Skip to main content

Review of Flash Festival 2019: A Splice Of Life by Ripple Ensemble at Castle Hill URC

Ripple Ensemble's A Splice of Life opens very traditionally and innocently, a couple coming together, moving in, setting out on their life adventure. It's all very cosy, and of course, we know this isn't destined to continue like this. Our couple Kate and Mark are struggling to have children, so much so they end up on rounds of IVF. With this failing to work before the money runs out, a rather intriguing proposition is put to them via a medical trial into genetics.

This results in Kate and Mark building a baby, years later to become the grown-up Sophie. Added to the family is adopted Luke, and the slightly less nimble Kate with creaking bones, and the now greyed Mark now appear to have the perfect family. Sophie is heading towards the Olympics, and Luke has followed the artistic nature of Kate. All is well until a chance discovery changes events dramatically.

A Splice of Life's brilliant theatre, always intriguing, with never a dull moment. Kit Wiles and Ryan Greendale are exceptional as Kate and Mark, this is a real relationship depicted, believable and heartbreaking at times. It is just so brilliantly conceived and written, with some stunning silent moments of just physical interaction.

The children at times take a backseat, and Tim Medcalf's Luke is never really given enough to do other than to be wisecracking. However, his sparring with sister Sophie (Meredith Barnett) is always great fun.

However, there is one single scene that sets A Splice Of Life apart from many a Flash show, and that is the confrontation between Sophie and her father. Here, Greendale and Barnett are at their very best, performing an almost perfectly scripted piece. A bitterness running through them both, but still, love showing the most. This is a cruel scene of emotions that is truly affecting, I know I was, some tremendous power of acting here on show. It also is dissipated in an incredibly brilliant moment of comedy. A rollercoaster scene indeed, and here Barnett is particularly stunning.

There is a lot of moral stuff going on in A Splice of Life, again as always with a Flash show, much to think about. However, most important of all, while it was happening, it was just tremendously entertaining. A real cracker!

Performance viewed: Thursday 4th April 2019

The Flash Festival 2019 ran until Sunday 7th April 2019 at venues across the town.
Details here: Flash Festival 2019
Labels:

Popular posts from this blog

Review of Murder She Didn't Write at Royal & Derngate (Royal), Northampton

Murder She Didn't Write , stopping off for a four-day run at Royal & Derngate on a lengthy UK tour, treads the now well-worn path of an improvisational evening of theatre entertainment. Unsurprisingly, from the title, this show from Degrees of Error's takes a murder mystery as its inspiration, with the story influenced by ideas from the audience each evening. Due to this, Murder She Didn't Write and a review are very much an individual affair. What I saw in my evening at the theatre will differ significantly from what the audience will see the following evening; however, the fine performers will remain. The touring cast, in no particular order, is Lizzy Skrzypiec, Rachael Procter-Lane, Peter Baker, Caitlin Campbell, Stephen Clements, Douglas Walker, Harry Allmark, Rosalind Beeson, Sylvia Bishop, Emily Brady, Alice Lamb, Sara Garrard, Peta Maurice and Matthew Whittle. For my performance, Skrzypiec, Procter-Lane, Baker, Walker, Bishop, and Clements were on stage alongsid...
Read more

Review of Immune by R&D Youth Theatre at Royal & Derngate (Royal), Northampton

The cover note for the script of Oladipo Agboluaje's Immune describes it as "a challenging science fiction play with a large cast", and the word challenging in this case is not a lie. This is a fast paced, multi-cast changing script which leaves little room for error for its young cast in the performance. If the script isn't enough to handle for the young performers, director Christopher Elmer-Gorry and designer Carl Davies have made the situation even more complex for the actors with the set and stage work. Having to manhandle great panels on wheels and a huge cube, which also splits in two occasionally, during scene changes requires skill, coordination and cooperation of a high level. As if all this is not enough, the actual story is epic enough for the relatively small stage of the Royal. Attempting to form an apocalyptic world (albeit only happening in Plymouth) offers challenges in itself, but Agboluaje's script does that in a sort of apocalypse in the teac...
Read more

Review of Theft at the Castle Theatre Studio, Wellingborough

The comedy-thriller Theft by Eric Chappell tells the story of an anniversary celebrating couple returning to the devastation of their home being ransacked in a burglary. However, this ransacking pales in comparison to the ransacking of their lives that then occurs as home truths are revealed. Anyone old enough to remember the works of Theft writer Chappell ( Rising Damp and Only When I Laugh ), could be forgiven for thinking that this 1996 play might feel a little dated for a 2021 audience. However, bar a few references much of their time now (the weaker sex and female priests for instance), Theft still feels comfortable in the 2021 world, where many of us just want both a good evening of theatre and a good bit of fun. With Theft from the highly regarded Wellingborough Technical Players, they get just that. The action starts as we find the man of the house John Miles played by Graham Breeze returning, very angry, to his home. He is a rightfully boisterous character, channelling all th...
Read more