Skip to main content

Review of the University Of Northampton BA (Hons) Acting Graduate Showcase at Leicester Square Theatre, London

The Graduate Showcase was pretty exciting even for me, so heaven knows how it was for the actors actually taking part. Here I was in a gathering of around twenty people (all others infinitely more important than me) at a special closed event at a West End theatre, complete with free drinks and buffet. Fortunately I had Mr Jim aka @mudbeast76 to keep me on the straight and narrow of juices after the one alcoholic one went straight to the head drink. Then as if it wasn't a surreal world as it was, there only goes and walks in Lukewarm himself, Christopher Biggins!

However, this isn't about me, this is about the thirty six ultra talented individuals who after I have followed them for a bit over a year are about to venture forth into the big competitive world of the acting community. They have though the double advantage of not only coming through the excellent three years University Of Northampton training and also being rather talented to help them in this.

This being my first showcase, I knew only a little of what to expect, mostly grilled out of Mr Jim. What I saw though was a seamless transition of pieces derived from small segments of plays interspersed with snippets of their own Flash Festival performances. These Flash moments were excellently selected considering the totally out of context nature of many of them and it was wonderful to see them again, even if they were only about ninety seconds.

The new groups of twos and threes that had been formed for each segment were also a revelation, almost all perfect in every way including the pairing up of my favourite man and woman performers from Flash. They were all seemingly perfectly selected even those that were actually a surprise at first worked.

Director Simon Cole certainly also kept a very busy seventy to eighty minute show flowing and somehow still managed to get all thirty six their equal moment of stage time, which was vital for this performance unlike their previous pieces in the course which greatly varied with performance time.

So the role call of honours are due, so to (in order of appearance) Samantha Colden, Dale Endacott, Sarah Kirk, Riley Stephen, Kate Fenwick, Ashlee Sopher, Ben Stacey, Joseph Clift, Jamie Park, Hannah Mitchell, Jenny Styles, Leanne Dallman, Rachel Sherborne, Sam Skinner, Jessica Kay, Julia-Louise Nolan, Samantha Ahweyevu, Sophie Poyntz-Lloyd, Matt Larsson, Catherine Garlick, Ryan Manning, Chloe Emery, Nikki Murray, Rochelle Halsall, Matt Hirst, Antonia Underwood, Zoe Davey, John Shelly, Mellissa Michelle, Michael Whelbourne, Abigail Benson-Ross, Tara Lawrence, Lydia Rose Blagg, Jack Smith, Steve Banks and Sam Billy Behan congratulations. The three years are over, the big world is open to you. Go and conquer it in anyway that you wish to. I await to see you on stage again soon.

A final thanks to Simon Cole, and Dr Ross Prior to making this stray out of place person feel like he was very welcome at this event. With thanks also to Dr Sally Cook and Chris Burdett and to any other people who are busy behind the scenes making this course, event and star making happen.

It is with pain that I let these thirty six leave me, but with the thought that I am certain that I shall be seeing them again. Onward and upward!

Popular posts from this blog

Review of The Bodyguard at Milton Keynes Theatre

The 1992 film The Bodyguard , starring Kevin Costner and marking the acting debut of singing megastar Whitney Houston, was a standard romantic thriller, greatly enhanced by Houston's presence and a cascade of big musical numbers. Surprisingly, it took twenty years to make the transition to the stage. Premiering in London in December 2012, just ten months after Houston's death, the show has since become a massive global success. Now it arrives at Milton Keynes Theatre again as part of its fourth UK tour in just thirteen years. The Bodyguard sees former Secret Service agent turned bodyguard, Frank Farmer, hired to protect an Academy Award-nominated actress and music superstar, Rachel Marron, from a stalker. Between Farmer's duties and Marron's career, something inevitably builds between the two amid music and dancing aplenty. Taking the leads on this tour are Sidonie Smith as Rachel and Adam Garcia as Frank. Smith has appeared in The Bodyguard before, as a walk-in in a p...

Review of Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat at Milton Keynes Theatre

There have been numerous productions of Andrew Lloyd Webber and Tim Rice's groundbreaking musical since it first appeared in 1968 and opened in the West End in 1973. One might wonder if there is still room for another tour. However, judging by the packed audience in Milton Keynes Theatre for the opening night of Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat , much interest remains for this show. Also, with this production first seen at The London Palladium in June 2019, and with a few production elements altered, Joseph still has, after all those years, the room to change and evolve. However, the question is, does this change help or hinder the show's history? For those unfamiliar with Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat, it tells the story of Joseph, Jacob's favourite son, in a lighthearted and musical style that jumps between various genres. Joseph's brothers are somewhat envious of him, leading to them selling him into slavery to an Egyptian nobleman. As for ...

Review of Breaking the Code at Royal & Derngate (Royal), Northampton

Breaking The Code , the opening play in the new Made in Northampton season at Royal & Derngate, is a surprisingly old and rarely seen play. Written in 1986 by Hugh Whitemore, it tells the story of legendary codebreaker Alan Turing, a man who, in the 1980s, when this play first appeared, was relatively unknown. The years since the origin of this play have been good for Turing, with his life's work finally getting the recognition it deserves, and also, very much what this play centres on, a recognition of the horrific life and end that Turing had as a result of dealing with the laws of the day. Breaking the Code has seen life before on the stage of the Royal, as back in 2003, Philip Franks took to the role of Turing in a very well-received production. So, what of this brand new version directed by the Royal & Derngate's artistic director Jesse Jones? Does it live up to Turing's legend? That is an unquestionable yes with no machines needed to crack the class behind thi...