intelligent. The structure and writing are very good in this respect. This play’s content, however, suffers from a ridiculous lack of realism, which is extra problematic, given that the performance style remains distinctly realistic and not absurdist, melodramatic or surreal. A certain shock factor is certainly favoured over credibility, and this makes for an acute predictability in all aspects of the performance. The material is wildly far-fetched; for example, the projection of pornography is rather [worryingly] realistic and not too wild an occurrence in a modern classroom, but then it is revealed that the main performer in this porno is actually Mr Crichton’s wife, and not only this, but there are no less than three of his co-workers behind the porno’s production. Then, there is the revelation of the alcohol, then the pistol, and then, finally, its shooting. The content gets more and more over the top but not to a comically facetious, absurd or comedic advantage; it is all simply too indigestible by the end. And this is without logicalising the material: this would never happen. Would we, the students, not know that this was, indeed, his wife? The jibing lines we are provided set this reality up as a mere joke, and it seems simply too much when this is revealed to be the truth of the situation, unbeknownst somehow to us. Why does this teacher who seems to handle the class rather well throughout, particularly with his grammatical corrections of the dirty message left for him on the board, buckle towards the end and fail to cope with the heckles and actions of his students? Why is he so steadfastly committed at the beginning yet so despondent at the end? These items, amongst others, make for too great an absence of realism. It just seems as though this performance wanted to go out with a bang, as it were –– quite literally, it seems, with the shooting of the pistol –– but this constant climaxing makes the overall text seem crude, bland. I would recommend either far lighter and more credible content or changing the style completely, from humdrum realism to chaotic absurdism or something of that calibre, to match. “A performance with a great premise but lacking in the appropriate creativity to benefit concept.” Nuclear War Written by Simon Stephens and directed by Alexander Knott. Finally, we have the feature play of the trio, Nuclear War, performed by Zöe Grain and Freya Sharp. This play remains extremely cryptic. Much like with Buried, Nuclear War forces so much down the throats of its audience –– physical theatre, dual character representation, over-diversified content, use of superfluous props, and so on –– that its meaning becomes completely lost. I shall start with content. Because of the sheer amount of material that constitutes this text, this play, which sets out to cover a lot, really says very little overall. There is very little, if anything at all, to ground this text; there are no common threads between sequences to join the material together. What we are left with is a series of existential ponderings or expressions of torpor and despondency, and these are presented alongside instructive “lectures” on scientific or philosophical thinkings, such as those about time and sex. These do not combine well to give us a cohesive and coherent text. Time, its passing and its effects, however, do become a recurrent motif but only halfway into the play, and so the only item that could join all of the otherwise disparate contents of this play together remains a seeming afterthought. The questions really remain: what is this play actually about? What is this play trying to communicate? If, for example, this sense of existentialism is the crux of the narrative, aided by these unique small pleasures that are mentioned, such as sitting Belgian waffles upon the brim of coffee mugs to change texture, flavour and sweet appeal, then this should be the sole focus of the play, and everything else, just like these pleasures, should relate back to and complement this; everything else should be secondary to this and should build upon it. A play, especially one of this length, should very rarely aim to fulfil multiple trajectories. A more focused and elucidatory narrative aim would also further aid our reading of character that is complicated by having “A Woman” be represented by two performers. A successful dualisation of character sees one character represented by two actors, each portraying a specific opposing aspect of the character’s identity or an opposing feature of their psychology. To better understand what I mean by a successful dualisation, I would recommend reading my review of Katharine Richardson and Caldonia Walton’s Weight/Wait. The “dualisation” that we see in this text is simply needless. They do not challenge our understanding of identity, for they represent characters in an identical fashion. The only thing they really do facilitate is a use of physical theatre. In fact, I find their signification to be very ill-conceived, given that they clearly do not represent “A Woman” at all times, one example being in these “scientific” lectures. The function of two actors performing this role definitely needs to be readdressed. The verbal language offered in this dramatic text has a distinct textural and sonic quality about it which is very demanding for a performer, requiring extensive practice and rigour. I commend the performers for achieving this, particularly with respect to lines delivered in unison; these can often sound robotic and slow, but the two have definitely refined this in practice. Although, I must nevertheless note that they still need to be even tighter. Both performers tripped up on their lines a few times, which is inexcusable for a performance that relies on precision and diction in such a way, and this was most subtractive. I should also add here that there is also a problem with projection, with Grain delivering her lines much louder, and hence much clearer, than Sharp. The same can be said for the physical language. Grain and Sharp definitely need to sharpen their physicality. Yet, movements were decisive, and the use of physicality, overall, made for an intriguing storytelling technique in this performance, offering an oftentimes visually pleasing symmetry. Some visuals are definitely directly borrowed and unoriginal, and the use of chalk and its significance definitely needs to be rethought, but, on the whole, this is an aesthetically pleasing piece. “A performance that seeks to do a lot, resulting in rather little.”

This review will consider The Emoji Project, which was staged at the Hen & Chickens Theatre and streamed online. I am not sure how this performance was constructed, but I imagine someone said to the various writers involved, "Write something inspired by emojis! Go!" At least, that is what it felt like when I watched The Emoji Project. And I rather hope that this is, indeed, what happened, because if the writings were conceived and compiled as they are deliberately, I would have to question Ariella Como Stoian (responsible for the production's creative concept and dramaturgy) on her methods. The Emoji Project has some really great and comical moments, and the entire cast perform throughout with vigour and energy, but I am afraid that a mere theme of emojis is not enough to group these plays together as they are currently grouped. Some texts, such as the several 'Monkey' texts by Tilney Brune or 'You Wake Up / Octopus' by Stoian, are difficult to relate to emojis at all. Whilst they both certainly deal with emotions and language, they bear very little relevance, if any at all, to emojis specifically. I have quite a big issue with 'Octopus', in fact. One expects to experience a variety of performance styles, modes and genres when presented with an anthology of dramatic texts, but one also expects there to be a palpable limit on this variation, and managing this limitation was Stoian's job here. 'Octopus' is far too different from the other texts, both in regard to its decided performance style and to its content. It simply has nothing to do with emojis, and whist the contents of the other texts differ considerably, they are still related in some way or another, notably by realism and by actor presence — and, of course, through theme. The disembodied voices of the performers of 'Octopus', the void created by the darkness of the stage, the lights used in lieu of the human body [mostly], these elements and others make this play too distinctly separate from the rest. It is a beautifully devised and well-written piece, I should clarify –– in fact, I think it is the strongest of them all, a very powerful and visceral text –– but it has no place whatsoever in this collection. Returning my focus to the rest of the performance, I shall go back to the beginning. The performance starts with a rather innocent and endearing monologue written by Stoian and performed by eleven-year-old "Emelia" over a piano instrumental. This is a nice overture that introduces us smoothly into the dramatic text and reminds us of the younger generation in the lives of whom emojis are most prevalent. It also reminds us that this is an "intergenerational" performance, as detailed in the description…which is strange to me, because it clearly is not –– regardless of the inclusion of a singular eleven-year-old actress. Whilst this is a strong beginning in theory, the execution is rather poor, I am afraid. I would recommend when working with young actors with performances like these that lines be remembered not verbatim but through chunks, concepts. This is to avoid a sense of roboticism or lack of naturalism in speech, as is found in this particular recording. It would involve, for example, giving a list of bullet points to the young actor that remind them of the ideas they are trying to get across –– that using an emoji at a funeral would be "awkward", for instance, as was one of the items Emelia lists –– so that they may convey the idea in their own manner. The young actor would use their own language and timing to express the idea in question, relying a lot less heavily and systematically on the literal text, and coming across as genuine, natural, unrehearsed. This naturalism is vital to the beginning, and, as it stands, we are already distanced from the very start by the lack of fluidity in Emelia's speech. Unfortunately, as well, this sets us up for the lack of naturalism where naturalism is needed in the rest of the texts. A huge issue across all of the texts and with all performers is the sheer lack of adequate comedic timing. I shall exemplify plainly by referring to the text, 'TEFL (Teaching Emoji as a Foreign Language)' by Phoebe McIntosh. Halfway into this text, one of two teachers enters, and upon his entrance, he delivers a joke to the audience: "I would offer you a refund, but…it's a free lesson.” At this very moment, Ingrid Marsh, playing Jeanette, holds up her poo emoji flashcard –– another joke. In theatre, two different jokes delivered simultaneously make none. An audience needs time to laugh, and this comedic timing, or lack thereof, was extremely poor here. A similar issue, the argument that ensues between Jeanette and Zel shortly after this moment is far too frantic and seems to come out of nowhere with no real stimulus. Zel claims that Jeanette's use of the poo emoji is racist, and then we have a further confrontation when Zel exclaims that their pronouns are 'they' and 'them'. In this moment, delivery is, again, poor, particularly in regard to naturalism and intonation, and timing is ill-managed. Although, the issue remains rather in the lack of coherent progression in the writing itself, I would add. However, I must say that the cast deal with ensemble interactions rather well. Though I personally found EEKORP scenes rather irritating and ineffective, the speed and accuracy with which the cast 'bounced off' of one another were above adequate. I would just recommend better diction when it comes to the speedy commercial stock phrases at the end of these specific scenes. Ironically, though, I think energy needs to be reined in quite a bit in places, and I think this is the main reason I disfavour EEKORP scenes. There is simply too much going on too early, and the texts need to be better paced out. We need time to digest what we have just seen. ‘Monkey’ scenes are good for this, but they are simply too irrelevant, as mentioned above, endearing and well-performed though they are. I would recommend, for instance, placing 'In an Emoticon Nation' by Sean Wai Keung further on into the collection and 'Happy or Sad?' by Alastair Gibbons closer to the beginning. Moving on to audience interaction and participation. What is good about this performance is that audience interaction is constant. I see time and time again in performances actors interact with audience members right at the end or the beginning and never again, or –– the worst –– interrupting a performance to do so with such little effect or reasoning. This performance, however, manages to maintain its open and direct relationship with its audience, which is great for comedy and great for the venue that this performance took place in: a pub theatre, the Hen & Chickens Theatre. However, I am still not too convinced that these interactions were necessary or progressed the performance in any significant way. It felt as though audience interaction for the sake of audience interaction, and this is not so efficacious. There is an odd fixation on gender politics throughout this performance, and this culminates in 'Lobster Emoji' by James Ireland. The collection remains unnecessarily politicised in places by this fixation, and 'Lobster Emoji' seems to come out of nowhere with its overly blunt and direct narrative. There is no issue with politicising content, of course, but the manner in which the politics here are presented is peculiar. 'Lobster Emoji' highlights a very important issue of representation, marginalisation and prioritisation of identities and their expression, and, in theory, is a very poignant text. It is, to some degree, also handled with a sense of comedy, with the lobster costume, symbolic of an assumption of the lobster as a symbol of the trans identity. However, the writing is simply too literal. It seems more like an unencumbered, blatant rant, where all other texts have been incredibly fictionalised and unrealistic –– from actors pretending to be monkeys to the emojis brought to life in 'Emoji Gameshow' by Jalice Corral, which, I should note here, is a very poor and lacklustre text that I would certainly recommend be removed from the collection with urgency. So, this ends up being a very feeble speech, important though it may be, devoid of creativity and artistic intellect. Overall, I think writing was simply rather weak, salvaged by the energised cast. However, whilst performers certainly possessed great vitality, the manner in which this was channelled was rather unrefined, and their comedic timing and naturalism need a lot of work. The dramatic texts in this collection fall short of the theme that supposedly unites them, and audience interaction, though consistent and well-organised, is simply needless and distracting from the material at hand. Enjoyable to watch though this performance is, my personal and critical responses are very different, hence my rating below. “An underdeveloped and confused performance made somewhat heartwarming by its cast.”

Ithaca is written and directed by Phoebe Angeni. It is now available to watch on demand through the Edinburgh Fringe website. I shall start this review by commenting on the sheer eclectic and chaotic nature of this performance. The vast majority of its content is quite decidedly esoteric, and this is in no way in its favour. I should note that there is, of course, the expectation that audience members will have a sufficient understanding of Greek mythology and its relative pantheon, and it is, indeed, rather just to presume that an audience interested enough to attend this particular performance would certainly possess this relative knowledge. This is acceptable and is not what I refer to when I write here about esoteric material –– although, this focus certainly does not aid the issue of esotericism for audiences unfamiliar with the Odyssey, in particular, and surrounding texts. I shall now elaborate. There are two main constituents that render this performance pretty much illegible: one is its inconsistent style, and the other is its manner of [dis]organising its content. Starting with style, we are first presented our main character, Nobody (played by Phoebe Angeni), through a soliloquy addressing us directly via second-person narrative, and it is implied, through Nobody's various statements such as the opening line, "You asked if I was happy", that we have been in direct conversation with her up until this point. However, we are then never addressed again, and the text thus loses its quasi-interactive quality and remains self-contained. Moving on to extensive multi-roling and then onto common duologues, then poetry and interpretive movement, the language, form and mode of this performance remain entirely confused. Within the first twelve minutes of this performance, we have already been introduced to all four of these forms that will recur and interchange regularly throughout the performance's entirety, and the result is, naturally and obviously, exhausting. The style is simply far too chaotic and leaves very little time for an audience to breathe and digest the material at hand. Already in this performance, too, within these first twelve minutes, we have been introduced to completely disparate, disjointed and unfinalised pieces of information. This manner of presentation is not limited to just the beginning of this performance, though; an eclectic overload of seemingly irrelevant and unrelated information persists throughout the entire performance. First, there is the inclusion of Greek gods and goddesses, mythological creatures, etc. But, we are also in America, as connoted by the inclusion of the national anthem, 'O Say Can You See', and archetypal characters such as the valley girl and the [actually, rather offensive] extravagant female hillbilly obsessed with home delights; references to 4th July; and Angeni's bizarre and meaningless [at least, superficially] impression of Donald Trump when voiceovering Posiedon. Furthermore, Nobody is an immigrant who has now been denied citizenship and has no right to remain, and she is also a reject actress; a daughter to a disembodied, demonic voice; and a strong female [feminist?] fat-shamed by whomever she meets. Finally, following on from this latter note, there are also the odd theme of and subtle fixation on sex/gender and sexism, which, I should note, have no real profundity or significance in this text at all; for example, Posedion states that getting your feelings hurt is "a woman thing", or, when Nobody is introduced to Homer, she exclaims, "Homer? That's a man's name, you have a woman's voice." This is a lot to attempt to squeeze into a performance of only one hour's duration, and to do this effectively and coherently takes skill, articulacy and excellent organisation…things this dramatic text does not bear. Of course, we could relate Nobody's deportation and quest to find home to Trumpian cultural exclusivity and immigration politics, and so this, at least, explains why we find immigration and America in the same context, but this is simply too far a stretch and too big an effort for an audience to consider –– and this is without mentioning that this is only an inference; it is not actually clear at all as to why all of these items coexist within this text. The text needs colossal work insofar as editing is concerned. Simplicity is key! If an element is not necessary, and if its inclusion is in any way negotiable, it is ineffective and must thus be deleted. I have established that the content itself in this performance is confounding and chaotic, but what of its presentation? Nobody is someone who, as her alias implies, does not know where she comes from, what her name is, her purpose, etc. This play presents her journey of self-discovery as she journeys back home to Ithaca, a home to which she has been deported. So, at the end of the journey, what do we learn? Well…nothing. In fact, Nobody does not even manage to physically reach home, which rather compromises the entire trajectory we have been following all the while we have been watching. When Nobody does remember things about her previous life, the act of remembering is…weak. For instance, when Nobody remembers that she once had a lover –– yet another item I would delete entirely from this text, given that he features so minutely and has such little effect on the plot, and given the confusing, recurrent and semi-feminist "I don't need a man, but I want one" narrative –– one would expect this to be quite a significant event, but this is simply overlooked in the narrative, and the lover's existence is simply passed off nonchalantly as an unimportant and negligible piece of information. This is a common issue in this text. When new information is presented, it is done so effortlessly as though the introduction is inconsequential and to have been expected. For example, Homer introduces himself to Nobody and soon states, for the first time, "This is not what I expected [you to be like]", to which Nobody replies, "You keep saying that", and the audience is just to accept that this makes sense and is in keeping with what we have witnessed thus far. It is not. Nobody later continues, "You're tearing me down. I'm always wrong, always less than expected." The language here implies that the two have known each other for a long period of time, which is not the case. This lack of logical progression and chronology is further intensified by Angeni’s performance of the poem that I shall title 'The Cave of the Cyclops'. Somehow, Nobody now remembers her entire origins and history in order to translate this into poetic verse? She also says to Homer, "I don't like asking for anything, much less help, and if you know me, then you know that." So…now Nobody has a clear sense of her personality and identity? How?! With no recognition from Nobody of her sudden ability to remember her entire life, it is easy to feel cheated watching this performance — if we were ever permitted time to invest in it to begin with. More on this poem. There are several of them, and I shall start by saying that the poems themselves are actually very well written, with the strength of the poetry getting greater and greater as the play goes on. In fact, ‘The Cave of the Cyclops’ provides readers with excellent and distinct imagery and wonderful articulacy and expression. However, in the context of this performance, not only are they ill-introduced, as mentioned above, but they are incredibly stylistically inconsistent with the rest of the text. Soon, the poems come to render the performance rather bipartite: a poem and then a duologue, then a poem, etc. They are then further dampened by the accompanying physical movement being so repetitive, and limited only to the arms and upper body. Angeni’s delivery of the spoken word-esque verses is, overall, tonally repetitious, and she also needs to focus better on her breathing; she is incredibly breathy. Overall, Angeni's delivery is simply…terrible, unfortunately. She gives no thought to pacing, intonation or intention, and this is evident right from the beginning, where lines are simply reeled off, all with the exact same tone. When Nobody is first, what I shall call, for lack of a better word, abducted, Angeni's monotonal, uninvigorated and unconvincing delivery is further exposed, especially in her delivery of lines such as: "Can you hear that? Hello?", "What the fuck? Who are you?”, “Erm, no, you're not [my father]. You can't be", and "Get out of my head. You're horrible." For the most part, however, I must admit that characters are well defined, but only through voice and specific gestural/physical movement, not through any profound characterisation or transformativity. There needs a better distinction between characters at the moment she is to transform from one to another. All elements considered, this performance is very weak and has yet to find its identity and a clear, coherent voice. Its material demands far too much ignorance from its audience in regard to its lack of vigour and intelligible progression. And this is without considering all of the errors and inconsistencies that compromise the credibility of the text –– for example, Angeni’s constant mispronunciation of ‘Aeaea’, or how Poseidon curses Nobody to endure troubles on her journey home by herself, alone, yet she journeys home together with Homer, from whom she is “inseparable”, and an ever-present, spying Calypso. I would recommend limiting the chaos present throughout so that it increases over the performance's duration, especially so that Poseidon's curse and stipulations, which are fundamental to the plot, are communicated well and clearly and not lost amongst nonsensical utterances of 'pumpkin pie' and fat-shaming. This would also give the audience appropriate time to settle into the narrative. I will end on a positive note, however. Supplementary technical elements in this performance –– music, sound and lighting ––– were very well designed. Compositions were adequately dramatic, and sound, for the most part, was clear and appropriately utilised, particularly efficacious when considering the effects applied to the voiceovers of the more eerie and particularised characters, such as the sirens. Lighting was well managed, if a little too harsh in some scenes; costume was a good, if rather basic, decision; and the prop of the bow and arrow was most impressive and eye-catching. Unfortunately, though, these elements could not together salvage my critical or personal engagement. “A weak and shambolic performance, devoid of voice, meaning and logic.”

Encompass Productions's twelfth year of Bare Essentials, a night showcasing the works of new playwrights from across the globe, takes place this year in its new home, The Arts Studio in Leicester Square, London. This year, Bare Essentials presents its audience with six plays: 'Should've Gone to Lourdes', 'Monstrification of Eastern Europe', 'Town Meeting', 'Chekhov's Gun', 'Roommates', and 'Generation Disconnect and Other Love Stories'. After providing a short introductory review of the overall night, this post will review and rate each of the six plays individually. In this review: Summary: Bare Essentials 'Should've Gone to Lourdes' 'Monstrification of Eastern Europe' 'Town Meeting' 'Chekhov's Gun' 'Roommates' 'Generation Disconnect and Other Love Stories' Bare Essentials Host: Liam Fleming. Producers: Jonathan Woodhouse, Róisín Walsh and Liam Fleming. This was a diverse, entertaining and lighthearted night, showcasing a wide range of writing and performing styles from talented theatremakers. The pantomimic and engaging hosting by Liam Fleming combined the plays well, creating a jolly and interactive atmosphere. Although, perhaps his nerves were a little too visible, as pacing back and forth became quite distracting. Nevertheless, his energy was flawless. One thing I would like to draw attention to, however, is the objectives of Bare Essentials. At the beginning of the night, it was highlighted that directors and performers are handed over scripts for which they have limited time to rehearse and produce the action. As such, the focus is drawn to the performers themselves and away from fancy theatricals (i.e. we see how theatre can be made and enjoyed using only the "bare essentials"). I found that this aim, whilst its hypothesis is objectively true, was flawed. Wheelchairs, costumes, props all count as extraneous theatrical elements, and I feel it would have been interesting to really work on this concept of "bare essentials" and use the audience's imagination: a character who is a wheelchair user, performed without a wheelchair - what effect would that have? These explorative outcomes could have made for interesting theatre. However, as the claims were not strictly kept to, I couldn't help but feel they were unnecessary, or simply unconfident excuses. I also couldn't help but feel that the material created was somewhat self-uninformed, particularly in the case of 'Town Meeting'. Fleming's reaction to it caused it to seem somewhat out-of-place or unexpected - but not in a way that complemented its style. As for the inclusion of the audience, the Twitter competition was very clever, providing room for personal in-jokes and an intimate ambience. However, the final reading of the tweets felt somewhat out of place with the rest of the show. Whilst recognising the audience's input was a nice idea, I felt it would have been better to stick with just the winner and to give spectators something to peruse alone after the show. As for the layout of the audience, I found this very problematic. The heterogeneous array of chairs, stools and sofas, whilst a cute idea, provided varying height levels and hence minimised the stage's visibility. I would have suggested a more rounded seating area. “A rousing night of talent and diversity but somewhat misdirected.” 'Should've Gone to Lourdes' by Stephen Kennedy Director: Kayla Feldman. Cast: Edward Bell (as Chris) and Eddie Usher (as Brian). The writing of this short play was comical and realistic. Its pacey and mysterious reveal of the location of the characters was effective, and the leakage of other narrative elements (such as backstory, allusion to other characters, etc.) was intriguing. Energy was seldom permitted to fall; however, I felt that the long silence as Chris leaves to converse with the prostitute was much too lengthy. This would have been more apt in a longer play, but for such a short one, this caused the momentum to become a little lost. An exceptional performance from Usher who emoted the character of Brian well; unfortunately, I felt that Bell's characterisation was somewhat wooden in places, and this took away somewhat from the piece. Nevertheless, the two together fitted well and served as a humorous duo. The two seemed to understand their characters well, and a clear relationship between the two was effectively encapsulated. “A comical and endearing piece of theatre, despite conflicts with pace.” 'Monstrification of Eastern Europe' by Nina Wieda Director: Justin Murray. Cast: Rimca Karmakar (as Natasha), Ramzi DeHani (as Viktor) and Mark Keegan (as Serguei). This performance started with a crescendoing soundscape of modern-day news reports. Whilst this was a typical way of introducing political content in a performance, it did set up the rest of the action quickly and well. The singsongy self-preparation from Natasha that then followed was a nice metatheatrical hint to the fact that she was about to perform. However, Natasha's character was very inaccessible. Karmakar realised her in a very robotic, emotionless and dazed way, and whilst I understood this to be a homage to the mechanical nature of the press, when bits of her personal feelings towards her reports began to surface, the effect was less poignant than it could have been. The physical movement aspect of Natasha's scenes were very unpolished and literal, making for an awkward watch. Whilst the idea of having Natasha at the heart of the news story she was presenting was an interesting one, it was taken too literally. The repetition of and themes of corruption within her scenes, however, I found most effective, and this was intensified at the end with the gas mask being removed and placed on Natasha's face. Moreover, the use of the gas mask and bike helmet worn by DeHani and Keegan poignantly alluded to war and modernity. Effective. I found this performance to be very textured, which was effectual. The performance style of Natasha's scenes vs those of Viktor and Serguei juxtaposed each other nicely and was successful in providing varying viewpoints on the same story, marking well the ubiquity and unreliability of the news industry. However, towards the end of the piece, this became somewhat bipartite and monotonous. DeHani and Keegan's characterisations, however, made these scenes flourish in a comical absurdity. “A lot of potential can be drawn from this performance, but development is needed.” 'Town Meeting' by Toby Parker Rees Director: Sam Dunstan. Cast: Josh Morter (as the Bandleader) and James Unsworth (as the One-Man Band). This piece was endearingly convoluted, chaotic and ludicrous. It tackled the very notion of plot in an original and almost melodramatic way. However, there was perhaps a bit too much confusion taking place, especially for such a short duration. It needed something to tie it all together so that the audience could engage with the material. Perhaps this thing was what was intended by "the tragedy", but because this was made cryptic and left unexplained, its potential to be a concrete platform to secure the audience's understanding of the chaos of the piece was flawed. It was unclear what time period this was set in: costumes were periodic, and yet the characters spoke modernly, referring to parts of modern everyday culture, as with the One Direction lunchbox. This would perhaps have been workable if that necessary grounding motif was left for the audience to be able to comprehend the world of the play. The interaction between Morter and the audience was good, immediately marking this performance as an immersive and loud one, and the pantomimic relationship between the two characters was comical and endearing. There were many moments, however, when Morter came out of character, and this severely disrupted the otherwise alluring mayhem. One thing this piece did certainly demonstrate is the difficulties one can run into when enabling audience participation, as, on the night I watched this performance, a spectator was invited to the stage and refused to leave. Whilst Morter clearly understood the piece well enough to be able to improvise his way out of awkward situations, moments like these - which are almost bound to happen - should be noted in rehearsals, for it was clear Morter did not know what to do. “Endearingly chaotic but missing a layer to thread the havoc together.” 'Chekhov's Gun' by Ben Beck Director: Liam Fleming. Cast: Duncan Mason. This piece victoriously manipulates the psychology of its spectators. The recurring motif of a pink elephant was an efficacious way to control spectators' imaginations, and the constant predictions of spectators' thoughts, and claims that someone in the room will die, were bold and fruitful. What was perhaps the most successful element of this piece, however, was the ominous skulking from Mason. Mason wandered on stage during the interval only to have attention drawn to him after a sudden blackout. This was then followed by moments such as the revealing of the gun, and Mason weaving through the audience. This constant movement and remaining eye contact served as a powerful omen. The only largely negative thing about this performance was the ending: Mason is dragged away by the host of the show, Liam Fleming. Whilst this was a clever idea, the execution was terrible. The shouting/kicking/screaming from Mason was over-exaggerated and wooden, and the whole drag-out was very tacky and awkward to watch. I felt that a simple blackout, or even having Mason leave the room to finish the job in private, so to speak, would have been much more effective and haunting. Followed by a pathetic gunshot sound effect, the ending was very anticlimactic. However, I will note that the twist of having Mason attempt to shoot himself was smart. “A thought-provoking and ominous piece of theatre.” 'Roommates' by Matthew Fowler Director: Ali Wright. Cast: Rebecca Hutchins (as Molly) and Phoebe Batteson-Brown (as Emily). This was a quirky and humorous piece of theatre. The ambiguity of the twins' location was charming and engaging, taking twists and turns with references to "prison" and the outside world, as examples of many. This ambiguity was even present in the title. The identical costumes (pink hoodies, white trousers and fluffy socks) paired well with flippant dialogue to portray a relationship between the characters. Whilst pauses were sometimes overdone, energy was kept high, and momentum, smooth. Performance was very good from both performers, and the lack of movement made for an intimate, self-contained feel, enhanced by the mother's music playing from outside. “A smart and lovable performance.” 'Generation Disconnect and Other Love Stories' by Kate Christopher Director: Lucy Foster. Cast: Andrew Gichigi, Roann McLoskey and Alexander Pankhurst. This piece gave an interesting and stylised angle on the concept of love. The whooshing sound effects between scenes gave the piece structure and coherence as well as being reminiscent of the scene transitions of a TV show or something of that calibre (i.e. they gave the piece movement and prepared the audience for a different scene with every sound). Characterisation was OK from Gichigi and Pankhurst and good from McLoskey; however, I would have preferred this play to have pulled more upon the notion of performers as opposed to actors. That is to say, I felt that the recurrent characters of Peter and a birdwatcher, amongst others, weakened the focal point of the piece. In contrast, the stylised scene in which characters expressed emotions through the use of terms commonly found on social media (e.g. "Follow me", "Like me"), although somewhat unoriginal, was effective, and more moments like these, as opposed to naturalistic dialogues, would have served the focal point better. Some physical movements were superfluous but, on the whole, fitted the style of the piece well. “An interesting starting point for an interrogative piece of theatre.” Photography Credit: Encompass Productions.

The full title of this play is: Captain Flinn and the Pirate Dinosaurs: The Magic Cutlass This was definitely a weak performance, from both a conceptual and executional standpoint. Whilst certain visuals and ambiences created in this musical are powerful and impressive, these remain practically the only elements of interest. With very little presence, beyond that naturally camp and flamboyant air which we immovably associate with drag queens and pantomime dames, Miss Pie (Mark Middleton) is the first character to be presented to the audience, leaving the stage and wandering around the tent to greet and mingle. Whilst Middleton definitely retains a certain degree of wit, with his quick-fire and readied responses to children’s statements and questions such as “You’re a boy!” or “Why are you wearing a wig?!”, it is energy, vitality and specificity of character that Middleton distinctly lacks here. Despite his heightened voice, not demanding a particular amount of effort or thought, there are few idiosyncrasies that particularise and define this character for us. This all worsens when Miss Pie is called back to the stage to begin introducing the play. A mixture of fallible writing and lacklustre characterisation, this introduction is flavourless, humourless and cricket-inciting, engendering no audible laughter from the audience on the afternoon I attended this performance. This lack of enjoyability is later accentuated by the absence of successful transformativity between characters, an issue not unique to Middleton but particular to the entire cast…more on that later. The character of Miss Pie conjures a very particular style of theatre that is not congruous with the rest of the material of this performance whatsoever. It feels as though theatre company Les Petits took inspiration from stock characters –– indeed, from arts such as pantomime or drag –– and imagined that this would be a sure-fire way to invoke joy in young audience members, but this does not consider this character’s significance, relation and coherency [or, rather, lack thereof]. In fact, I think the entire narrative of a primary school production should be omitted completely. It adds absolutely nothing to the text and only complicates our reading of the two worlds, these being ‘real’ world in which Miss Pie resides and the world of the dinosaurs. It is not made clear as to what relationship these worlds bear to one another or what is real and what is not, and this is too complex a layer to add on last minute, with Miss Pie attempting to cover up her pupils’ disappearance. I say that Miss Pie is the first character to be presented to the audience, but Middleton is not the first performer. Throughout the performance’s highly conspicuous setup — I fail to understand why this was not already set up before the audience enter… — performers are clearly visible from either side of the thrust stage. In fact, the entire backstage area is on show, and this seems to be deliberate or, at least, unapologetic, given the set design (Zoe Squire). This is an issue that persists throughout the entire performance, utterly obliterating illusion, especially in scenes using shadow theatre, the [in]efficacy of which I shall detail shortly. How effects are achieved is exposed, dampening them considerably, and visible costume changes lessen the believability of characters. On the subject of performers, characterisations were harshly similar, with the only real variations being within lines or in the characters’ statuses and relationships within the world of the play. As mentioned before, there was very little transformativity amongst the cast, with Stephan Boyce being [not strong but] the strongest in this respect, and this especially became a problem when multi-roling occurred. The different performers’ takes on the characters were utterly dissimilar, and actors were unable to portray their exactitudes, a good example of this being Middleton’s vs Boyce’s interpretation of the brachiosaurus. Diction was also a massive problem across the cast, particularly during songs, though this was not so much an issue for Ellie Pawsey. For the most part, it was a struggle to understand any of the lyrics. The performers’ use of space was also questionable. In fact, overall topography was incredibly poor and ill-conceived. Not only was the naturally slightly less visible material, such as the use of small puppets or shadow puppets, performed too far Upstage or too far Downstage, further complicating visibility, but delivery remained imbalanced to one side in particular, Stage Left. It was rare to have any action, if not fleeting or ill-weighted, delivered to the audience Stage Right. This includes both musical numbers and action during dialogue, audience address or asides. On a more positive note, however, I will say that performers did possess relentless energy and vitality, even Middleton when not performing as Miss Pie. In this way, it is not necessarily the capabilities of the performers themselves that I have an issue with but with direction (Hal Chambers) and, more intrinsically, with the writing of their characters. The text for this performance is especially fruitless, both unfunny and unrewarding. It is dull, repetitive and relies far too much on puns, heavily overusing them. This is particularly erroneous given that puns should, indeed, be intended for a maturer audience, given that the appropriate and here necessary ability of abstract thinking does not develop amongst young people until the age of eleven at the very earliest. These puns are hence highly unfruitful from their very concept onwards. It is clear that the text is desperately attempting to be comedic, yet jokes and gags just fall flat consistently. The same type and style of material is used over and over again, and this often has an effect on the intrigue as far as structure is considered, especially when the dinosaurs’ entrance is imminent. When the dinosaurs are due to enter stage, lighting states (lighting by Matt Leventhall) change drastically; crescendoing, dramatic music (composed by Jack Graham Thomas) plays; and the sound (also designed by Graham Thomas) of dino-stomping echoes around us. These moments, ironically, are extremely impressive and show great artistic promise, but they do become rather overused, as this occurs thrice. It is also a shame that the lead-up here is greater than what we are finally presented. This is never ideal. That being said, the T-Rex’s costume (costumes designed by Zoe Squire) is rather sublime. A humongous presence on stage, this costume is particularly mesmerising. However, as previously mentioned, lack of backstage concealment meant that costume changes were highly visible, and so any favouritism towards this character would be immediately thwarted in the direct and concretised knowledge that this is really just a performer under a piece of cloth. On top of this, as though illusion could not be broken any further, there was a gaping hole in the back of the costume, exposing Middleton’s legs. Overall, there was very little effort to conceal human physicalities beyond this example, the most irritating case being the animation of the brachiosaurus. Ventriloquism, or a certain physicality that presents the puppets as significant focal points, is best with puppets like these; otherwise, it is quite distinctly a puppet head controlled by a talking human. This was emphasised in this performance by the sheer lack of movement from the brachiosaurus puppet beyond its mouth, meaning that most movement actually came from actors — though this was more the case for Middleton’s animation. Children are not as easily fooled as one may desire to think, and this is highly worth noting for this musical. It seems, however, that this lack of care towards exposing the puppeteer behind the puppet is somewhat deliberate, with Pawsey, when portraying Pearl, states that she and her triceratops character have never seen each other “face-to-face” before, a metatheatrical joke considering that Pawsey has been playing the role of the triceratops up to this point. This metatheatre is most uncalled for and unseemly. All in all, costumes and puppet pieces ranged in quality, from this rather cogent giant T-Rex costume to the strap-on wings to represent a pterodactyl. There was a lack of colour and overall visual intrigue in these puppets, and the lighting and set did not complement this at all, I must admit. On the note of set and tech, I shall now return to the shadow box at the back of the stage. Used both as such and as a screen for projections, this is a dynamic item by nature, yet this was not at all used to its full potential. Firstly, there is the problem of the size and placement of the box. Placed far Upstage, the box is relatively difficult to see, particularly when smaller items are presented upon it. Then, the shadow puppetry was rather mediocre. The introduction of the pirate dinosaurs, with just a rigid claw cast onto the screen, was pitiful, and, as I wrote above, how any shadows were cast was revealed in the lack of backstage concealment — a problem by which it must now [hopefully] be obvious that I am particularly irked. However, the diving shadow sequence is absolutely divine. This is a very mesmerising — if a rather tiny and short-lived — display and demonstrates imagination, dynamism and comedy. The sea-life puppets that follow are just as magical. I am just irked once more by the topography puppeteers follow, with a once-again imbalanced stage and with human physicality being far too exposed, most notably with the hermit crab. Projections, though irritatingly simplistic, were just about sufficient for this performance, however. A final note on music. If somewhat unoriginal in terms of overall sound, music was the most impressive feature of this performance. It was very well composed and sufficient in suspense and drama. Lyrics were more doubtable and repetitive, however, and not in a necessarily catchy way, but these nevertheless retained the vitality of the music and complemented theme. Overall, this is a highly unbefitting performance. Besides some impressive sensory elements, those which solely increase my rating, there is very little to take away from this performance. The design of props, of music and lighting, those features which extend from and complement the dramatic text itself, are those that render this performance watchable and somewhat enjoyable, but there is very little quality and intrigue to be had in this performance. Sitting on the furthest row with a good sight of plenty of child audience members, I can bravely say that I did not see a single smile or laugh from a single child. In fact, one child even stated that they were bored, and another that they had “no idea what’s going on”. “A performance professing to do a lot and verily doing incredibly little.” Photography Credit: Gail Harland.

The full title of this play is: Iphigenia Crash Land Falls on the Neon Shell that Was Once Her Heart (A Rave Fable). In reading that this play – written by Caridad Svich, and performed, on this occasion, at The Bread and Roses Theatre – was a Brechtian and surreal investigation into violence towards women and LGBTQIA themes, I was very intrigued. I felt it paradoxical to combine a dream-like, ethereal mode of theatre with a political, alienated and metatheatrical one. The aim was high, I thought. The first notable thing about this performance was the large role that immersion played: constant glances into the audience; Yoli (Rebecca Rahman-González) gesturing that a spectator kiss her hand; popcorn being offered to the front row; even the set leaked into the audience, with the purple glow-stick crosses stuck down by duct tape, all around the floor. This immersion paired with monologues in which characters, chiefly Iphigenia (Jess Rahman-González), spoke of themselves in third-person, and with 'Brechtian' factors such as live costume-changing, multi-roling, and humorous references to the action on stage, to reference an epic theatre style. Then, we move on to the surrealist elements. The only truly surreal feature of this performance were the images projected onto a screen behind the stage. These images were, indeed, visceral, and I was particularly drawn to the static/moving pictures of Iphigenia and her father, General Adolfo (Mickey Shaw) displayed during the opening scene. The combination of storytelling and a visual reference worked effectively and played into the Brechtian theme. This was, however, perhaps the only moment that the surreal and the epic combined well. Whilst there were small surreal symbolisms to be noted – from the floaty Christmas lights wrapped around Iphigenia’s body to her holding two delicate balloons attached to a solid branch, blindfolded – I felt these not enough to have real poignancy. But, I was especially confused by the choice to have all performers, barring Iphigenia and Achilles (Sam Kindon), shoeless. If this was to differentiate these two from the other characters, I felt this too unnoticeably significant. Characterisation was a huge issue for this performance, particularly for Jess Rahman-Gazález. For her characterisation of Iphigenia, everything seemed forcefully poetic and over-performed, and this high energy became, over time, tiresome to watch. Emotions other than joy seemed forced and highly lacklustre. As for the other performers, not a single gestussen was used – something I found particularly odd. With all the multi-roling, it was difficult in many scenes to pinpoint who was who. Shaw, on the other hand, demonstrated differentiation well, making a convincing and humorous General Adolfo. Sara Jewell playing Luz and Virgin Puta (and an understudy for Violeta Imperial on the night I saw the performance) also characterised well – to the extent at which I thought it would have been a better choice for her to play Iphigenia. Having Achilles represented as a libidinous sadomasochist was an interesting and refreshing choice, one which I felt had potential. However, Kindon’s characterisation seemed to be very samey the whole way through, and I was waiting for a real corrupt descent of character, which would have made for a more effective epic theatre. Whilst Brechtian performances are supposed to eliminate psychological realism, there must be at all times a visual scope enabling the audience to understand what is going on at all times. That is to say, even if the audio was completely removed from a true Brechtian piece, the visuals would tell the story. A lot of Brechtian techniques seemed to be overused in this performance, and the simplest, and perhaps what would have been the most effective in this performance – like gestus – were omitted. One example of this is a scene wherein Yoli, Luz and Yvonne sit off stage, commenting on a dialogue between Iphigenia and Achilles. This, whilst funny at a few points, seemed highly unnecessary, having no political or estranging effect. It just seemed to have been a technique employed for the sake of it, taking away from the aims of the play. This was a good opportunity to present the audience with another, darker interpretation of the scene, to distract them from the theatrical artificiality of the dialogue and present them with the underlying corruptions. A good opportunity missed, I think. One moment I did find efficacious, however, was what I’m going to crudely call “The Sex Fest”, towards the end of the play. This was definitely a surreal and poignant scene in its hilarity, and the only scene in which I enjoyed the absence of clear character. This is because it had a more general impact – referring to the common objectifiers of women. However, when the performers started referring to themselves as characters, this impact was slightly lost for me. Another moment was the repeated movements under the stroboscopic lighting. Whilst these movements had been repeated for a long – too long – amount of time a few scenes before, looking at this scene alone, the rhythmic music, lighting, movements and voiceovers layered extremely well and were effective. There were, however, movements throughout the rest of the performance that really frustrated me, and this is particular to moments when simultaneous movements occurred. Little hand gestures or counting aloud, used to stay in time during these movements I mentioned, or at the end before Iphigenia’s last mention – to name a few – were highly distracting and took away from any potential efficacy. Repetition was a problem, and the whole performance towards the end became highly predictable, from Iphigenia’s emotionless, poetic monologues to the performers announcing the next scandalous, almost-identical photographs of Iphigenia to be projected onto the screen. Surrealist theatre focuses on dreams, and dreams should not be predictable. And any Brechtian predictability should have political purpose. Hence, I found this repetitiveness of structure fallible. This was a performance with a clear aim, and its plot was effective in using the canonical character of Iphigenia as a puppet in a quest to explore violence towards women. Issues arise, however, in the performance’s attempt to combine two very different genres of theatre, and its lack of certainty as to why it was using the techniques it was and what the effects of these be lead to the piece's comedown. “A play with a clear and exciting aim but with execution not living up to desire.”

This review will consider Bedlam, a play written and directed by Tom Hodson and staged at the CLF Art Cafe. This is a very good performance, from its thorough and impressive aesthetic to its engaging concept, writing and execution. As the audience come in, they are greeted by complete silence and dim lighting. There is a slight mist in the air. Upstage, to the left and to the right, two square playing areas, each formed of a sofa and a chair (overall design by Ed Saunders). Far Stage Left, two chairs. Barring this, the stage is completely empty, and the audience must bear its heaviness. This is a most chilling and ominous beginning, one which instals a sense of trouble and disconcertion. It is also very brave. Two actors enter, Christopher Roscoe Brown and Peter Stone, playing what I shall call Therapists 1 & 2, and the play begins. I cannot say that I was particularly overwhelmed by the initial acting, starting with the awkward-looking and rather needless mime between the two as they walk into the space, grab a drink and briefly pretend to talk. When Matt Forey (playing George) enters, he and Brown seem rather wooden, and not just because their characters are awkward or cold towards one another. A combination of the writing and acting, this first scene seems to lack fluidity and naturalism. It is rather repetitive and artificial. Its rhythm and tone also grate against the second scene in which Lucy Hilton-Jones (playing Ellie) enters the second playing area where Stone is awaiting her. There is too huge a contrast in energy and character type but also in momentum, and this makes the beginning of the play difficult to digest. Whilst the beginning is rather stodgy, what ensues is utterly engaging. Forey and Hilton-Jones step away from the playing areas and come downstage, right in front of the audience. It is here, Downstage, that their relationship starts to play out, that the story begins to deepen and to unfurl. Slowly littering the Downstage area with props, scattering vignettes of their life together before our eyes, this relationship becomes more and more complex and unique. It was effective to have this so close to us, not only demonstrating an intimacy between the characters in a literal close-up on their lives away from the therapy rooms but also creating an intimacy between the characters and us. I should note here, however, that smoking with such proximity to audience members could be very dangerous should but one spectator suffer from any lung problems; I would recommend a pre-warning for this. The writing makes for a unique relationship between the two, one which demonstrates particularities and patterns of behaviour existing beyond the action we are presented –– an example of this, of course, being Ellie’s mood swing when George reveals he has broken her mug, or the two’s shared interest in music and alcohol. Forey and Hilton-Jones are excellent actors, convincing and articulate. They also demonstrate a successful chemistry and confidence on stage. In terms of Stone and Brown’s acting, I would have liked more. I found Stone to be slightly over-the-top, more energised than the text really allows him to be. I found his lines to be rather short and staccato, and this meant that his high energy was regularly cut short. I feel he could have benefitted from a more natural approach, which would have made his character seem more insidious, overall. This was also an editorial problem, however, as I feel the text was far too blatant in his character’s siding with Ellie, in his egging her on, so to speak. As for Brown, I found the opposite. I feel that he could have been more articulate in his physicality. His demeanour was far too cool and hence rather nonchalant and inert. I would have liked to see him play into his lines more, particularly those that deliberately draw focus to masculinity –– football, drinking, etc. I feel that his character is, though rather poorly, psychoanalysing the basics of George’s personality/pscyhe, and masculinity seems to be a way into this in this text. I would have liked to see slightly more of a caricaturisation in related moments of coercion. As a final note on all actors, I would like to see more during transitional scenes, or during scenes where our focus is on one therapy room, leaving the other dimly lit and silent. These moments start to lack variation in terms of what actors do when they are not in the limelight, and this is particularly the case for the Therapists, being that they sit out of the main action so often. There is only a certain amount of note-taking that is 1) feasible and 2) intriguing to watch. It seems as though the actors are not even acting at points, particularly Brown who often seems to gaze off into space whilst sat to the side of the stage. Whilst I would urge these movements to be minimal, so as to not distract from the main action, if actors are deliberately lit, it needs to be with purpose and significance. Even a slight tapping of the foot, or restlessness from Hiltone-Jones and Forey whilst they are sitting silently in the therapy room would make an image more engaging. Again, movements were still made during all of these moments but not sufficiently. On to the writing itself. One particularly jarring thing about the Therapists, rooted in the structure of the writing, is their need to leave to “confer with their colleagues” at the end of every scene. This becomes way too overused, and scenes seem to end far too prematurely. It feels as though nothing has really happened in some scenes, that they could actually be cut altogether for their brevity and lack of plot progression. Again, I feel that the text could benefit from some more realism and fluidity here. Would the Therapists really need to disappear so often? Surely they do this all the time and so would be prepared for the events that will happen? It also does not feel as though most of the things George says are particularly game-changing for the Therapists. There are also some irregularities in the text. One major irregularity is that it is not made clear as to why Ellie became so fearful of George having cheated on her in the first place. Whilst I understand that his reaction is not particularly reassuring when Ellie finds a group photo of him and the potential other woman in question, this is not enough to clarify how this situation blew out of proportion for the two of them in such an extreme way. The revelation that Ellie and George are, in fact, participants in a TV talk show is very well conceived and, for the most part, is successfully woven into the narrative. Again, whilst I think that Therapist 2’s [Stone] doings are far too blatant, I really enjoy the subtle and surreptitious elements that, only in retrospect, are the fruits of the ‘Therapist’’s clever rigging ––  Therapist 1’s getting George drunk for the show being a very good example of this. However, I feel that this reality does not possess our focus in the way it intends to. It is most certainly a shocking plot twist but it does not make for a particularly impactful ending. With the text giving so much focus to the couple’s relationship, accentuated by the lengthy scenes they share beyond the therapy rooms, and with therapy scenes being so succinct and brief, the talk show becomes of secondary importance. Our interests remain heavily in Ellie and George’s relationship; we want to know what happens to them next and, initially, if they ever benefit from whatever “therapy” it is that they are receiving. Our interest in their physical location is not so great. Furthermore, the ending transpires so hurriedly, and it feels as though the reveal is skimmed over. All of this is accentuated by the fact that the couple’s situation remains cryptic until further on in the performance; we do not find out that George potentially cheated on Ellie until the middle/end of the performance. There is not really very much to ground our attention in the context of a therapist’s office, let alone that of a TV show. More time should be spent on concretising, perfecting and deepening these therapy scenes and the roles and functions of the Therapists themselves if it is desired that the spectators concentrate on the context of the TV show above the characters, that they see the characters as secondary, as pawns in a game. It was made clear that this was felt by many other, if not all, audience members at the end of the performance, being that many were quite vocally unsure whether or not to leave the house, asking around if there was an interval or if the play had, indeed, ended. The story definitely seemed unfinalised, yet I would also say that this is to do with the same silent, dimly lit setting, that which I commended very early in this review, being repeated again. A complete blackout on the stage and house lights up, a very basic and well-known cue for an audience to leave, would have been preferable, perhaps along with the sound of the TV audience or theme tune for the show to leave the impact of the plot twist to settle amongst the audience. I mentioned earlier that I would like to see more variety from the Therapists when they are sitting out of the main action. If our concentration should remain on the context of the story and not so much on its plot, I would recommend, instead of becoming insignificant add-ons, tucked away in the corner, miming, that the Therapists take on a more active role. They should be watching the action, maybe even taking notes of what the characters are doing in realtime vs making other, virtually unrelated notes. They should be ominous figures, constantly in the background, supervising the memories of the characters, worming their way into their story. This, I feel, would have slightly bettered our reading of the play’s location, but I think meticulous editing is required to make this whole, underlying narrative more articulate, readable and hence effective. “An extremely original and highly intriguing performance; just in need of reassessment of overall aims.”

For my first review since The Theatre Reviewer's hiatus, I shall examine Dorian: A Rock Musical, plunging first into aesthetics. It is clear that this production had a good budget or, at least, access to good resources, as both set and costume (Belle Mundi) are, on the whole, well designed, sleek and well presented. However, all together, the aesthetic is simply disharmonious and illogical, particularly when it comes to costume: there is a complete lack of sense of time period, and designs are fraught with historical inaccuracies. But I must say, I am afraid that this is as good as it gets… Written and directed by Linnie Reedman, this musical’s dramatic text is most definitely underwhelming. It is easy to feel as though one has been cheated of one’s time watching this performance, and this is mostly due to the sheer lack of detail and specificity in the text. One is left with a huge amount of unanswered questions. We learn hardly anything about Dorian (Bart Lambert), why the other characters are so obsessed with him, and we see no indication that being locked away for his entire life has had any impact on his ability to socialise, on his levels of anxiety or agoraphobia, for instance, making for a most unconvincing and unrealistic character type. We learn hardly anything of the theatre the characters frequent or of the sort of people the characters are, beyond their interest in clubbing and paintings — two very different interests, again leaning into that unstable aesthetic, inspiring the visuals of romantic masterpieces and dingy modern nightclubs. In fact, whatever we do learn about the characters is only through basic disposition (which is also somewhat illegible, given the lack of transformativity amongst the cast) and from what other characters say about them, not through the characters themselves. Indeed, the writing seems to provide us with nothing but a skeletal plot, with development of story and character being overly crude and blatant. The main reason for this, really, is an overuse of song (music and lyrics by Joe Evans). The songs in this musical, very catchy though they are, depend on over-literariness, flamboyant bombast and melodramatic feeling, attempting to deal with deep, mournful and existential themes, such as love, sin and youth, but to the detriment of psychological realism, naturalism and credibility. The songs are simply far too abundant, eating into the time that should be spent allowing us to get to know the characters. What should be momentary ponderings or interactions between characters to progress the story along become lengthy, heartfelt ballads, as is the case with Lady Henry (Johanna Stanton), for instance, when she sings about her husband’s (John Addison) lack of compassion and mutuality. Lady Henry really need not have so much time allotted to her, being a rather negligible character in this story, and this song, like many others, unnecessarily draws out what could be a mere few seconds of stage-time. The problem is that the songs do not teach us anything profound about the characters, their psychologies or their contexts; they are simply meaningless pseudophilosophical attempts to excavate and examine elements of the human experience — which is just as high-flown as it sounds. Having written all of that, however, the music remains very lively and catchy, but there are few motifs or particularities throughout to give the overall catalogue a sense of identity and uniqueness. There also seems to be a confusion of rock and tango… The lyrics, unnecessarily bombastic though they are, do remain thought-provoking and romantic, however, but I just wish more attention had been given to the vocals –– that is their volume and their marriage with the instrumentals, as the two sound far too obviously distinct, having been recorded separately and badly combined together. I mentioned that transformativity was lacking amongst the cast members, and this was the musical’s absolute downfall. Especially during songs, movements are unnaturally brusque and ill-conceived, with characters performing actions with no obvious [or natural] motivation or need (movement direction by Anthony Whiteman) — a good example of this being in the opening scene wherein we see Dorian needlessly picking up various items scattered around Margaret’s dresser: a glove, a pencil, Margaret’s portrait… Lambert simply lifts the item, looks at it, and puts it back down –– pointless. The term Chekhov's gun comes to mind! Direction is incredibly poor when it comes to character intent. On top of this, there is a huge lack of naturalism in general, with actors’ intonation and delivery failing to replicate the patterns of natural speech. Either there is a complete lack of emotionality, passion and conviction, or it is simply melodramatic, as with Sophie Jugé (playing Mrs Leaf) and her out-of-nowhere histrionics for her [inaudible] song during Dorian’s death scene, now resembling an opera performer after hitherto performing completely plainly — a very good example of what I meant when I wrote about the poor and failing marriage of vocals and instrumentals in this performance; Jugé is practically on mute during the entire song! Then, there’s the odd inclusion of the ensemble who make rare appearances and add absolutely nothing to scenes but peculiarity. Why? Just to make the scenes look busier, more interesting? A terrible conception. However, I should note here the shining star and redeeming hope for the profession of acting in this performance: Addison. A wonderfully credible and compelling performer of which others in this performance should take note. Another adequate performer was his onstage counterpart, Stanton, but even she faltered towards the end, for me. A shockingly poor cast, I, unfortunately, have to note. At least, Lambert garnered the strength to perform with a degree of conviction during his scene with Lewis Rae, but perhaps too late… Overall, I really fail to see why this performance was so long and what the writer-director assumed they would achieve in its creation. This is a very underdeveloped, lacklustre and, I must say, boring performance. From illogical costuming to large and vacuous sets to overly harsh lighting and mediocre performativity, this performance was simply negligible. Usually, I do not comment upon cinematography for recorded performances, but I must mention that the terrible compositions and camera angles definitely lean into this performance’s sheer lack of professionalism and order. Terrible framing and blocking often mean that characters are completely obscured and one cannot even see what is going on in a given scene… With a final remark that everything I have written relates to the performance's entirety, I have nothing left to write…and so I end this review. “Poor concept, poor execution.”

Certainly the strongest of the three performances in the Teatro Multilingue triptych, this play is the most structured and coherent. I shall start by considering the first major artistic decision in this performance: the desaturation of all colours barring blue. This effectively contextualises us in the mid-1900s through an intertextual visual reference to pre-Technicolor cinema and, more generally, renders the ‘palette’ bleak and cold. Whilst video editing is not something I usually consider when reviewing virtual performances, I think this is something worth noting, due to the effect it has on the play’s reading, and I believe it to be a good, if a little on-the-nose, decision. Ignoring this, however, what we are first presented with in this play is incredibly confusing. ‘A madame no le gustan los extranjeros’ [‘Madame doesn’t like foreigners’ in English] is María’s (Mavil Georgi) first line of this play. Her next line portrays her concerned for the whereabouts of her cat. The next tells us that “his” cat returned home after a month, whilst subsequent lines confirm that is she who has lost her cat… So, who is Madame? Who is “he”? Georgi delivers one line, then turns, and the camera angle changes, and then she delivers another, turns, etc… The beginning is simply chaotic and illegible. I would recommend, without explanation and for obvious reasons, a complete rewriting of this beginning which should be immediately simple and accessible to an audience, contextualising the action and introducing lucidly us to the characters of the play and the play’s plot. Thus, the beginning is incredibly weak. And this is without mentioning that this all takes place in the stalls, with Georgi sifting through the seats… I fail to understand why this is not performed on the stage, as there is no symbolic reasoning for this to take place here. Because of this lack of legible context and of concrete characters and objectives, naturalism is, as has been the case with the other two performances, very lacking. However, as the play progresses, naturalism certainly increases, with actors proving themselves to be credible and energised, but issues remain with the text itself. Somehow, María manages to bring her cat from Spain to Marseille but loses it now on arrival? Somehow, a spy has been watching her, collecting information on her, completely undetected for some time now and yet casually, unthinkingly reveals that she knows her name? And then reveals her own? I also find it bizarre that María should wait until the end of the Spanish Civil War to flee the country, with the action of the play taking place one day afterwards. Why not flee sooner? More importantly, why María’s sudden change of heart to join the Anarchists? Elements like these compromise the realism of the text. All irregularities aside, however, this play does capture a good amount of vivid detail on the wartimes of France and Spain, with an appropriate amount of time spent detailing María’s backstory and her experience with the Spanish Civil War and her journey to France. I would just recommend either developing François’s (Maxence Dinant) character or removing him completely. He has little effect on this plot; Elena’s (Carolina Gonnelli) character could have been enough, really. I can see that these characters are used more as simple representations of the types of people that may have existed during these times, as opposed to intricate and unique characters who happen to live in the times, and this perhaps justifies the lack of character psychology in lieu of a focus on character history and experience. However, if this is, indeed, the intention, this should be developed further and perhaps this direct method of storytelling should replace the conventions of the traditional play, necessitating the removal of elements like the cat, for example. Related to this, however, I think including the Alberti poem, whilst a little inconsistent stylistically with the rest of the performance, is an attractive and reflective one, with the restoration of colour to the scene — red being both symbolic of bleeding death and, of course, the international symbol of remembrance, the poppy. Overall, this is a good performance, if it does take a while to find its footing. I would just recommend refining pivotal moments of the plot, where plot-altering events are given more time and consideration. “A good evocation of the sufferings of the past but lost to unsteady dramatisation.”

The second of Teatro Multilingue’s triptych, Mrs Green, is a twenty-minute play focusing on the lives and relationship of two foreign lovers living in Britain during the times of Brexit. It is an enjoyable play, I must say, and is, for the most part, coherent and accessible. However, as the play progresses, theatrical and stylistic techniques become obscure, and story is compromised by an obvious obsession with needless dramatic tension. I shall start with story. The first issue I have is with the very title of the play. With our focus being on the two lovers, I find it difficult to comprehend why Mrs Green (Shenagh Gallivan), being a secondary and merely facilitative character, is presented as titular here, as if of primary importance. I perhaps understand the intention to use Mrs Green as a symbolic representation of the British ‘Anti-Brexiteers’ during the times of Brexit, but her influence is simply too minimal. Right from the start, then, focus is not where it should be. Brexit itself is introduced gradually into the characters’ lives, with a sense of dramatic irony growing with us as each ‘Chapter’ presents us with a quote on the subject by a British prime minister. This is strong in that Brexit is allowed to become an insidious danger in the text, ultimately ending in the lovers’ ‘fallout’ — more on the efficacy of this later. With the situation of Brexit being something most European — and particularly bi-/multilingual — audience members will recognise and know, any further descriptions of Brexit would be somewhat needless here, and so we are given a sufficient amount of information on the subject. This is good. Equally, the cyclicality of the play, with the motif of Isabel’s (Altea Hernández) abandoned suitcase, successfully foreshadows the symbolic significance of Brexit and also the pain the characters will endure. Multilingual theatre is always a treat, and I must say that the language use in this performance, for the most part, is decisive and well conceived. Having the characters perform monologues and soliloquies to the audience in their own language vs speaking English amongst each other is a clever way to create intimacy between character and audience member and unity between characters. In this way, languages are organised well. On the same line of story structure, I must say that focus in this dramatic text needs quite a bit of work. For instance, back on to the topic of Mrs Green, Gallivan is seen throughout the lovers’ interactions placing her handmade political posters upon the wall, upstage. Perhaps a directorial decision, this is incredibly distracting, moving our focus away from the lovers — where it should be — and towards her needless pottering about in the background. Less significantly, we could also consider the attention to detail given in the description of the lovers’ landladies, Mrs Green, again, and Mrs Brown, a character we never actually meet, and could compare this to the time and detail given to the lovers’ first encounter, which is most brief and lacking, though an event of extreme significance in the plot. I should also note here the deliberate code-switching when Jacques (Maxence Dinant) proceeds to describe Mrs Brown to the audience in English after having explained everything else in French. Consistency is key. Attention to detail is also rather lacking where characterisation is concerned, and, especially, attention to naturalism. For example, considering this very first encounter again, Hernández speaks incredibly quickly, again minimising the readability of the significance of this scene — such a quick and fleeting meeting would hardly garner interest in a second between strangers — and, of course, comprises the naturalism of speech. Then, Jacques informs us that English people often mistake him for a Londoner, which is most unrealistic considering Dinant’s strong French accent. Either the text should be altered here, or Dinant should have extra accent training to match the role he plays. After the lovers’ second interaction, Hernández turns to ‘the audience’ and describes Jacques to ‘us’ — note here the apostrophisations, as Hernández does not face the camera but stares off to the side. Who is she talking to here? This needs to be far clearer. Similarly to this latter issue, when Mrs Green details her experience of her former French lodger and then apologises for her lack of care in the swiftly-following subsequent scene, we are made to imagine Hernández’s responses as Gallivan mimes that she is interacting with her. This is a terrible decision. Hernández plays a principal character; she should be present in such scenes, not imagined. This is a stylistic inconsistency. Lastly, we have moments like the one in the texting scene where Jacques’s ‘boss was coming’, yet all Dinant presents us with a mere momentary glance to the side, not even attempting to conceal his phone — most unnaturalistic. It is elements like these that make a good amount of scenes either totally unwatchable or seem simply amateurish, and what is worse is this aforementioned insistence on dramatic tension. Theatremakers should not rely solely upon technical and spectacular elements to create dramatic tension; instead, these should be used to intensify the dramatic tension already present in the text. I say this, of course, in consideration of the final scenes of the play. Three major and notable things happen towards the end: the lovers have their first and final argument, Mrs Green recites some poetry, and then, we have the final scene seeing Mrs Green posing stiffly over Isabel’s abandoned suitcase. The first of the three, the argument, is…pathetic, for a lack of better words. From the ill-timed and jarring interruptions to the awkward repetition of “Why are you doing all this?!”, this entire argument scene needs to be completely rewritten. This scene seems to come out of nowhere, with no clear tension having been building between the two characters beforehand, and the level of characterisation and credibility is simply horrendous. The long and hardly visible shots of the two leaving the stage and auditorium lend too much focus to the characters’ exits as opposed to what caused them to exit in the first place. Oh, and then Mrs Green drops her poster! As if this has some terrific, dramatic significance. This scene is simply awful. Then, we have Mrs Green’s recitation. This is both inconsistent with style, given that poetry has not featured in this performance thus far and that a mere verse is not enough to ground it in the text now, but also awkward in Gallivan’s over-performativity and the previous lack of solemnity in the text to make this scene meaningful and serious. Lastly, the final scene. Much like Mrs Green, I too remained speechless for one minute and forty-two seconds while she rigidly poses with a suitcase, the camera being walked further and further away, ever so slowly, until she is a mere blob on the screen. I cannot comprehend in the slightest why this was believed to have been an effective and powerful ending. It is, quite honestly, ridiculous. As I said above, Mrs Green is not a principal character, despite her titular name; she is merely an eccentric, jittery and homely landlady who happens to be swallowed up by the Anti-Brexit movement. We are simply not made to care enough for her or to view her character with enough seriousness or critical thought to be able to be affected or impacted by this unthoughtful ending and the effects that Brexit have supposedly [indirectly] had on her. Moving my focus away from the writing and towards the acting. Whilst naturalism is lacking in many places, as said before — though this is principally an editorial issue — all performers demonstrate some degree of credibility in this play, with an emphasis here on Gallivan’s characterisation. Energy is also high across all three performers. Chemistry between Jacques and Isabel definitely comes across; Dinant and Hernández portray intimacy believably and extremely well. This is commendable. To conclude, this is quite a weak performance, but until the oddities in the final scenes, it is rather enjoyable, and this is mostly because of this aforementioned energy the actors each possess. The dramatic text needs a severe amount of editing, with better concentration on story structure and the articulation of political messages, and not to mention consistency of character thought, with Jacques’s relationship with Brexit being completely unclear and changing, for example. Editing is needed even where lighting is concerned, which is far too harsh and expansive throughout. Overall, I would replace washes with focused spotlights and, for example, light the couple harshly from in front in the Brighton beach scene to fill the frame with a mere silhouette of the characters and to leave the creation of the beach to our imagination [which I believe was perhaps the desired effect, but it simply was not achieved]. A cleaner lighting design would make the use of space in this performance slightly more legible. “A dramatic text with huge potential but obliterated by an excess of needless dramatic techniques.”