A Small Mind At The Theatre

Major spoilers are contained within this review. Having fully adopted myself into the amateur theatre realm of shows in Northampton and now knowing a few of the people involved, it was perhaps inevitable at some point that I might have the awkwardness of writing a slightly poorer review where I knew people involved. However I have backed myself into this corner, so I shall have to bite the bullet and fight my way out. A Swan in the Attic written and directed by Weekes Baptiste is sadly one of those slightly problematic plays, although not in this case with the performances. These I felt were in general nicely done from April Pardoe as lead Gloria through to the mad antics of Jake Abbott's Doll. April on stage for much of the show and with a significantly larger role than I have seen her perform before is confident throughout. However the play itself takes so many odd turns it often feels very difficult to follow their characters progression. It truly is a difficult play to ge...

Ever since the announcement of Speed The Plow and its stage débutante star and wild child Lindsay Lohan, the internet and press were as wild as her with comments about the likely disaster than the production was to become. I saw comments ranging from her not knowing lines, to her walking away from the show and the comment that her understudy was likely to perform more than her. I have no interest in naysayers generally and would rather form an opinion myself really and have not kept tabs on her commenter's much since the début. However a whole paragraph on Miss Lohan from me is ironic really as I didn't attend Speed The Plow to see her as I was here for the opportunity to see Richard Schiff on stage. The West Wing is probably my favourite TV series and I was never going to miss a chance to see Toby Ziegler in action live. He is not a disappointment for me and issues forth David Mamet's wordy script in all the fast paced manner I am familiar with from the aforementioned te...

Its true to say that sometimes I could be won over by a production in the first minute or so, much I suppose like the opening line of a book maybe. 1984 from Headlong and Almeida Theatre did just that. The opening scene following the striking of the thirteenth hour begins with Winston Smith writing in his diary. After a time the lights of the stage go out and seemingly seconds later they are back on and six more members of the cast have appeared from seemingly nowhere and are perfectly posed to begin their roles. I can be won over maybe too easily by sound, visual and those choreographed tricks perhaps too much, but this one I think would easily win over most people. I know that it presented a number of gasps from the audience surrounding me. Gasps were plenty during the creators Robert Icke and Duncan MacMillan's new adaptation of Orwell's classic novel. There were so many visual and sound tricks with clever stage and set work there are too many to many to mention. People ...