Waitress - Review

Churchill Theatre, Bromley

****

Music and Lyrics by Sara Bareilles

Book by Jessie Nelson

Directed by Diane Paulus

Evelyn Hoskins and George Crawford

After a triumphant run in the West End, Sara Bareilles’ smash-hit musical comedy continues to wow audiences across the UK with this heartwarming show arriving at Bromley’s Churchill Theatre for one week only.

Waitress tells the emotional yet empowering story of Jenna Hunterson, a waitress and baker who is in an abusive relationship. The show sees her battling to transform from an anxious wife into a strong and determined woman, with ups and downs along the way.

Bromley's press night saw both first covers stepping up to the roles of Jenna and her gynaecologist Dr Pomatter, with incredible performances from  Aimée Fisher and Nathanael Landskroner respectively.  Fisher made the role her own, playing Jenna as comedic yet endearing. She had exceptional attention to detail, particularly in What Baking Can Do and It Only Takes a Taste. Her beautiful rendition of She Used to Be Mine had the audience on the edge of their seats, with the whole theatre erupting into rapturous applause almost before she could finish her last note. Landskroner’s Pomatter was full of the awkward, nervous charm we know and love, with flawless and tender vocals.

 

Other standout performances were from Evelyn Hoskins and George Crawford, playing the geeky and loveable Dawn and Ogie. Crawford’s Never Ever Getting Rid Of Me was comedic and witty with fantastic diction. Sandra Marvin’s Becky was hilarious and full of sass, and her powerful vocals in I Didn’t Plan It brought the house down.

Waitress is as refreshing as ever and hasn’t lost an ounce of its West End charm, despite occasional sound and lighting blips. A show that’s full of cheers and tears, often at the same time.

Runs until 26th February then continues on tour

Photo credit: Johan Persson

Shepherd - Review

***

Written and directed by Russell Owen

Tom Hughes

Eric Black (Tom Hughes) is a man with a troubled past who, in search of inner peace and resolution, accepts a job offer as a shepherd on an otherwise uninhabited Scottish island. The location is a remote wilderness, and if these few words of description hint at Jack Nicholson’s performance for Stanley Kubrick as Jack Torrance, then you won’t be far off the mark. But while there is much about Shepherd (even the opening helicopter shot of a car driving into the remote hills) that hints at Stephen King’s masterpiece, this movie lacks The Shining’s shine.

As Black comes tries to come to terms with his past, he is tormented by scenes with his devoutly Christian mother (passable work from Greta Scacchi) and an enigmatic local fisherwoman (Kate Dickie), whose faith is far more dark. Ultimately the narrative here is too focussed on Black’s self-indulgent introspection, rather than a terrifying psychological horror. If there were less of his soul-searching and more (and better) graphically visual excitement, then the film would have been immeasurably improved.

Wags may spot a brief nod to The Italian Job, while a field full of crucified sheep did little more than amusingly suggest The Slaughtered Lamb inn from An American Werewolf In London.To its credit the film’s aerial and drone photography of the Scottish and Welsh landscapes is gorgeous, easily passing as a promo for those two countries’ tourist boards. But as a worthwhile horror movie, this Shining-lite, lacks polish.

Shepherd will be available on Blu-ray and Digital Download from 21st February

The House On Cold Hill - Review

The Mill at Sonning, Sonning

***

Written by Peter James

Adapted for the stage by Shaun McKenna

Directed by Keith Myers

Debbie McGee works her magic with the company

The House on Cold Hill is a ghost story with all the traditional mcguffins. The doors creak, the pipes creak - hey, even the script creaks as Caro  and Ollie with-their teenage daughter Jade (Madeleine Knight, Matt Milburn and Hannah Boyce respectively) move into Cold Hill House, an ancient mansion with dark and haunting secrets.

There's just a hint of Ghostbusters and The Exorcist in the mix here and for those who prefer some magic with their supernatural thrills and chills there is even Debbie McGee making her acting debut as Annie, the local cleaning lady with a double life as the village medium.

The horror may be more ham than Hammer but this being The Mill At Sonning the ticket price includes a delicious meal to get the evening started. (The salmon was wonderful!) And recognising the senior demographics of Sonning’s typical audience, it is also fair to say that for the most part the mild scares are more corny than gory.

A pleasant evening's entertainment that’s unlikely to give you nightmares.

Runs until 26th March

Photo credit: Andreas Lambis

Hamlet - Review

Sam Wanamaker Playhouse at Shakespeare's Globe, London

*

Written by William Shakespeare

Directed by Sean Holmes

George Fouracres

"Fuck you Fortinbras!", as uttered by Claudius, is but one of the early revisions to Hamlet that Sean Holmes subjects us to in this, the first production of the play to be performed in the candlelit intimacy of the Sam Wanamaker Playhouse at Shakespeare's Globe. 

At least in 1994, when Disney offered up their take on Hamlet, they had the decency to re-name their version 'The Lion King'. The artistic team at the Globe lack such grace. Their interpretation of this finest of tragedies is sloppy in its revisions with text chopped and re-written, inappropriate songs and chants introduced and amidst a general demolition of the fourth wall, audience singalongs included too. Perhaps the Globe's team had taken Shakespeare's description of his audience to heart, the groundlings being "for the most part capable of nothing but inexplicable dumbshows and noise". Either way, it is notable that no name is posted in the credits to take responsibility for this ghastly adaptation.

This Hamlet comes across as no-more than a big budget student production, a play more likely to have graced the Edinburgh Fringe, rather than one of the country's leading Shakespearean venues. At least at Edinburgh the tickets would have been considerably cheaper and the show would have been likely to have lasted little more than 1 hour, rather than the interminable 3+ hours on offer here.

Ultimately it is hard to say what is more troubling. The butchery to which Shakespeare's prose has been subject or the rapturous applause, standing ovation even, that the whooping audience bestowed upon the production. This reviewer is privileged to be familiar with the text, having seen the play on many occasions over the decades. On the night that this production was attended, the Playhouse was packed with at least two parties of of school students. What a betrayal that these young people are being exposed to, seeing Hamlet perhaps for the first time in their lives, performed at times as little more than a pantomime with so much of Shakespeare’s verse savaged.

This is cultural vandalism of which the Globe’s trustees should be ashamed. The one star rating is for George Fouracres' decent work in the title role and by John Lightbody as Polonius. The rest is silence.

Runs until 9th April

Photo credit: Johan Persson

Luzia - Review

Royal Albert Hall, London

****

Written and directed by Daniele Finzi Pasca

After a Covid-induced interregnum exceeding 600 days, Cirque du Soleil’s Luzia returns to the Royal Albert Hall, reprising its Mexican themed extravaganza of human skills and water-based artistry.

As is nearly always the case in touring circuses that pitch up in the capital, the physical talent on display is stunning. The power, stamina, precision, courage and sheer human genius of the aerialists, pole artistes, trapeze performers and many more defies our understanding and we rightly gasp in awe at the skills on display before us. What is not the case for most touring shows however is the price tag. At Luzia most adult tickets sold at less than £100 will deliver a restricted view, while for the best seats in the house, the cost edges closer to £300 each. 

Is it worth it? Well for 2 ½ hours – including a 25 minute interval – the circus craft on display is world class. Combining mime, physical theatre and music – with supreme physical agility, Mexican culture ranging from the Aztecs through to the nation’s renowned talents with a football are cleverly interweaved. There is some gorgeous animal work too, including a horse and a big cat, cleverly brought to life by their human puppeteers.

Rain and water form a large part of the evening’s imagery, with a fiendishly smart spray arm sitting above the revolving stage and a centre pool. From here, sheets of water not only offer an enchanting backdrop to some acts, they also deliver up some clever images captured in the rhythm of the cascading drops. Ingenious? For sure. But these waterworks display the talent of designers and technicians, supported by state of the art technology. For decades, the essence of Cirque du Soleil's magic has been drawn from its displays of human talent, wowing audiences with unimaginable feats of strength and style that are live, vibrant and risky. By contrast, this aquatic display of digital wizardry could arguably be better presented around the corner at London’s Science Museum.

With a cast of 50 and a backstage crew of at least equal numbers, Luzia is lavish and, for the most part, great fun. For sure this is a feast for the eyes, including the eye-watering skills of Russian contortionist Aleksei Goloborodko who shows his body to be far more serpentine than the famous pond that’s just across the road. But at the risk of sounding churlish, alongside the show's unquestioned beauty and talent, more death-defying acts wouldn’t have gone amiss. From Holland, the appropriately named Fool Koller delivers occasional clown routines that are at times more subtle than hilarious.

In Hamlet, Gertrude asks for “more matter with less art” and there are moments in Luzia when that sentiment rings true. But where a family of four will need to spend close to a grand for ringside seats with a view, one cannot help but recall the words of Phineas T. Barnum...

Runs until 27 February 2022

Welcome To The Woke Trials - Review

*****

Julie Burchill’s Welcome To The Woke Trials is a brave and excoriating critique of today’s Woke-culture that seeks, via political correctness and the power of the social-media massed mob, to upend so many traditionally held conventions. The book’s journey to publication has proved a woke-war in itself, with two publishers in turn choosing to sign contracts with Burchill before cowardly reneging on their commitments, but two years on from its inception all credit to Academica Press for having the commercial cojones to bring Burchill’s work to an audience. Indeed, such is the toxic nature of today’s wokery that even as this review was being initially compiled, so were Facebook suspending their sharing of Quentin Letts’ review of the book that had already been published in The Times. Truly, sadly, deeply, life is imitating art.

Burchill comments in the book that the delay in publication has ultimately proved to her advantage in that she has been able to “end with an up-to-date roll-call  of  the  Woke  lunacy that  has  taken place  between 2019 and the autumn of  2021,  as  I  write  this” and in that respect the book is bang up to date. That being said of course, the Woke Wars are incessant and post the publication of Burchill’s work, Professor Kathleen Stock’s conflict with the University of Sussex and an even more recent free-speech battle between columnist Rod Liddle and the University of Durham, both events that could easily have fueled another of Burchill’s chapters, have grabbed the headlines.

Burchill’s work is thorough throughout, proving to be both entertaining and educational in equal measure. Her research has been meticulous and as she bravely exposes the hypocrisies of the latter-day puritans of Woke, the book becomes a very bloody abattoir of sacred cows. Hollywood and its spawning of the #MeToo movement, that had so complicity turned a blind-eye to Weinstein for decades, is tackled. Likewise does Burchill take to task the assault on the feminist movement from the transsexual lobby.

Antisemitism and its myopic accompanist of islamophilia is scrutinised, while elsewhere in the book some of Burchill’s most blistering critiques are levelled at the Duke and Duchess of Sussex and their de-camping to California, described intuitively by Burchill as “The Grabdication”. Perhaps her most powerfully painful comments of all are those that focus on the elitist dismissal of the working class in a chapter exquisitely titled The Wrong Kind Of Diversity.

At times hilarious, at other times bleak. Burchill acknowledges her sources and offers us a devastatingly honest portrait of our times. Typos abound - but given the book’s fraught journey to reach the shelves, they can be forgiven.

Rarely is a work of socio-political comment such a damn good read. An essential volume for anyone interested in considering both sides of a debate.

Available from good booksellers and online via Amazon and most usual channels.

The Art Of Banksy - Review

Earlham Street Gallery, London

***

The Art Of Banksy, an exhibition of the elusive street-artist’s work that true to form is not authorised by the man himself, opened earlier this year at London’s 50 Earlham Street Gallery.

Tracking Banksy’s work from his emergence in the 1990s through to the present day, the exhibition marks a carefully curated collection that, if nothing else, will stimulate your reactions. This website last reviewed Banksy’s work at Dismaland, the bemusement park he mounted in Weston Super Mare’s disused lido in 2015 - so the time is right to catch up with this intriguingly eclectic creative.

Banksy’s work is powerfully political and this Covent Garden event is interspersed with his quotes that often bite (devour?) the very hand that feeds him - a phrase that visitors encounter early on in the exhibition reads “The art world is the biggest joke going. It’s a rest home for the overprivileged, the pretentious, and the weak.” Link those words to his 2005 screen print Morons, depicting an art auction at which millions are being bid for a canvas bearing the words “I can’t believe you morons actually buy this shit” and his message is clear, the laugh is on us.

Banksy’s work is as brutally satirical as the world he depicts. When he turns his attention to Nick Ut’s harrowing and instantly recognisable photograph image of the little girl napalmed during the Vietnam War, Banksy places her between Mickey Mouse and Ronald McDonald, these two icons of Americana holding the girl’s hands up high and waving to the crowds. As a comment on the USA, the artist’s message mercilessly skewers our conscience.

Banksy’s politics however are too often disappointingly correct, lacking a spectrum of balanced perspective. His mockery of our world, albeit necessary, picks on selective targets that focus more on the artist's chosen causes to champion, rather than balanced debate. His Walled-Off Hotel that challenges Israel’s relationship with the Palestinian Territories is a powerful graphic that offers up material for a fair debate. But where criticism could be levelled at those same territories, say for their murderous intolerance of the LGBT community, then Banksy’s silence disappointingly deafens.

Much of Banksy’s famed humour and wit has been assembled for the event, but the display is not exhaustive. If one is hoping to catch a glimpse of “Love is in the Bin” the artist’s famously self-shredding take on his “Girl With Balloon” that recently sold at auction for $25 million then steel yourself for disappointment.

Interspersed with video interview clips from Banksy’s printer Ben Eine, The Art Of Banksy is an exhibition of artworks that may well entertain, challenge, inspire or offend. As an excuse to step inside from the capital’s cold winter, the event is a fascinating distraction.

Booking until 22nd May 2022