THE LION, THE WITCH AND THE WARDROBE
* * *
November 26, 2015
Birmingham Rep until Saturday, January 16, 2016
CS Lewis’s children’s classic struggles to fill the Rep in a production that lacks a little festive sparkle. For the full review visit whatsonstage.com
* * *
November 26, 2015
Birmingham Rep until Saturday, January 16, 2016
CS Lewis’s children’s classic struggles to fill the Rep in a production that lacks a little festive sparkle. For the full review visit whatsonstage.com
Samantha Power (left) and Rebecca Ryan in Maxine Peake's Beryl.
BERYL
* * *
November 24, 2015
Birmingham Rep Studio until Saturday, November 28, 2015
SHE’S nothing if not versatile, that Maxine Peake. Hot on the heels of starring as Hamlet, she’s seeing a revival of her play Beryl touring the country, celebrating the life of the almost-forgotten female cycling champion Beryl Burton.
The aim of raising Beryl’s profile half a century after she was at her performing peak is a worthy one. This extraordinary Yorkshire housewife was at the top of her game for well over two decades yet, because of the non-existent coverage of women’s sport in the 60s and 70s, her moment in the limelight never came.
Peake sets out to change that, putting the athlete and her achievements centre stage in a heartwarming and affable biographical tale. With an actor’s ear for dialogue, Peake supplies her cast of four with some nifty one-liners. She also makes them work hard – physically as much as anything – as they pedal and pound their way through a lifetime’s competitive cycling with the help of a crafty set design (Naomi Dawson) and some pacy direction (Rebecca Gatward).
Samantha Power is feisty and forthright as Beryl, but Rebecca Ryan, Matthew Ganley and Lee Toomes all get their chance to shine in a huge array of characters. Inevitably, the canter through Beryl’s successes feels at times like a bit of a checklist, and the string of short narrative scenes prevents much in the way of character exploration or depth of emotion.
But it’s an amazing story, well told, that certainly deserves to find an audience – and not just among cycling aficionados. As perhaps this country’s most consistently high-achieving sportswoman ever, Beryl Burton should be a name that everyone knows.
* * *
November 24, 2015
Birmingham Rep Studio until Saturday, November 28, 2015
SHE’S nothing if not versatile, that Maxine Peake. Hot on the heels of starring as Hamlet, she’s seeing a revival of her play Beryl touring the country, celebrating the life of the almost-forgotten female cycling champion Beryl Burton.
The aim of raising Beryl’s profile half a century after she was at her performing peak is a worthy one. This extraordinary Yorkshire housewife was at the top of her game for well over two decades yet, because of the non-existent coverage of women’s sport in the 60s and 70s, her moment in the limelight never came.
Peake sets out to change that, putting the athlete and her achievements centre stage in a heartwarming and affable biographical tale. With an actor’s ear for dialogue, Peake supplies her cast of four with some nifty one-liners. She also makes them work hard – physically as much as anything – as they pedal and pound their way through a lifetime’s competitive cycling with the help of a crafty set design (Naomi Dawson) and some pacy direction (Rebecca Gatward).
Samantha Power is feisty and forthright as Beryl, but Rebecca Ryan, Matthew Ganley and Lee Toomes all get their chance to shine in a huge array of characters. Inevitably, the canter through Beryl’s successes feels at times like a bit of a checklist, and the string of short narrative scenes prevents much in the way of character exploration or depth of emotion.
But it’s an amazing story, well told, that certainly deserves to find an audience – and not just among cycling aficionados. As perhaps this country’s most consistently high-achieving sportswoman ever, Beryl Burton should be a name that everyone knows.
LORD OF THE FLIES
* * *
November 3, 2015
Birmingham Rep until Saturday, November 7, 2015
REMEMBER the opening sequence of the television show Lost – before all the nonsense about polar bears and underground bunkers – when the wrecked hulk of a plane littered the beach of a remote desert island? Well somehow, designer Jon Bausor has managed to recreate that on a stage.
It’s far and away the most impressive thing about this Regent’s Park Theatre touring production of the 1954 William Golding novel in which unsupervised stranded schoolboys descend into savagery. With an intimidating jungle backdrop and the massive, debris-strewn carcass of a plane’s tail section dominating the performance space, Bausor’s imaginative contribution to the show is supreme.
His versatile set provides endless opportunities for the 12-strong cast to leap, hurdle and somersault their way through two hours of frenzied activity, rarely pausing for breath and certainly not for dramatic effect. Co-directors Timothy Sheader and Liam Steel put all their efforts into showing the reckless vitality of youth, unfortunately largely sacrificing the subtleties of Golding’s psychological studies in the process.
So we get lots of shouting, which rapidly becomes wearing on the ears, especially with the unnecessary addition of amplification. There’s plenty of running about too, rendering much of the action bewildering, while the narrative is too often confused and muddled. Moments of slow-motion caricature tread dangerously close to comedy and are, ultimately, unhelpful.
The ensemble do their best with what they’re asked to get up to, but with a heavy reliance on quickfire, gabbled delivery at yelling pitch, it’s all a bit relentless and unvarying. The poignant exceptions to this are Anthony Roberts’s touching outsider Piggy, whose pathos is almost palpable, and an astonishingly assured performance from child cast member David Evans as one of the so-called Little ’Uns.
Nigel Williams’s script loosely follows its original material, but the half-hearted attempts at modernising the dialogue jar uncomfortably, and everyone still manages to sound like a 1950s prep school oik anyway – which is, of course, exactly what Golding intended.
As a study aid for schools it’s a perfectly serviceable production with a fabulous set and atmospheric feel. As a standalone piece of drama, it’s far less successful.
* * *
November 3, 2015
Birmingham Rep until Saturday, November 7, 2015
REMEMBER the opening sequence of the television show Lost – before all the nonsense about polar bears and underground bunkers – when the wrecked hulk of a plane littered the beach of a remote desert island? Well somehow, designer Jon Bausor has managed to recreate that on a stage.
It’s far and away the most impressive thing about this Regent’s Park Theatre touring production of the 1954 William Golding novel in which unsupervised stranded schoolboys descend into savagery. With an intimidating jungle backdrop and the massive, debris-strewn carcass of a plane’s tail section dominating the performance space, Bausor’s imaginative contribution to the show is supreme.
His versatile set provides endless opportunities for the 12-strong cast to leap, hurdle and somersault their way through two hours of frenzied activity, rarely pausing for breath and certainly not for dramatic effect. Co-directors Timothy Sheader and Liam Steel put all their efforts into showing the reckless vitality of youth, unfortunately largely sacrificing the subtleties of Golding’s psychological studies in the process.
So we get lots of shouting, which rapidly becomes wearing on the ears, especially with the unnecessary addition of amplification. There’s plenty of running about too, rendering much of the action bewildering, while the narrative is too often confused and muddled. Moments of slow-motion caricature tread dangerously close to comedy and are, ultimately, unhelpful.
The ensemble do their best with what they’re asked to get up to, but with a heavy reliance on quickfire, gabbled delivery at yelling pitch, it’s all a bit relentless and unvarying. The poignant exceptions to this are Anthony Roberts’s touching outsider Piggy, whose pathos is almost palpable, and an astonishingly assured performance from child cast member David Evans as one of the so-called Little ’Uns.
Nigel Williams’s script loosely follows its original material, but the half-hearted attempts at modernising the dialogue jar uncomfortably, and everyone still manages to sound like a 1950s prep school oik anyway – which is, of course, exactly what Golding intended.
As a study aid for schools it’s a perfectly serviceable production with a fabulous set and atmospheric feel. As a standalone piece of drama, it’s far less successful.
PRISCILLA, QUEEN OF THE DESERT
* * * *
October 20, 2015
New Alexandra Theatre, Birmingham, until Saturday, October 24, 2015
LAST time Jason Donovan appeared on a Birmingham stage, he was playing the voice coach to stuttering George VI in the theatrical adaptation of The King’s Speech. How times change.
In a few short months, he has switched from one film adaptation to another, dumping the drab 1930s outfits and finding his inner drag queen. In fact, to be strictly accurate, he’s re-found her, having starred in the musical Priscilla before. Dusting off the frocks and heading out on tour, he’s reprising the role of Tick, the drag act with a secret son who journeys from seedy Sydney into the Australian outback with two bitchy colleagues to finally meet his boy.
But this road trip is like no other, and the adventures of Tick, Bernadette and Felicia lead them through redneck backwaters and the barren wastelands of the Aussie interior as they unintentionally spread the cross-dressing word.
One of the most impressive things about the stage adaptation is that it refuses to be tied down by its silver-screen ancestor, creating instead a show that works superbly in its own right. Writers Stephan Elliott and Allan Scott deliver a script that is sharper and funnier than the film and brings out more of the pathos and emotion in the trio’s individual stories.
Donovan leads the company with sweeping Australian confidence, not afraid to poke knowing fun at his own image and demonstrating that his warm, accomplished voice is so much more than that of an 80s pop idol. Adam Bailey is a feisty, flamboyant Felicia, while Simon Green supplies a show-stealing turn as the ageing transgender performer grieving for a lost career and lost love.
Designer Brian Thomson has a few ingenious tricks up his sleeve – not least a full-size, moving bus – while costume designers Tim Chappel and Lizzy Gardiner go completely, delightfully over the top at every opportunity. Director Simon Phillips keeps the whole thing rattling along at a decent gallop, and there are a couple of brilliant coups de theatre to add to the romping feel of the evening.
Throw in a lively, energetic ensemble and a seven-piece band that’s versatile enough to cover everything from Verdi to Village People and you’ve got a crowd-pleasing, foot-stomping success on your hands. No doubt even King George would have approved.
* * * *
October 20, 2015
New Alexandra Theatre, Birmingham, until Saturday, October 24, 2015
LAST time Jason Donovan appeared on a Birmingham stage, he was playing the voice coach to stuttering George VI in the theatrical adaptation of The King’s Speech. How times change.
In a few short months, he has switched from one film adaptation to another, dumping the drab 1930s outfits and finding his inner drag queen. In fact, to be strictly accurate, he’s re-found her, having starred in the musical Priscilla before. Dusting off the frocks and heading out on tour, he’s reprising the role of Tick, the drag act with a secret son who journeys from seedy Sydney into the Australian outback with two bitchy colleagues to finally meet his boy.
But this road trip is like no other, and the adventures of Tick, Bernadette and Felicia lead them through redneck backwaters and the barren wastelands of the Aussie interior as they unintentionally spread the cross-dressing word.
One of the most impressive things about the stage adaptation is that it refuses to be tied down by its silver-screen ancestor, creating instead a show that works superbly in its own right. Writers Stephan Elliott and Allan Scott deliver a script that is sharper and funnier than the film and brings out more of the pathos and emotion in the trio’s individual stories.
Donovan leads the company with sweeping Australian confidence, not afraid to poke knowing fun at his own image and demonstrating that his warm, accomplished voice is so much more than that of an 80s pop idol. Adam Bailey is a feisty, flamboyant Felicia, while Simon Green supplies a show-stealing turn as the ageing transgender performer grieving for a lost career and lost love.
Designer Brian Thomson has a few ingenious tricks up his sleeve – not least a full-size, moving bus – while costume designers Tim Chappel and Lizzy Gardiner go completely, delightfully over the top at every opportunity. Director Simon Phillips keeps the whole thing rattling along at a decent gallop, and there are a couple of brilliant coups de theatre to add to the romping feel of the evening.
Throw in a lively, energetic ensemble and a seven-piece band that’s versatile enough to cover everything from Verdi to Village People and you’ve got a crowd-pleasing, foot-stomping success on your hands. No doubt even King George would have approved.
ANITA AND ME
* * *
October 13, 2015
Birmingham Rep until Saturday, October 24, 2015, then Theatre Royal, Stratford East, from October 29 to November 21, 2015
MEERA Syal’s semi-autobiographical novel gets a workmanlike stage adaptation from Tanika Gupta.
For the full review, visit Whatsonstage.com
* * *
October 13, 2015
Birmingham Rep until Saturday, October 24, 2015, then Theatre Royal, Stratford East, from October 29 to November 21, 2015
MEERA Syal’s semi-autobiographical novel gets a workmanlike stage adaptation from Tanika Gupta.
For the full review, visit Whatsonstage.com
KING CHARLES III
* * * *
September 8, 2015
Birmingham Rep until Saturday, September 19, 2015, then touring
PLAYWRIGHT Mike Bartlett came up with a brilliant idea when he created this verse drama along the lines of a Shakespearean tragedy, using the future King Charles as his subject. It’s packed with subtle and not-so-subtle references to King Lear, Hamlet and Macbeth, and has all the high drama of the greatest royal epics from the Bard.
Even the iambic pentameter is put to consistently effective use, reinforcing the grandeur of the scale of Bartlett’s ambition – which makes it all the more unfortunate when he chooses to throw in modern aphorisms that undermine the effect, usually for a cheap laugh.
But I’m quibbling. Overall, with Bartlett and his director Rupert Goold we are in extremely safe hands. Some of the characters’ motives are occasionally suspect, and a subplot about Prince Harry’s desire to abandon royal status after taking up with a republican commoner is simply unbelievable. But the big themes – kingship, personal sacrifice and public duty – are clearly drawn and passionately argued.
For this national tour, launching in Birmingham, the production has been recast, with Robert Powell taking on the role of Charles. It’s an impressive performance, with plenty of gravitas and a real exploration of the struggle between the man and the monarch, and Powell thoroughly deserves his warm reception from the audience.
He’s surrounded by a strong cast, from Ben Righton and Jennifer Bryden as a scheming William and Kate to the boyishly charming Richard Glaves as Harry. Penelope Beaumont’s Camilla is aristocratic but tender, and there are fine performances from Tim Treloar and Giles Taylor as the political leaders who have to deal with the constitutional fallout of Charles’s attempts to exercise his royal rights.
The design (Tom Scutt) and music (Jocelyn Pook) are formal and rather constraining, making it difficult for the human stories to emerge fully, but on the other hand, they reflect the scale of the show to perfection. In short, it looks and sounds appropriately opulent.
It’s a long and extensive tour, and the originating Almeida Theatre deserves praise for bringing its West End hit to a wider audience. It’s certainly worth the effort.
* * * *
September 8, 2015
Birmingham Rep until Saturday, September 19, 2015, then touring
PLAYWRIGHT Mike Bartlett came up with a brilliant idea when he created this verse drama along the lines of a Shakespearean tragedy, using the future King Charles as his subject. It’s packed with subtle and not-so-subtle references to King Lear, Hamlet and Macbeth, and has all the high drama of the greatest royal epics from the Bard.
Even the iambic pentameter is put to consistently effective use, reinforcing the grandeur of the scale of Bartlett’s ambition – which makes it all the more unfortunate when he chooses to throw in modern aphorisms that undermine the effect, usually for a cheap laugh.
But I’m quibbling. Overall, with Bartlett and his director Rupert Goold we are in extremely safe hands. Some of the characters’ motives are occasionally suspect, and a subplot about Prince Harry’s desire to abandon royal status after taking up with a republican commoner is simply unbelievable. But the big themes – kingship, personal sacrifice and public duty – are clearly drawn and passionately argued.
For this national tour, launching in Birmingham, the production has been recast, with Robert Powell taking on the role of Charles. It’s an impressive performance, with plenty of gravitas and a real exploration of the struggle between the man and the monarch, and Powell thoroughly deserves his warm reception from the audience.
He’s surrounded by a strong cast, from Ben Righton and Jennifer Bryden as a scheming William and Kate to the boyishly charming Richard Glaves as Harry. Penelope Beaumont’s Camilla is aristocratic but tender, and there are fine performances from Tim Treloar and Giles Taylor as the political leaders who have to deal with the constitutional fallout of Charles’s attempts to exercise his royal rights.
The design (Tom Scutt) and music (Jocelyn Pook) are formal and rather constraining, making it difficult for the human stories to emerge fully, but on the other hand, they reflect the scale of the show to perfection. In short, it looks and sounds appropriately opulent.
It’s a long and extensive tour, and the originating Almeida Theatre deserves praise for bringing its West End hit to a wider audience. It’s certainly worth the effort.
REBECCA
* * * *
April 27, 2015
Birmingham Rep until Saturday, May 2, 2015, then tour continues
CORNWALL’S Kneehigh Theatre Company have made something of a speciality out of taking classic texts and reinventing them in their own idiosyncratic style. Brief Encounter, The Red Shoes, Tristan and Yseult – they’ve all undergone the Kneehigh treatment with enormous success.
Now artistic director Emma Rice brings it all back to Cornwall with Daphne du Maurier’s Rebecca, set on the county’s coastline and with the scenery proving as much of a character as any of the participants. Cornwall runs through this show like a seam of tin in a mine.
All the Kneehigh trademarks are here, from leading actors doubling up as musicians to physical theatre techniques and witty visual gags. The versatile, evocative set by designer Leslie Travers allows Rice to dream up hugely imaginative ways of presenting her tale. Whether it’s a wrecked boat or a burning mansion, the decaying corpse of the set – like the title character – looms sinisterly in the background to great effect.
Rice’s adaptation is sensitive but irreverent, bringing out plenty of fun amid the gothic chills of du Maurier’s story about the new Mrs de Winter’s jealousy of her husband’s drowned first wife. Daftness in the shape of some comic servants and relatives gives the tale an added texture, while the darkness at the heart of the book is clearly retained for a stunning denouement, even if the plot twists become almost too much to take.
Imogen Sage, making her Kneehigh debut, is both brittle and believable as the young ingénue brought to Manderley by her new husband Maxim. Her tonal shift as she discovers more about his past and her own self is palpable, so that by the end she’s as strong and determined as the ominous housekeeper Mrs Danvers (Emily Raymond).
Tristan Sturrock’s Maxim is more than a two-dimensional, stiff-upper-lip caricature, bringing warmth and likeability to a tricky role, and there’s some excellent support from Lizzie Winkler and Andy Williams as his sister and brother-in-law. Richard Clews and Katy Owen do their best to steal the show as the servants Frith and Robert, and a chorus of fishermen-musicians provides an atmospheric, if occasionally unnecessary, underscore throughout.
It’s impressive, imposing and authentically Cornish. Emma Rice and Kneehigh have done it again.
* * * *
April 27, 2015
Birmingham Rep until Saturday, May 2, 2015, then tour continues
CORNWALL’S Kneehigh Theatre Company have made something of a speciality out of taking classic texts and reinventing them in their own idiosyncratic style. Brief Encounter, The Red Shoes, Tristan and Yseult – they’ve all undergone the Kneehigh treatment with enormous success.
Now artistic director Emma Rice brings it all back to Cornwall with Daphne du Maurier’s Rebecca, set on the county’s coastline and with the scenery proving as much of a character as any of the participants. Cornwall runs through this show like a seam of tin in a mine.
All the Kneehigh trademarks are here, from leading actors doubling up as musicians to physical theatre techniques and witty visual gags. The versatile, evocative set by designer Leslie Travers allows Rice to dream up hugely imaginative ways of presenting her tale. Whether it’s a wrecked boat or a burning mansion, the decaying corpse of the set – like the title character – looms sinisterly in the background to great effect.
Rice’s adaptation is sensitive but irreverent, bringing out plenty of fun amid the gothic chills of du Maurier’s story about the new Mrs de Winter’s jealousy of her husband’s drowned first wife. Daftness in the shape of some comic servants and relatives gives the tale an added texture, while the darkness at the heart of the book is clearly retained for a stunning denouement, even if the plot twists become almost too much to take.
Imogen Sage, making her Kneehigh debut, is both brittle and believable as the young ingénue brought to Manderley by her new husband Maxim. Her tonal shift as she discovers more about his past and her own self is palpable, so that by the end she’s as strong and determined as the ominous housekeeper Mrs Danvers (Emily Raymond).
Tristan Sturrock’s Maxim is more than a two-dimensional, stiff-upper-lip caricature, bringing warmth and likeability to a tricky role, and there’s some excellent support from Lizzie Winkler and Andy Williams as his sister and brother-in-law. Richard Clews and Katy Owen do their best to steal the show as the servants Frith and Robert, and a chorus of fishermen-musicians provides an atmospheric, if occasionally unnecessary, underscore throughout.
It’s impressive, imposing and authentically Cornish. Emma Rice and Kneehigh have done it again.
FEED THE BEAST
* * *
April 21, 2015
Birmingham Rep Studio until Saturday, May 2, 2015
Writer Steve Thompson has an impressive pedigree. He’s written for Dr Who and Sherlock on the telly, and his previous plays have been up for Olivier awards. All of which boded well for his new, timely political comedy Feed the Beast, co-produced by Birmingham Rep and Ipswich’s New Wolsey Theatre.
The realisation of this zeitgeisty piece about a fictional Prime Minister clinging tenuously to his principles in the teeth of a hostile press feels, however, somewhat less glitzy and a little more obvious than some of that earlier work.
The reality is that the script has little of insight to add to the debate about politics and the media, while its core protagonists – the PM, his pitbull press secretary and an almost wilfully obtuse chief of staff – amount to little more than caricatures. None is ultimately believable in the way they behave, the things that they say and the rapidity with which they are prompted to scream at each other.
Having said all that, Feed the Beast is perfectly entertaining as a night out. It’s got some amusing one-liners, its premise is reasonable enough, if not exactly the most radical in present circumstances, and it’s performed extremely capably by a large cast who are asked to double (or more) a vast array of ciphers who come and go at Number 10 largely to serve plot points or provide the PM with another excuse to fly off the handle.
Gerald Kyd is impossibly naïve but fundamentally likeable as Michael Goodlad, the hapless PM with more than a hint of Leonard Rossiter’s Rigsby about him, while onetime EastEnder Kacey Ainsworth sheds Little Mo like a snakeskin to supply the voice of conscience in the shape of chief of staff Sally.
Talented stalwarts such as Paul Moriarty and Tristram Wymark are underused in their range of supporting roles, but director Peter Rowe keeps the whole thing moving frenetically along to its dubious and downbeat ending, accompanied by subtle lighting from Simon Bond and video projections by Nathan Jones, all played out on a striking set from designer Libby Watson.
It might not shed any new light on the issues, but Feed the Beast makes an amusing diversion from the predictability of the election campaign.
* * *
April 21, 2015
Birmingham Rep Studio until Saturday, May 2, 2015
Writer Steve Thompson has an impressive pedigree. He’s written for Dr Who and Sherlock on the telly, and his previous plays have been up for Olivier awards. All of which boded well for his new, timely political comedy Feed the Beast, co-produced by Birmingham Rep and Ipswich’s New Wolsey Theatre.
The realisation of this zeitgeisty piece about a fictional Prime Minister clinging tenuously to his principles in the teeth of a hostile press feels, however, somewhat less glitzy and a little more obvious than some of that earlier work.
The reality is that the script has little of insight to add to the debate about politics and the media, while its core protagonists – the PM, his pitbull press secretary and an almost wilfully obtuse chief of staff – amount to little more than caricatures. None is ultimately believable in the way they behave, the things that they say and the rapidity with which they are prompted to scream at each other.
Having said all that, Feed the Beast is perfectly entertaining as a night out. It’s got some amusing one-liners, its premise is reasonable enough, if not exactly the most radical in present circumstances, and it’s performed extremely capably by a large cast who are asked to double (or more) a vast array of ciphers who come and go at Number 10 largely to serve plot points or provide the PM with another excuse to fly off the handle.
Gerald Kyd is impossibly naïve but fundamentally likeable as Michael Goodlad, the hapless PM with more than a hint of Leonard Rossiter’s Rigsby about him, while onetime EastEnder Kacey Ainsworth sheds Little Mo like a snakeskin to supply the voice of conscience in the shape of chief of staff Sally.
Talented stalwarts such as Paul Moriarty and Tristram Wymark are underused in their range of supporting roles, but director Peter Rowe keeps the whole thing moving frenetically along to its dubious and downbeat ending, accompanied by subtle lighting from Simon Bond and video projections by Nathan Jones, all played out on a striking set from designer Libby Watson.
It might not shed any new light on the issues, but Feed the Beast makes an amusing diversion from the predictability of the election campaign.
JEEVES AND WOOSTER IN PERFECT NONSENSE
* * *
March 9, 2015
Birmingham Rep until Saturday, March 14, 2015, then tour continues
DIRECTOR Sean Foley has track record in this area. His production of The Play What I Wrote was a huge critical and commercial success back in 2002, and his madcap take on silly stories has continued throughout his career. Now he brings that same daftness to the already fairly daft world of PG Wodehouse.
Wodehouse’s most famous characters, the nice-but-dim toff Bertie Wooster and his knowing butler Jeeves, have been played and parodied endlessly, almost since their creation in 1915. This adaptation of the 1938 novel The Code of the Woosters is both affectionate and showing a healthy lack of respect for the source material, allowing Foley’s trademark physical humour and slapstick full rein.
After a successful run in the Wet End, it’s now out on a national tour, with Peep Show’s Robert Webb reprising his London turn as Bertie. His is arguably the easiest job in the show, although there’s plenty to get him breaking a sweat, and the importance of holding the whole flimsy charade together must not be overlooked. Webb is charmingly innocent and a delightful host for the evening as Wooster recounts the mishaps of his recent stay at Totleigh Towers with the aid of just two supporting cast members.
One of these, naturally, is Jeeves, played with beautiful deadpan uprightness by Jason Thorpe. The conceit of the show is that Jeeves has set up the entire production – complete with movable sets and bicycle-powered revolve – for his master to tell the story. Because of the numerous other people involved in the tale, this requires Jeeves and his butler colleague Seppings to play all the other parts between them.
Thorpe and a wonderfully versatile Christopher Ryan step into this breech superbly, donning dresses, fat suits and giant overcoats depending on the requirements of Bertie’s story. There’s even one moment where Jeeves plays an entire scene with himself.
Foley employs every theatrical trick in the book to achieve the plentiful laughs and is well served by his energetic cast. If the result is more warmly entertaining than a rip-roaring blast, that may be partly down to Wodehouse’s upper-crust material, which feels at times ill-suited to the frenetic pace of the show. But there’s also a sense of having seen much of this kind of thing before, even down to the Tommy Cooper half-man-half-woman split personality routine. Comedy is rarely as funny the second time around.
* * *
March 9, 2015
Birmingham Rep until Saturday, March 14, 2015, then tour continues
DIRECTOR Sean Foley has track record in this area. His production of The Play What I Wrote was a huge critical and commercial success back in 2002, and his madcap take on silly stories has continued throughout his career. Now he brings that same daftness to the already fairly daft world of PG Wodehouse.
Wodehouse’s most famous characters, the nice-but-dim toff Bertie Wooster and his knowing butler Jeeves, have been played and parodied endlessly, almost since their creation in 1915. This adaptation of the 1938 novel The Code of the Woosters is both affectionate and showing a healthy lack of respect for the source material, allowing Foley’s trademark physical humour and slapstick full rein.
After a successful run in the Wet End, it’s now out on a national tour, with Peep Show’s Robert Webb reprising his London turn as Bertie. His is arguably the easiest job in the show, although there’s plenty to get him breaking a sweat, and the importance of holding the whole flimsy charade together must not be overlooked. Webb is charmingly innocent and a delightful host for the evening as Wooster recounts the mishaps of his recent stay at Totleigh Towers with the aid of just two supporting cast members.
One of these, naturally, is Jeeves, played with beautiful deadpan uprightness by Jason Thorpe. The conceit of the show is that Jeeves has set up the entire production – complete with movable sets and bicycle-powered revolve – for his master to tell the story. Because of the numerous other people involved in the tale, this requires Jeeves and his butler colleague Seppings to play all the other parts between them.
Thorpe and a wonderfully versatile Christopher Ryan step into this breech superbly, donning dresses, fat suits and giant overcoats depending on the requirements of Bertie’s story. There’s even one moment where Jeeves plays an entire scene with himself.
Foley employs every theatrical trick in the book to achieve the plentiful laughs and is well served by his energetic cast. If the result is more warmly entertaining than a rip-roaring blast, that may be partly down to Wodehouse’s upper-crust material, which feels at times ill-suited to the frenetic pace of the show. But there’s also a sense of having seen much of this kind of thing before, even down to the Tommy Cooper half-man-half-woman split personality routine. Comedy is rarely as funny the second time around.
Raymond Coulthard and Jason Donovan in The King's Speech. Picture by Hugo Glendinning.
THE KING’S SPEECH
* * * *
February 26, 2015
Birmingham Rep until Saturday, March 7, 2015
IT’S being marketed – perhaps a little unfairly – as a star turn by Jason Donovan. He’s playing the irascible Australian voice therapist Lionel Logue, who worked with King George VI to overcome his crippling stammer and thus rescued the monarchy from the very real threat created by George’s playboy older brother Edward VIII.
And while Donovan’s nuanced and highly enjoyable performance is undoubtedly central to the success of this revival of David Seidler’s play, it’s far from a one-man show. Right there alongside him, tussling and tangling with him every step of the way, is a sublime Raymond Coulthard as the unexpected king.
Their relationship is at the heart of Roxana Silbert’s good-looking production, which transfers to Birmingham from a run at Chichester. Director Silbert exploits both Tom Piper’s glorious art deco set and the supreme talents of her leading men to terrific effect, drawing out a very personal, highly intimate story of a burgeoning, if unlikely, friendship.
Set against the backdrop of the abdication crisis in 1936, the play – which became an Oscar-winning film starring Colin Firth and Geoffrey Rush – works best in the scenes where the two misfits in their own worlds come together in a battle of wills, self-doubts and ultimate inspiration. Indeed, Seidler puts so much into their relationship that the secondary figures become almost superfluous, except for the purposes of exposition.
That’s not to say there isn’t plenty of comedy to be mined from the likes of Nicholas Blane as Churchill and Martin Turner as a pompous Archbishop of Canterbury. The wives of the protagonists, too, get impressive renditions from Claire Lams and Katy Stephens, although you can’t help wishing they were given more to do.
But it’s the central pairing which provides the focus – quite rightly – and they deliver handsomely on the care and attention that’s paid to them. Their scenes together are a constant delight, finding human depth and emotion behind the trappings of kingship or the façade of the feisty colonial upstart.
While the play may have its faults, this is a production that looks and sounds thoroughly regal.
* * * *
February 26, 2015
Birmingham Rep until Saturday, March 7, 2015
IT’S being marketed – perhaps a little unfairly – as a star turn by Jason Donovan. He’s playing the irascible Australian voice therapist Lionel Logue, who worked with King George VI to overcome his crippling stammer and thus rescued the monarchy from the very real threat created by George’s playboy older brother Edward VIII.
And while Donovan’s nuanced and highly enjoyable performance is undoubtedly central to the success of this revival of David Seidler’s play, it’s far from a one-man show. Right there alongside him, tussling and tangling with him every step of the way, is a sublime Raymond Coulthard as the unexpected king.
Their relationship is at the heart of Roxana Silbert’s good-looking production, which transfers to Birmingham from a run at Chichester. Director Silbert exploits both Tom Piper’s glorious art deco set and the supreme talents of her leading men to terrific effect, drawing out a very personal, highly intimate story of a burgeoning, if unlikely, friendship.
Set against the backdrop of the abdication crisis in 1936, the play – which became an Oscar-winning film starring Colin Firth and Geoffrey Rush – works best in the scenes where the two misfits in their own worlds come together in a battle of wills, self-doubts and ultimate inspiration. Indeed, Seidler puts so much into their relationship that the secondary figures become almost superfluous, except for the purposes of exposition.
That’s not to say there isn’t plenty of comedy to be mined from the likes of Nicholas Blane as Churchill and Martin Turner as a pompous Archbishop of Canterbury. The wives of the protagonists, too, get impressive renditions from Claire Lams and Katy Stephens, although you can’t help wishing they were given more to do.
But it’s the central pairing which provides the focus – quite rightly – and they deliver handsomely on the care and attention that’s paid to them. Their scenes together are a constant delight, finding human depth and emotion behind the trappings of kingship or the façade of the feisty colonial upstart.
While the play may have its faults, this is a production that looks and sounds thoroughly regal.
James Dreyfus, right, as Elwood P Dowd, with David Bamber as his psychiatrist Dr Chumley. Picture by Manuel Harlan.
HARVEY
* * *
February 10, 2015
Birmingham Rep until Saturday, February 21, 2015, then Theatre Royal, Haymarket
The most famous incarnation of Harvey, the invisible six-foot white rabbit who inhabits the imaginary world of Elwood P Dowd, came in a 1950 film starring James Stewart. But it had started life six years earlier as a Broadway play, and it’s this script that has been revived for a whimsical, lighthearted outing at the hands of director Lindsay Posner.
It offers two choice parts – Elwood and his exasperated sister Veta – and they’re impeccably filled in this production by James Dreyfus and Maureen Lipman respectively. When Veta tries to get her brother committed to a sanitarium, she instigates an unforeseeable chain of events that sees psychiatrists, nurses and even a judge becoming increasingly uncertain of their own realities as Elwood remains implacably sure of his. It’s warm, witty and pleasantly unchallenging, played out on an ingenious and decorative set by designer Peter McKintosh.
Lipman does repressed frustration to perfection, even if the American accent slips occasionally, while Dreyfus looks utterly at home in the role of the eccentric, possibly hallucinating bachelor with a penchant for drink and social obliviousness. In fact, it’s his performance that holds the whole slight confection together, constantly beguiling and believable as the affable ingenue at the heart of the craziness.
The performances from the large cast are uniformly strong, with David Bamber and Sally Scott particularly appealing as the shrink Dr Chumley and his down-to-earth Nurse Kelly, and the finished product emerges as gently amusing, rather than rip-roaringly funny. Its pace should pick up during the run, tightening some of the slightly loose feel and hopefully finding the endearing, if unlikely, white rabbit a deserved audience.
* * *
February 10, 2015
Birmingham Rep until Saturday, February 21, 2015, then Theatre Royal, Haymarket
The most famous incarnation of Harvey, the invisible six-foot white rabbit who inhabits the imaginary world of Elwood P Dowd, came in a 1950 film starring James Stewart. But it had started life six years earlier as a Broadway play, and it’s this script that has been revived for a whimsical, lighthearted outing at the hands of director Lindsay Posner.
It offers two choice parts – Elwood and his exasperated sister Veta – and they’re impeccably filled in this production by James Dreyfus and Maureen Lipman respectively. When Veta tries to get her brother committed to a sanitarium, she instigates an unforeseeable chain of events that sees psychiatrists, nurses and even a judge becoming increasingly uncertain of their own realities as Elwood remains implacably sure of his. It’s warm, witty and pleasantly unchallenging, played out on an ingenious and decorative set by designer Peter McKintosh.
Lipman does repressed frustration to perfection, even if the American accent slips occasionally, while Dreyfus looks utterly at home in the role of the eccentric, possibly hallucinating bachelor with a penchant for drink and social obliviousness. In fact, it’s his performance that holds the whole slight confection together, constantly beguiling and believable as the affable ingenue at the heart of the craziness.
The performances from the large cast are uniformly strong, with David Bamber and Sally Scott particularly appealing as the shrink Dr Chumley and his down-to-earth Nurse Kelly, and the finished product emerges as gently amusing, rather than rip-roaringly funny. Its pace should pick up during the run, tightening some of the slightly loose feel and hopefully finding the endearing, if unlikely, white rabbit a deserved audience.
