A Small Mind At The Theatre

For the third year running, I had the pleasure of being allowed to see another batch of talented actors strut their stuff on a London stage in front of the agents and directors of the acting world. This is always a key and very final moment of the course, and at no point will these people perform together again (although wouldn't that be neat to have performance reunions in years to come!). There is little point in my going into too much detail again over the performers really as I have done this elsewhere in my final review ( click me! ). However, the show under the direction of Simon Cole was a neat "showcase" of their talents once again, whipping between scenes featuring duos or trios glued together by swift scene changes. It really was a seize the moment as the actors never got very long to prove themselves. The format (and some of the content) was the same as last year, and a couple of my picks were Diary of a Madman featuring two superb comic moments from Karr ...

Mentioning the name Ruth Ellis to people of a certain age even after over sixty years brings about a strong emotional reaction with some, and even for those not of a certain age, many people know well the name and her story of being the final woman hung in Britain. Olivia Sarah Jane Noyce This nicely researched play from Merge Theatre (opening my fourth year at Flash) tells at times vividly that story, from the early days of her meetings with her future husband George Ellis (played by Jennifer Etherington), via her success at 'The Little Club' and onto her destructive meeting with David Blakely. Connor McCreedy Centre in the play is an extremely solid performance from Olivia Sarah Jane Noyce as Ruth Ellis, portraying the confident and freewilled person with style, whose confidence remains to her final days in Holloway. Jennifer Etherington Jenny Watson is also excellent as her sister Muriel, the quiet opposite of Ruth and she is superbly emotional in he...

You always have to remember that the BA Actors course that I happily follow is there foremost to challenge and teach its students. For this brief period of theatre going, perhaps the audience (paying or not) are not always the most important part of this production. I make this reasoning for the selection of this play, Pornography by Simon Stephens and last years Days of Significance by Roy Williams. Neither of them offer much of a way in for the audience with their endlessly unsympathetic characters and grim look of life. I can see a day after seeing the play and my usual 'sleep on it' contemplation, why the play works for the students, it challenges them as much as this grumpy theatre goer in row C. Difficult and challenging subject matter, disturbing situations to portray and some really very long and difficult monologues for the several lead characters to perform. It all provides a checklist of items that an actor will see in their future careers. At the time, I felt t...

The performance of The Comedy Of Errors by the current second year actors heralded my first viewing of my fourth batch of students. With two groups seen into the big bad world over the last couple of years and next weeks Flash Festival saying a fond farewell to the group I have followed the longest (25 months!), I needed new blood to tide me through the next year. As a first encounter with the first half of this group, it looks as if the quality is continuing into the next generation. The eighteen in this production of Shakespeare's comedy appear to show no lack of skill, even minor roles although often relatively brief were lively and realistically performed. I knew nothing of this particular play upon arrival and garnered just a little quick knowledge that is was about lost twins and mistaken identities from the programme. Oddly this was enough and for a first encounter with a play by the bard, this was for me the most easily accessible one I have seen. I actually knew what wa...