Tag Archives: Liverpool

I Know All The Secrets In My World, Theatre Review. Unity Theatre, Liverpool.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *

Cast: Samuel Nicholas, Solomon Israel, Michelle Asante.

By talking we are able to express our emotions, our fears, our doubts and concerns with greater clarity than we ever can by the silence that surrounds us. At times though grief is so overpowering that the simple things like laughter, joy and love can only be shown by the quiet and hushed up screams. The internal rage and sorrow of loss can only ever be expressed by non verbal communication and it affects us more than we realise.

I Know All The Secrets In My World, Theatre Review. Unity Theatre, Liverpool. full post

(386 words, estimated 1:33 mins reading time)

More Light, Theatre Review. Everyman Theatre Studio, Liverpool.

Liverpool Sound & Vision Rating: * * * *

Cast: Billy Czajkowska, Isobel Balchin, Abigail McKenzie, Nuala Maguire, Alice Corrigan, Ian Cook.

Bryony Lavery’s play More Light tells the story of the recently deceased Chinese Emperor who, in order to keep the location of his tomb a secret had not only himself encased within the tomb but his entire army of craftsmen, builders and his finest courtiers. Also immured are his five young infertile wives. These women have had the best food and lived secure and luxurious lives, but now they are faced with making the most horrendous decisions in order to stay alive. Human behaviour pushed to the very limits are explored in this dramatic hour long performance directed and performed by YEP (Young Everyman Playhouse.)

More Light, Theatre Review. Everyman Theatre Studio, Liverpool. full post

(324 words, estimated 1:18 mins reading time)

The Massive Tragedy Of Madame Bovary!, Theatre Review. Everyman Theatre, Liverpool.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * * *

Cast: Emma Fielding, John Nicholson, Javier Marzan, Jonathan Holmes.

There will always be the book, the classic pieces of literature that everybody has heard of and to whom as a single person people will believe they know what it is about down to hearsay and speculated knowledge; it won’t have been read but it will be understood by reputation alone. It may be understood for what it is known for but it won’t be comprehended or valued until it is actually read first hand and then it fits into place that what you know, is nothing like what you know.

The Massive Tragedy Of Madame Bovary!, Theatre Review. Everyman Theatre, Liverpool. full post

(436 words, estimated 1:45 mins reading time)

Rams, Film Review. Picturehouse@F.A.C.T., Liverpool.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *

Cast: Sigurður Sigurjónsson, Theodór Júlíusson, Charlotte Bøving, Jon Benonysson, Gunnar Jónsson, Þorleifur Einarsson, Sveinn Ólafur Gunnarsson, Ingrid Jónsdóttir, Jörundur Ragnarsson, Viktor Már Bjarnason, Ólafur Ólafsson, Jenný Lára Arnórsdóttir, Guðrún Sveinbjörnsdóttir, Þorsteinn Gunnar Bjarnason, Anna Sæunn Ólafsdóttir.

Tales of heroism and love abound wherever you look, sometimes it comes in the most unexpected of places, sometimes it offers a mirror up to the society in which it serves, regardless of its origin, heroism is never wasted, even it it ends up not living up to the goal it sets its self.

Rams, Film Review. Picturehouse@F.A.C.T., Liverpool. full post

(377 words, estimated 1:30 mins reading time)

The Broke ‘N’ Beat Collective, Theatre Review. Unity Theatre, Liverpool.

Liverpool Sound & Vision Rating: * * * * *

Cast: Jack Hobbs aka Hobbit, Ryan Harston aka LoGisTics, Elisha Howe aka Elektric, Mohsen Nouri.

What do you get when you get a beat-boxer, poet, dancer and puppeteer in the same room? Certainly nothing that has been seen before as, 20 Stories High and Theatre-Rites collaborate to produce a spectacular show.

The Broke ‘N’ Beat Collective, Theatre Review. Unity Theatre, Liverpool. full post

(454 words, estimated 1:49 mins reading time)

Trumbo, Film Review. Picturehouse@F.A.C.T., Liverpool.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10

Cast: Bryan Cranston, Diane Lane, Helen Mirren, Michael Stuhlbarg, Dean O’ Gorman, David James Elliott, David Maldonado, John Getz, Alan Tudyk, Louis C.K., Richard Portnow, Roger Bart, Robert Stripling, Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje, Ellie Fanning, John Goodman, Stephen Root, Christian Berkel.

The era of McCarthyism was arguably one of the most shameful times in American politics, one that to this day still sends a shiver down the spine and causes the heart to miss a beat or two as the scare tactics employed by the junior senator and those of involved with the committee hearings dealing with the House Un-American Activities. That shiver should be felt for all time, it should never relent and whilst Arthur Miller brought the nauseous feeling and rising anger superbly to the stage in the classic The Crucible, Trumbo makes it feel so much more modern and dastardly.

Trumbo, Film Review. Picturehouse@F.A.C.T., Liverpool. full post

(470 words, estimated 1:53 mins reading time)

Dad’s Army, Film Review. Picturehouse@F.A.C.T., Liverpool.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 5/10

Cast: Toby Jones, Catherine Zeta-Jones, Bill Nighy, Michael Gambon, Tom Courtney, Mark Gatiss, Blake Harrison, Daniel Mays, Sarah Lancashire, Emily Atack, Ian Lavender, Bill Paterson, Frank Williams, Alison Steadman, Annette Crosby, Holli Dempsey, Martin Savage, Felicity Montague, Oliver Tobias, Julia Foster.

Nostalgia isn’t what it used to be but sometimes by revisiting the past you are in danger of completely undermining all the excellent work that once went on before; the package and the idea may look appealing but the beyond the sentimental, the finished article is a pale and perhaps at times, irritating shadow.

Dad’s Army, Film Review. Picturehouse@F.A.C.T., Liverpool. full post

(392 words, estimated 1:34 mins reading time)

The Dire Straits Experience, Gig Review. Philharmonic Hall, Liverpool.

Terence Reis of The Dire Straits Experience at the Liverpool Philharmonic Hall, February 2016. Photograph by Ian D. Hall.

Terence Reis of The Dire Straits Experience at the Liverpool Philharmonic Hall, February 2016. Photograph by Ian D. Hall.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10

It is the shiver of expectation, the memory of mountains conquered and the marriage of saxophone and guitar, dipped in amber and the sound held out as if some lofty idyllic treasure was being presented from down upon high that makes the music of Dire Straits such a pleasurable way to spend an evening. Not that Dire Straits tour anymore, the chief of it all Mark Knopfler no longer caressing that particular avenue anymore and yet the sound of rolling thunder and expressive ambience lives on in the form of The Dire Straits Experience.

The Dire Straits Experience, Gig Review. Philharmonic Hall, Liverpool. full post

(445 words, 1 image, estimated 1:47 mins reading time)

I Am Not Myself These Days, Theatre Review. Playhouse Theatre Studio, Liverpool.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 8.5/10

Cast: Tom Stuart.

Everybody wears a mask, the camouflage of fitting in when really all that is ever desired comes in the form of standing out and having fun, even if it comes with a cost. In Tom Stuart’s dynamic play, based upon Josh Kilmer-Purcell’s book, I Am Not Myself These Days the mask of illusion is only worn to be loved and it is love of all excessive things that carries the play at the Playhouse Studio into a realm of perfectly captured hedonism and glittering prowess.

I Am Not Myself These Days, Theatre Review. Playhouse Theatre Studio, Liverpool. full post

(445 words, estimated 1:47 mins reading time)

Brick Up The Mersey Tunnels, Theatre Review. Royal Court Theatre, Liverpool.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * * *

Cast: Roy Brandon, Eithne Browne, Carl Chase, Suzanne Collins, Paul Duckworth, Adam Keast, Andrew Schofield, Francis Tucker.

It is undoubtedly one of the finest productions to come out of Merseyside in the last ten years, a difficult birth it may have been, a show that found itself with an audience but being put on due to commitments and other factors somehow making the play seem an impossibility and yet a decade on, over 200,000 members of the public later, Brick Up The Mersey Tunnels is a show of insurmountable honest and terrifically funny appeal; so much so that it is only right and proper for it to come back to the Royal Court Theatre and give the jolt of marvellous humour needed after a January of gloom and false starts.

Brick Up The Mersey Tunnels, Theatre Review. Royal Court Theatre, Liverpool. full post

(426 words, estimated 1:42 mins reading time)