Skip to main content

Review of Jekyll & Hyde at Royal & Derngate (Royal), Northampton

The Third Year BA Acting & Creative Practice students made their final appearance onstage together in an adaptation of Jekyll & Hyde by Royal & Derngate's Erica Martin, who directs with Trudy A Bell. It offered an inventive, if perhaps overlong, telling of the story, but allowed the diverse range of skills from the students to be fully exploited.

This telling of Robert Louis Stevenson's classic, might at times feel a little different to those that know the story well. The piece itself, while in keeping with the Jekyll tale of a scientist exploring a hidden self, also developed a separate story, involving another culprit for Hyde's deadly adventures. This revolved around a local piece of history relating to the 1892 murder of Annie Pritchard (Amy Catherine), and the person convicted of her murder, an Andrew McCrae (Ben Loftus). It's a neat spin on fleshing out the tale, especially to allow more depth for the 23 strong year group to all be part of.

So, Jekyll & Hyde has its fair share of excellent acting and inventive moments, and its strength at all times is the ensemble work, the group generally all work well together, creating vibrant scenes upon the stage bridging scenes as well. These are the strengths of the whole show and keeps the piece interesting.

From the performances, Samuel Jordan is a clear and controlled Jekyll, every bit the thinker and explorer and his discussions with his friends are measured, this gives the perfect balance against George Henry's Hyde. Hyde takes some bedding in from Henry's performance, as at close of act one, he feels totally unconvincing in his fleeting appearance, not menacing enough at all to be the perfect opposite of Jekyll. However, it improves, in the second act, his menace increases, without too much volume, and at play end Henry has created an excellent, and sinister interpretation of Hyde.

Elsewhere there are a superb collection of performances. Rosalie Evans is strong and confident as Victoria, Ellie Lomas is perfectly cast in the lovely little role of Penny Girl especially, and Kyla Williams opens the entire show with a wonderfully evocative speech as Gypsy Woman.

I totally enjoyed the petulant and bolshy performance from Rosemarie Sheach, once again proving one of the stronger performers of the year group. As was Samual Gellard, with his controlling the stage and captivating his audience with his brilliant telling of Annie's story down at the White Horse. Erin Thorpe made an extremely convincing Utterson, in the gender-switched role, sparking in her scenes with Jekyll. Finally, from the cast, Liam Bottazzi created a clipped and precise version of Poole the butler (a role I've played don't you know), maintaining a discreet distance in the background as he should most of the time, but never dropping character.

Throughout the piece, there was some excellent setpieces and surprising songs, ensemble ones solid, and a wonderful solo performance from Amy Catherine of We Played A Game. From the collection of clever bobbing choreography during the dance sequence, and the hypnotic song laying behind, there were some truly brilliant moments of both visual and aural treat.

As already mentioned, I think as a piece it was too long, maybe as much as half hour, with some of the first act feeling like filler, although in actual fact, probably more importantly for this university piece, allowing all performers a good cut of the action. Therefore here, unlike other shows, it has to be allowed to get away with some of its bloated nature.

However, no question did I not enjoy it. There was so much to within it, some really neat ideas and totally as expected, some brilliant performances. This year group is mostly an excellent bunch of people, and as they have now parted, I can't help but wish them the best of successes in the future. Most especially the Jekyll's amongst them.

Performance reviewed: Friday 31st May 2019 at the Royal & Derngate (Royal), Northampton.
Jekyll & Hyde ran at Royal & Derngate between Friday 31st May and Saturday, June 1st 2019. 

For further details about the Royal & Derngate see their website at http://www.royalandderngate.co.uk

Photos: Graeme Braidwood

Popular posts from this blog

Review of Benidorm Live at Milton Keynes Theatre, Milton Keynes

I arrived at Milton Keynes Theatre to see this touring stage version of ITV comedy hit Benidorm with a distinct lack of knowledge. Having never seen the show, my information stretched as far as knowing it was set in a holiday resort in Spain (the title helps there), and that the humour generally resorted to the cruder end of the spectrum. However, having graced the screens for ten years, it was clear that Derren Litten's show had garnered quite a following, and indeed it was clear from the reception of the audience on the night, that this following was pretty much filling the theatre. The plot, such as it is for this stage show, is very much drafted from an episode of Fawlty Towers , and made a great deal more adult with its humour. The hotel manager, Joyce Temple-Savage (a sharp performance by Sherrie Hewson) gets wind that a hotel inspector is in, and the scene is set for seeking them out and all the obvious cases of mistaken identity. It's thin and doesn't fill

Review of The Time Machine at Royal & Derngate (Royal), Northampton

As the title suggests, Original Theatre’s The Time Machine , importantly subtitled “A Comedy”, takes the 1895 novella by classic science fiction writer H. G. Wells of the same name as its source material. However, while the name is on the show, those expecting a straight, or even, as suggested, comedic full version of the story, will be disappointed, as this often drifts, like the machine of the title, out of control from the source material. What we do have though is a tremendously thrilling couple of hours of entertainment, where the unexpected, is very much at every turn, and indeed at times, even unexpected for the actors on stage. Original Theatre’s  The Time Machine  takes the form of a play within a play, here all three of the actors in the production are pretending to be playing themselves playing several characters within the story. This allows for much of the staple of plays that go wrong to rear their head, including dysfunctional scenery and repeated sequences, here used in

Review of UoN Fringe 2019: Working For The Man by Naked Truth Theatre at The Platform Club, Northampton

When looking at the prospect of the Fringe performance Working For The Man , it is slightly difficult to work out who is the bravest person involved in this remarkable one performer, one audience member show set totally within or around the edges of a car. I guess I would in my case, say myself, but it takes some daring for performer Ellie Lomas of Naked Truth Theatre to also create a piece that offers the boldness that it does. Working for the Man is perhaps unsurprisingly about the sex trade, and explores exploitation and how, or if, prostitution is taken as a serious profession. It involves no live audio dialogue from performer Ellie Lomas, instead, she inhabits a purely physical performance, that is progressed by the use of a pair of headphones which you are given at the start. Across this audio are instructions of what to do. "Get in the car", "sit in the middle seat in the back", "open the glove compartment" etc, as you move to different areas