'Out There Festival' of Circus and Street art

'Out There festival' of Circus and Street Arts

20/09/15

This isn't so much a review of the entire 'Out There' festival, yet more of a happy comment on how much I enjoyed this annual festival once again. For those who don't know, this is a festival comprised of many international street performers, based in a seaside town in Norfolk, and has grown into a fully fledged weekend of fun. 

The reason I am featuring this on my blog, other than it being a recap of my recent theatrical goings on, is because it reminded me of exactly what can be achieved with very little. That may sound like a rather underwhelming statement, but when you can be completely captivated by the narrative of two very skilled acrobats, with a few simple props and no sound at all but music, you realise the true power of the actor. The whole experience was very grotowskian in the sense that there was no need for fancy lighting and costume; all that mattered was the two actors. Whilst writing this I realise I am referring to one act in-particular, and that was the work of Circus Katoen with their showing of 'Ex Aequo', a silent (but for music) circus act which told the story of a couple in conflict about where to put their furniture in their new house. When I say furniture, I really mean blocks of wood and potted plants, for that's almost all they used to bring this narrative to life. The two acrobats did all sorts of flips and cartwheels here there and everywhere, often balancing on makeshift piles of wood and wooden planks and often on each-other. It just really brought back to me how you honestly need very little to be able to engage an audience in this way (well apart from intense acrobatic skill of course), and provided for me a huge lesson in the art of clowning, and theatre in general. you don't need anything as long as you have a message, and I think that's a hugely important thing to remember in this industry.   

'The Curious Incident of The Dog in The Night-time'- Marianne Elliott (Adapted by Simon Stephens)

'The Curious Incident of The Dog in The Night-time'

 

Gielgud theatre

3rd September 2015, 2:30pm

I know I'm a little late to the party to be talking about the incident that is the one of a certain dog in the night time, but unfortunately it wasn't until recently that I got to see this gem that is Simon Stephens' play adaptation of Mark Haddon's classic novel. The play tells the story of 15yr old Christopher Boone, an incredibly intelligent protagonist labelled by the novel's blurb to have Asperger's syndrome, and thus a few social and personal difficulties. Although the central plot revolves around Christopher's decision to snap into detective mode when he finds his neighbour's dog 'Wellington' killed with a garden fork, the narrative develops in a way which allows us to see peppers of Christopher's everyday life, and a chance to see things through his eyes.

Telling you that the play was good would be like telling you that chocolate is delicious: an evidently badly kept secret on the theatre scene, and probably partly due to my delayed watching of the show. Nonetheless I will proceed in telling you just why I loved it.

As a slight beginning disclaimer, as is the case with any novel adaptation, it takes a while for a person (like myself) who's read the book, to adapt to the story as a visual piece. In the case of 'The Curious Incident...', adapter Simon Stephens has an even harder job, as the novel takes the form of almost a stream of consciousness from the perspective of someone who thinks very differently to your average person. In order to keep the element that it was from Christopher's perspective, rather than just a story with him at the centre, there needed to be an element which told us his feelings, and an air of narration. To overcome this, Stephens conveys Christopher's thoughts through his councillor 'Siobhan' reading the book that Christopher writes of his thoughts on the Wellington story. Although a little uncomfortable to hear a woman's voice as Christopher's thoughts, rather than the actor who played him, you soon became attuned to the method, and began to thank Stephens for this, especially during the sensitive parts of the story when we told Christopher's feelings by an external narrator, allowing the endearing element of the story to be kept. 

I think part of the huge success of the show can be put down to the use of aesthetics, as throughout, audiences are bombarded with the beautiful and constant imagery created by not only the ensemble themselves, but the projection, props, lights and sound effects which aided them. Throughout, I felt like the stage was a metaphor for Christopher's very orderly mind, perhaps most significantly achieved through the appearance of the stage which had the projection of a lined graph on the floor, three walls and ceiling of the performance area. Through most of the play none of the ensemble (of 10) left the stage, yet sat quietly at the sides and corners of the space during scenes in which they weren't needed, springing up and moving at the exact same time when scenes changed. It felt to me as though they were all in his head, moving in an orderly mathematical fashion when Christopher wanted them to, yet always in the back of his mind when he didn't. When things became more complicated in his life, the stage became more disrupted, with Christopher dashing about the stage, opening cupboards and cubby holes here, there and everywhere to find pieces of train tracks which he frantically built during scene changes and long bits of distressed dialogue. The stage became more and more messy in the same way that his mind did, and the pinnacle for me was when Christopher found out the ultimate secret that his mother was actually still alive, and all of her hidden letters exploded from the ceiling, Kaffe keating (as Christopher) performing quite the striking fit, along with strobe lighting and the sound effects of muffled numbers and letters. There were many moments like this where we were given quite a display for the senses, and if I had any qualms with the direction it would perhaps be that the (dare I say) overuse of the technical components perhaps played it safe a little when trying to convey Christopher's feelings. In some ways it took a little bit of the naturalism away, and I would have liked to have seen the actors convey things themselves just a touch more than they did. None the less, 'The Curious Incident...' picked a style and stuck to it, and throughout my eyes were always indulged. There were even tiny visual intricacies which didn't go unnoticed, like the fact that 'Mr Shears' wore a yellow tie, an aspect for me which symbolised the fact that Christopher disliked him (yellow being his least favourite colour). 

Indeed, I think intricacy is the only way to describe every aspect of the performance, the choreography of the ensemble by Frantic assembly's Scott Graham, obviously reaching the slick standard which the name suggests it would, with actors sweeping Keating off of his feet at every opportunity, and of course in perfect uniform. There was one especially delicious section where actors performed a 'fast forward' sequence to show time passing, and instead of going crazy with the exaggerated fast movements that you would expect, they each perfected the tiny slight gestures of genuine human quirks: itches, hands in pockets, looking around, flipping pages etc. Possibly one of my favourite parts to watch as an actor, and definitely something that I will be using myself when the time comes. I even find myself noticing as I research into the play further, that it wasn't just on stage that the attention to detail stopped; 'The Curious Incident of The Dog in The Night-time' also has an Instagram page, twitter account, and even a soundcloud where you can go and listen to all of the original music compositions featured in the show. Even in the auditorium of the Guilgud Theatre, each seat number that was prime had a special 'Prime Number Seat' poster suck to it to further the idea that the whole theatre was indeed part of Christopher's mind.It feels to me that The Curious Incident isn't just a play, but a community which fits nicely in the centre of London's west end, and one which won't be leaving for some time.

As far as acting goes, I felt some of the strongest work came from Nicolas Tennant as 'Ed Boone', who I thought carried the dramatic irony of the piece in a way which was so natural. The truly endearing quality of the novel is that Christopher doesn't realise how his at times his difficult behavior can affect people, and I thought Tennant as Christopher's father conveyed the air of an exasperated but undoubtedly loving father with perfect gruffness. At starts I thought Kaffe Keating was a rather confident Christopher, playing the role as though he perhaps knew he was being difficult. Once again however I had to ween myself off of my interpretation of a more self nervous Christopher from the novel, and relax into Keating's more knowy, outward approach, which he conveyed undoubtedly consistently. I think the most perfect moment from Keating as a protagonist however came at the end, when he tells Siobhan that he thinks he can do anything, asking her if she thinks so too. The silence in retort, and black out seemed almost a perfect direction by Marianne Elliott, finishing an otherwise complex show, with just the simplicity of silence, which I think is sometimes needed. 

http://www.curiousonstage.com/  

'Everyman' - Rufus Norris, adapted by Carol Anne Duffy

 

'Everyman'

The National Theatre, Southbank

8th August 2015, 2:00pm

I think the sweet spot for any modern director when tackling an old legend is getting that balance. A play which can emulate the charm and message of the original text, yet with a modern recontextualisation which can appeal to contemporary audiences. 'Everyman' attempted this, with Carol Anne Duffy making the bold attempt to adapt a 15th century morality play, into a modern materialistic tale of drink, drugs and partying.
The play's opening was certainly an impressive start to this, as audiences were presented with an elaborate physical theatre portrayal of a 40th birthday party. Here the ensemble of 22 moved dynamically and often in synch to snort lines of coke off forever moving tables, chanting an original song 'happy fucking birthday'. This, for any aspiring actor was what you wish to see from an ensemble, the slick, in unison movements being to a standard that most wish to reach, as well as achieving the desired effect of disorientation from the pace. From here it certainly felt that the play was going to remain at a level to which we could all identify with, the modern party etiquette of drinks, drugs and dancing something which we are all at least familiar with. I fear to say however that the play reached a peak with this beginning, the following tone failing to keep that sense of identification with the present, instead fluctuating between the modern and original context of the play.
I feel the means for this lack of balance was the fact that the piece followed the frame work of the original text, poet Carol Anne Duffy (script adapter) keeping the original character names of 'Everyman' 'Death' and 'God', typical of the morality play, as well as much of the archaic language. I feel her reasoning for this was in order to make the idea of an 'Everyman' a timeless one, keeping that name in order to assert the idea that the term is as relevant today as it was in the 15th century. I feel the sustaining of the language was a necessary one in order for the play to be seen as an adaptation rather than a new 'Everyman', yet this came at the price of the play failing to hit the modernisation to which it aspired. It was fine when we were faced with the very entertaining musical numbers of William Lyon, enriched with modern language, swearing and the glitz and glamour of gold armoured shop assistants, yet the moment the play plunges back in the more original sections, it looses that element of sparkle.
In saying this, it doesn't mean the actual quality of the play was anything to be desired, much the contrary the piece was incredibly strong in all areas the way The National Theatre only ever works. Very strong performances came especially from Dermot Crowley as 'Death', bringing an element of funny Irish charm to the part, providing the perfect balance for the gritty reality of his threatening words, which force the Protagonist 'Everyman' on his journey to better himself before facing death. His sarcastic elements reminded me a lot of Arthur Darvill as 'Dr Faustus' Mephistopheles, the admirable interpretation of a enemy death figure as comic relief. Similarly strong was Kate Duchene as the refreshingly female god/morality figure, one of the most poignant parts of the play for me coming from her speech in the rubbish dump where her exasperation with Everyman reaches it's climax. For me this was one of the realest moments in the play which allowed the audience to question that stereotype of an invincible God, and that he too can reach the end of his tether. My only comment would be that had Duchene have been a little less infuriated before this point, it would have been even more of an impacting moment, as previous to this, she seemed a little more angry and subsequently one toned than needed. Obviously all roles are subject to interpretation, yet my own yearned for God to have made the most of those niggles of comedy in her dialogue which I felt didn't quite come through. Talking of one toned, I regret to say that this was the very word to describe protagonist Chiwetel Ejiofor. From start to finish he was undoubtedly strong, with some of the most admirable diction and annunciation I have seen in live theatre, yet there were moments I really wanted to see him strip it back rather than play up to the audience. He seemed exasperated throughout, I suppose a fine portrayal of a man about to die, but sometimes less is certainly more. Had he have had those levels, I feel the audience could have identified a little more with his character which has been constantly knocked as an ineffective 'Everyman' due to his rich living.

http://www.nationaltheatre.org.uk/shows/everyman



'The Mentalists' - Directed by Abbey Wright (featuring Stephen Merchant)

 

 

 

'The Mentalists'

Wyndhams Theatre, London

29th July 2015, 7:45pm

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Is Ted a fruit bowl, coke bottle or pepper shaker? Sadly I think that if we'd have been faced with that question some 20 minutes earlier in the play, half of the audience wouldn't have left in the interval.

 

Richard Bean's 2002 play, 'The Mentalists' deals with the story of two middle aged men who set out to make a film which will revolutionise the world. This is all because protagonist 'Ted' has found an old copy of B. F Skinner's 'Walden Two' in his shed, a utopian novel which tells the story of a community which lives a supposedly perfect life, residents working only four hours a day, the absence of a ruling body etc. In finding this book, Ted believes he has the answer to the world's problems, and thus Bean's play tells the rather endearing story of his venture to make a film talking about the components of 'Walden Two' (which he assumes a lot of people haven't read) in hope that the world will join him in the quest to right societal wrongs. He and assisting best friend Morrie, also an amateur film maker, rent a cheap Finsbury park hotel room to make the dream a reality.

 

Bean's play is beautifully written, and deals with the peaks and troughs of human nature in an incredibly subtle way. Both characters in this two man play are intricately defined: Ted the controlling but unadmittedly self nervous protagonist, and Morrie, the confident, chatty hairdresser with an air of campiness. All of this is achieved through the play's solid naturalism of characters' constant conversing, peppered with jokes and the general banter of old friends.

 

I fear to say however that the writing of the play was where the positives stop, as sadly the execution undermined the plays beauty. Firstly, although a comforting sight for any west end audience, the grandeur of the embellished Wyndham theatre sought only to belittle the static box set of the north London hotel room. I feel a smaller theatre would have complemented the nature of the play more, making the experience a lot more intimate for the audience. Instead, the grandeur of the theatre only served to make the acting in the show bigger than needed, and as a keen Merchant fan, I was disappointed to find he as 'Ted' the worst offender. He seemed to adopt the shouty tone of an actor who was aware of the audience, directing a lot of the conversation out, often breaking the fourth wall to direct a joke. From my interpretation, the beauty of Ted as a character is that he is unaware of his humorous nature, genuinely believing that he has the key to revolution, unaware of the hilarity he conveys when constantly asking if he looks okay, or nagging Morrie to stop touching the camera. In order for this to be conveyed however, the plays naturalism and truth needs to be unquestionable, something which Merchant broke for me. I wanted him to embody Ted with his endearing quirks, instead he skimmed the surface, showing me a lot of his own personality than that of his character. In response Steffan Rhodri as 'Morrie' was somewhat stronger, never breaking his role as the self confident, reassuring friend to Ted. However, the style of Merchant meant that responses from Rhodri could only equal the outwardess of his colleague, neither actor 100% convincing me of their role.

Because of the lack of embodiment of the characters, the first half of the play fell flat, and I regret to say I found myself loosing concentration during the long chunks of dialogue. There just wasn't that intended sense of personality coming from Bean's writing, and because of this, the intended pinnacle of the play (post interval) fell short. I was unaware whatsoever that there was supposed to be any questionability to Ted's psychological state. To me, his dedication to his quest to revolutionise the world was just a comical trait to his character, as Merchant often directed the audience to believe through his over the top gestures to the audience. To me the suspect phone calls which appear occasionally in the first half are just the familiar calls of a suspecting wife, and again no hint from Merchant led me to believe otherwise. Because of this, the interval came at a time when there seemed to be no plot development, but just a lengthy and dare I say, boring conversation between two men, a lot of the dramatic irony lost. When I returned to my seat after the interval, most of the row I was sitting on had left.

The play took a completely unexpected turn when suddenly there begin to be questions on whether Ted is sane, something which I had not suspected in the slightest. Morrie gives Ted an ultimatum on whether he is the self assured revolutionary he thinks he is, or really a slightly instable man, using the metaphors to which I referred at the beginning. When it is revealed that actually Ted is very much the latter, I felt I lost a huge sense of the impact, because I had never believed in Ted's character to begin with in order to feel sad about his deterioration. Albeit the acting in the second half improved somewhat, probably because Merchant's default to direct the comedy outwards was no longer an option during the sensitive revelation. Ted's breakdown was certainly a touching moment, made even  more so when Morrie's only solution is to console his very broken friend with a haircut. An emotional moment which really brought out the beauty of Bean's writing, the fact that he knows nothing more than to offer a hair cut and something which he is so adamant will help, when fully aware that his friend has committed a murder and is quite obviously doomed.

All in all, it was only disappointing that 'The Mentalists' lacked the detail it needed in order to be impactful. I feel a smaller venue could have helped to serve this purpose, giving the play the intimate audience it needed to allow the actors to relax into their roles, and pay them the intricate attention they needed.  

 

http://www.thementaliststheplay.com/     

 



 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 



'Utopia' - Penny Woolcock

 

 

'UTOPIA'

The Roundhouse, Camden

Tuesday 11th August 2015, 3:30pm

Utopia is as nebulous or as clear as you want it to be".

Whilst taking myself through the promenade immersive piece that is Penny Woolcock's 'Utopia', I struggled to find a way to describe it, until I came across this perfect statement from one of the speakers involved.

The nature of the piece is explorative, and allows an audience a free reign to walk around the main space of The Roundhouse, Camden, presented with an array of different audio and visual components all based around the themes of life and life stories.

As you enter the space you are faced with an immense tower of boxes which look as if they are for sale, each labelled with things such as 'wealth' 'happiness' and 'popularity'. Through blue flickering backlights, the tower of boxes are made to look desirable, gleaming for a second and then hazed, the words often difficult to make out. As a young artist, I tend to want to put meaning to everything in theatre, and on my entrance into the space, after comprehending this for a moment, I soon decided that this was Woolcock's way to comment on the unattainability of these fancies in life, through the scale of the sculpture and haziness of the words. Satisfied with this interpretation, I moved into the main body of the piece, which was comprised of the verbatim recordings of many real life speakers. The first I came across was inside a Land Rover placed to the right of the box sculpture which invited audiences to sit inside and listen to the story of a young working class man speak of his childhood and abusive father. Placed just outside of this, there was a huge rubbish bin from which a recording of another young man played. He spoke of his experiences with education and his general failures at school with grades, and the impacts of this. Like everything in Utopia this was left to the interpretation of the spectator, and at this point in my journey, I still applied meaning to the props, deciding that the fact this recording came from a rubbish bin meant that the speaker felt discarded due to his lack of education.

At each end of the space there were openings for audiences to travel through, the first of my journey leading to a messy bookshop, where from different shelves came even more recordings, most of which dealt with the stories of young men talking about their experiences at school. These recordings formed the very core of Woolcock's piece, as they told incredibly interesting and in some cases very touching stories. One recording spoke of an incident where the head teacher at his school had hung himself in the sports hall. When I entered the Bookshop I begun looking at the books on the shelves, trying to find the meaning of why some were on the floor and others not. I even looked at the books around where the recordings emulated from, yet found no correlations. Once I begun to actually relax and take time to listen to these recordings, I began to realise that there were no clever intricate placing of props, and that generally, the recordings took centre stage, the actual stories of people. The props became of less significance, yet more to compliment the words of the speakers, as I'm sure if there were just speakers placed about the space, the piece would have lacked the journey and sections that the props provided. This was when I began to relax into Utopia, taking my time to listen to every word of the amazing stories told.

At this point in my journey, I was beginning to think that utopia dealt only with the rather troubling stories of working class teenagers, and decided that the piece was a comment on the way we all desire those all important components of the box sculpture, yet were in total ignorance of the poverty happening around us. Once again I was wrong, because coming to the end of the bookshop and into a walkway surrounded by piles of bricks and rubble and beer cans, we begun to hear some different natured stories. For example the story of a wealthy woman who spoke of always spending £50 on each meal, and only picking up products labelled 'finest'. There were not only stories on different ends of the spectrum, but in-between, like the story of the a young working class teenager who came from a less wealthy household, yet started making hundreds of pounds a week from burning cd's and selling them on. One of the most intriguing stories was of a young homeless woman. Where at first glance you assume that this was the sad story of a woman who had graduated with a degree and fallen into poverty, the woman spoke poised and confidently of the ways she would act as if she were not homeless, always having at least a pound to have a coffee in a café late at night to keep herself safe. Reaching the end of this walkway some of the props begun to echo the opening image, as some of the boxes labelled 'wealth' 'happiness' etc. were now discarded on the floor. I came to realise that these things were no longer relevant, and that when you take away the material desires in life, you are still faced with the amazing, interesting stories of these very normal people. Woolcock made me question why there is so much desire in life when she was able to put together a very basic series of recordings of just normal, real life people, and create something so enlightening.

Entering back into the main space, I continued down the alternative walkway which was much the same. Here there were even more interesting recordings, for example the recording of just an old woman singing a muffled tune. These recordings were laid out on what looked like office desks, accompanied with even more irrelevant props like stapes and lip-glosses and pens etc. With the gist in my head that these were no longer relevant I barely even took them in, focussing all my attention to the words of the speakers. It made me think that even when surrounded by material objects, the stories of the people prevailed. One which stood out was the story of a mother talking of her daughter who underwent a sex change. By this point there were no props, just a little cubby hole where you could stand and hear the words of a very supportive mother.

Both of the walkways in the piece lead to the same space: a big screen of various people, who we recognised as some of the speakers, reading extracts from 'Utopia' by Thomas More. To me this consolidated the idea that all of the stories we had heard were our version of reality, and that really if we all decided to have a society like 'Utopia' we could have. This was echoed in a set of comments on the piece from Penny Woolcock, and some of the speakers which was on a wall at the very  back of the space. Here Woolcock explained how she was inspired by Darwin's theory of the cave: the idea that people assume that the life we live is reality, and that just because this is way the world is, it doesn't mean there isn't a whole different life outside of the cave in which we are chained to assuming that this is the only reality. The world could be like 'Utopia' if only we got out of the cave









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Obviously everything I took from 'Utopia' was COMPLETELY interpretational. Others could have walked around the space and taken something completely different. Likewise the nature of the piece meant that you could have either walked through the space in ten minutes, hearing just brief snippets of the recordings and taking in the amazing visuals of the piece; or like me you could have taken your sweet time, listening to every word of every recording, and spending an hour and a half. Either way it would have been an amazing experience. Woolcock taught me quite what theatre can be, as I've never been to see a piece where the people 'performing' are not actually present in the piece. I've never been to something where an audience are completely in control and can be as passive or as active as you like. It taught me so much about the boundaries of theatre as an art piece and formed for me an incredibly cathartic experience.


http://www.roundhouse.org.uk/whats-on/2015/penny-woolcock-utopia/