Skip to main content

Review of Flash Festival 2016: Him by Just Bear Theatre Company at St Peter's Church

Just Bear Theatre Companies Him tells the story a chance meeting between Happy and Issac

The above I got from the description of the show online. After seeing the show, I have to admit that I am still a little confused as to the main subject matter. What is clear having seen Him is that this is more of a standard play than you tend to expect from Flash. There are less juxtapositions between stimulating serious and comic content, there is little choreography movement and physical theatre, there is little tech. This is a play simply telling a story and perhaps therefore fails in what you generally expect from a Flash production. What is does, is well performed, what is says though is far less clear.

It gets off to a very bad start though as Happy (Jack Alexander Newhouse) is exchanging conversation with Her (non third year actor Jemma Bentley). Jack does the most heinous thing in a theatre production in an acoustically challenging church and performs much of the opening dialogue with his back to the audience. I have seen shows in the round of the Holy Sepulchre and this can be excused, however here in St Peter's the audience is all in one direction and there simply is no excuse for it. I personally heard most of the dialogue although at times it was challenging, however I was in the second row. I know others did struggle.

What this play does do though is use the church space well to perform the production. With the play actually set in a church, use of aisles and the door itself to herald the arrival of Isaac (Neizan Fernandez Birchwood) is impressive, giving an atmosphere perfectly as we the audience sit within the actual set.

The story though I have a lot less understanding of. Perhaps it is my fault, I am being dense (although having spoken to others who thought the same, I don't think I am). It is clear that this mysterious stranger is known to Lucky, however I don't think this ever totally becomes clear why.

Then we have Her. After the arrival of Isaac, Her is no longer Jemma, but a blowup doll. This offers much hilarity for the audience, and offers some entertainment (occasionally in the awkward way). However I genuinely didn't quite get what it represented. My first and pretty much only thought is that it represents how lonely Happy has become. He has created a fictional partner to spend his time with. This is the general thought for such a thing.

However does it work like this within the play? I just don't think so. What mainly doesn't work is that Isaac seems so willing to play along with it. I have no idea why he would not mention something like that pretty early in a meeting. So that is the main sticking point of the whole play not working for me. Then we have the moment that rather inexplicably Isaac one night sees Her in human form again, or appears to? That really did leave me puzzling.

So I hope to be told exactly what was going on and my apologies for not quite getting it, if it really is rather obvious. It was all very well performed despite a few issues and I do congratulate them at the very least for completing this rather strange little play without corpsing at any point. So that without a doubt is a credit to the professional performance from the duo. All rather strange indeed.

The Flash Festival 2016 runs between Monday 16th and Saturday 21st May, 2016 at four venues across the town. Details can be found at http://ftfevents.wix.com/flashtheatre2016

Popular posts from this blog

Review of Lord Of The Dance at Royal & Derngate (Derngate), Northampton

The stage show Lord of the Dance possibly needs little introduction to most people, as it has become a legend and now, in this touring version, subtitled rather immodestly, 25 Years of Standing Ovations, it reaches a landmark anniversary. Those that do not know of the show would probably well know its spiritual fathers Michael Flatley, and even more likely Riverdance , from which Lord of the Dance sprung with a proper spring in its step. During the interval of the 1994 Eurovision Song Contest, Riverdance hit the world by storm as Michael Flatley and his troop of dancers possibly presented the most famous part of Eurovision ever, certainly of the non-singing variety at least. Here, this touring show brings that same style Flatley created from traditional Irish dancing across the country once again and it is truly something special to see. The concept of the show is simply a battle between good and evil told through dance, and some captivating and stunning songs performed by Celyn Cartw...

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 Rambert Dance in Peaky Blinders - The Redemption of Thomas Shelby at Royal & Derngate (Derngate), Northampton

The Rambert Dance Company is the oldest such company in Britain having first performed in 1926. However, despite this, this was my first encounter with the group in my ten years of theatre-going. Coupled with this, it was also my first encounter with Peaky Blinders , having never seen the show, and only knowing a few vague things about it. My companion for the evening however was very familiar with the show, allowing some background behind the show. It turns out though,  Rambert Dance in Peaky Blinders - The Redemption of Thomas Shelby needs a little more than a good bit of knowledge of the show, as despite this production having incredible style, there struggles to be a cohesive structure to the show and the storytelling. Much more than other dance shows as well. The first act does a whistle-stop tour of the first five seasons and while it is a feast on the eye, and on the ear, it gets extremely confusing at times. The second act is freestyle and drifts away from the stories tol...