A Small Mind At The Theatre

The wonderful Caroline Avis welcomes us at the door of St Peters Church. She is in full mime mode, enthusiastic and eager to please. She beckons each of us to our seats. Once we are all happily seated the show The Hold Up begins. This is silent entertainment as Caroline holds up (get it?) cards telling us among other things to switch off our mobile phones. This is going to be a fun night. However all of a sudden with no warning (unless you have read the pre-show publicity), a group of five armed men and women burst through the church doors. This immediately becomes a different kind of hold up. I imagine now someone who has come to this show without knowledge of it and their reactions, as it is all very real. A moment of real dramatic impact. Our terrorist captors are Tom Stone (the leader), Suzannah Cassels, Stuart Warren, Amy Weaver and the injured Patrick Morgan, who lays prostrate in the church aisles. Early on we are told that we are safe as long as we stay seated and keep eyes...

I first got the opportunity to see these now third year actors at the Holy Sepulchre in March 2014 and even at that time, as first years, their heavily choreographed movement work and delivery of the words of John Donne showed huge potential. Fast forward to June this year and the levels of skill were developing at an exponential rate as before my eyes they made my nemesis Shakespeare very, very watchable with their Winter's Tale and Merry Wives performances. Now a full twenty months after I first saw them they have presented perhaps the very best of the Northampton University shows I have seen to date and there have been many exceptional ones believe me. What Orientation did for me that was a delight that I have not always seen from the University productions is that as a concept it kept it simple. We are in a highly competitive office with a group of workers, basically amounting to a dysfunctional family, who find themselves not only snowbound in the office but also in som...