A Small Mind At The Theatre

Poor old Tommy and Tuppence, forever playing third fiddle to the might of Hercule Poirot and Miss Marple. However maybe 2015 will be their breakthrough year some 93 years from their creation. There is not just this clever and fun play, but a certain David Walliams set to appear before the end of the year as Tommy Beresford to Jessica Raine's Tuppence. However first we have this gem of a little play to contend with. Adapted by Sarah Punshon (who also directs) and Johann Hari (an interesting history himself, have a Google), from the novel of the same name, it featured at first perhaps nothing you would expect of a play based on an Agatha Christie novel. We had singing, dancing and musical instrument playing from the outset and we may all have thought that we were at a cabaret show. It soon fell somewhat back into type once the usual multi-layered Christie tale (this time involving top secret papers in the hands of a lady survivor of a ship sinking) began to evolve. It did however...

Act One of the Royal & Derngate Youth Theatre School Shorts were a great deal less stressful than Act Two with its subject matter (although to be fair one included the subject of bullying, albeit quite lightly). It was also a group of younger children and this dropped the level of seriousness considerable (for the better). So we had a little bit of pausing for lines (they carried scripts, but didn't always want to use them), we had obstinate hats, we had glances to parents and we had fiddling with ties. It was all much more relaxed, and therefore much more enjoyable to watch. * Daffodil Scissors by Philip Ridley is a fun little story of Daffodil (Jack Brennan) and his problems and indeed woes, mostly at the hands of his highly needy mother (Mia Heslop). Through her bizarre needs, she not only requires Daffodil to wear frankly ridiculous hats, which end in his being bullied, but she also requires to sit and watch "boring, boring, boring" television with her, kee...

Long term readers of this blog (I pity you) will be aware that myself and William Shakespeare are not friends, so the opportunity to go to see a play subtitled "One Man's Battle With Shakespeare" seemed very apt. This coupled with the shear horror of an opening in the form of a panto (another pet hate), could have left me fleeing for the doors of the Looking Glass Theatre. However if I had, I would have deprived myself of seeing a quite brilliant one-man show from Mark Carey. So as I pretended to look like I was enjoying singing that "wishy washy" some such with words written upon some cardboard cutout bloomers, I gritted my teeth and got through it. Amateur dramatic director Simon Trottley Barnes did not however wish to see our lead George Crocker's Widow Twankey thankfully and we were soon away from such shenanigans and onto Shakespeare (whoopee do). Into The Breach features five main characters (although there are seventeen in total), residents of a s...

The Royal & Derngate Youth Theatre School Shorts consisted of two acts and to add to my confused mind I watched act two first. However this matters not as each act consists of two completely separate plays. Act two features the plays Stay Brave, Brian Gravy by Carl Grose and Who's Afraid Of The Bogeyman? by Mike Kenny. Both plays are short (no flies on me) and roughly about 25 minutes, also these two in particular featured very tough and heavy subjects. * Stay Brave, Brian Gravy is the lighter of the two but even so revolves around the potential divorce of Brian's parents and their constant fighting and physical violence. The latter is handled in a lighthearted way complete with comedy sound effects. However this doesn't disguise from the seriousness of the situation of what these young actors are performing. A spin on the divorce nature in the second half of the play adds a neat and thankfully more lighthearted element to proceedings. At the centre of the piece...

On Thursday I wrote my ninetieth post on this blog. Turned out it was a controversial one and has since become a talking point on Twitter. The blog in question was a review of the "rock opera" Jesus Christ Superstar . I say "ROCK OPERA" now, but on Thursday I wrote "musical". It was a mistake I have since learnt to regret. It also shows my ineligibility to write reviews of musicals/rock opera it seems. A little information for you first. On the evening of Thursday I was sent a tweet in reply to the review link on Twitter that simply read "JCS is not a musical. It's a rock opera". The tweet was from @MTIreland and said no more. I was interested on the difference being so simply highlighted and it turned out in further correspondence that my calling it that was a true definition that I should not have been writing critical reviews of such pieces as I did not have the experience required to do so. My own reply of "Musical for me was a story...

Forgive me father for I am about to sin. That momentous rock opera called Jesus Christ Superstar and written by Lord Lloyd Webber and Sir Tim Rice is perhaps not all its cracked up to be. Well, in my ever so humble opinion anyway. The money it has made and success it has had, obviously dictates otherwise, so I bow to this. It has its merits, the title song "Jesus Christ Superstar" is a magnificent piece and that coupled with the powerful ending makes the final fifteen minutes wonderful. Much of the rest is what I would go as far as saying is just noise, and this is not because I hate rock music. Much of the time the music overpowers any singing going on and when this is not happening it just feels like a lot of howling. A prime example of the ear is in the beholder perhaps, but this music is not for me. Having said all these disparaging comments, I have to say "Hosanna" is a superb song and my favourite of the show. The one track I took with me from the Derngate...

Kissing Sid James by Robert Farquhar is an odd little play. Essentially consisting of a dirty weekend, it is also a greatly sad play, laying many emotions bare. No happy endings and an underlying grimness. It also blows rather hot and cold in the script sense. There are scenes that are tremendously funny, like those in the bedroom in the first half. The "sex" scene in particular gives plenty of moments of hilarity, especially when Eddie (Mark Farey) just won't keep quiet, as his companion Crystal (Juliet O'Connor) desires. Eddie indeed just can't keep his Nobby Stiles in, it would seem. However for all the good scenes and witty lines in the play, there is also a huge amount of pondering. The second half is particularly at fault. When Crystal threatens to leave, it seems an age before she makes the decision. Also as this is just a two-hander, we have some really odd scenes of the characters talking to someone off stage. They just seem strange, and the only ones t...