Tag Archives: theatre review

Assemble, Theatre Review. 81 Renshaw Street, Liverpool.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *

Cast: Jackie Jones, Nuala Maguire, Marie Westcott, Sarah Keating, Becky Brooks, Sophie Smith, Josie Sedgewick Davies, Maggie Quinlan.

Four plays written, edited, practised and performed inside 24 hour whilst all the while at the back of the minds of all involved with Lady Parts Theatre the small nagging doubt that this perhaps can be a jump too far for all participating in the project. Assemble was the rallying call and assemble with flying colours they did, all present and correct, suitably attired and as a bonus were just magnificent.

Assemble, Theatre Review. 81 Renshaw Street, Liverpool. full post

(477 words, estimated 1:54 mins reading time)

Noises Off, Theatre Review. The Lowry, Salford.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * * *

Cast: Maureen Beattie, Neil Pearson, David Bark-Jones, Thomasin Rand, Danielle Flett, Chris Larkin, Sasha Waddell, Simon Bubb, Geoffrey Freshwater.

What Noises Off brings to the stage, is the sense of what regional theatre really is like, fly by the seats mayhem, utter confusion and misunderstanding and above all just the most amazing and side splittingly funny couple of hours you can ever hope to have in a theatre.

The Lowry in Salford is the latest venue to host Michael Frayn’s incredible farce and with a cast that you just want to carry on forever, causing mayhem and theatrical anarchy as they go.

Noises Off, Theatre Review. The Lowry, Salford. full post

(521 words, estimated 2:05 mins reading time)

Ladies Day, Theatre Review. Royal Court Theatre, Liverpool.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10

Cast: Eithne Browne, Lynne Francis, Roxanne Pallett, Angela Simms, Jack Lord.

The glitter, the finery, the new frocks and strange alien language truly known only by a smattering of people can only mean one thing; that Amanda Whittington’s play Ladies Day is in Liverpool and under starter’s orders to go down as one of the great feel good productions of 2013.

Ladies Day, Theatre Review. Royal Court Theatre, Liverpool. full post

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

The Last Five Years, Theatre Review. The Epstein Theatre, Liverpool.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * * *

Cast: Helen Carter, Stephen Fletcher.

There are times when a production can simply not be bettered, it has the most fantastic response to it and lingers on well in the memory as one of the absolute highlights of the theatre year. That production is The Last Five Years, it was considered by all who saw it at the Actor’s Studio, a rip roaring accomplished piece of art from start to finish. That is where the two productions stop being comparable, as Stephen Fletcher, one of the finest young actors in Liverpool and the exceptional Helen Carter bought Jason Robert Brown’s play back to the stage for the second time and in one fell swoop made it a gleaming example of artistic beauty, of tremendous fortitude and belief and overall simple elegance.

The Last Five Years, Theatre Review. The Epstein Theatre, Liverpool. full post

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

Lionboy, Theatre Review. Playhouse Theatre, Liverpool.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *

Cast: Adetomiwa Edun, Femi Elufowoju Jr., Robert Gilbert, Victoria Gould, Lisa Kerr, Clive Mendus, Dan Milne, Stephen Hiscock.

There are many plays and productions that can make an audience sit up just that little bit higher in their seats and marvel at the spectacle, wonder with joy at the sheer leap in the imagination and be amazed at what the theatre company has managed to achieve in the time on stage. Complicite are no exceptions to this rule as they bring their superb adapted version of Zizou Corder’s acclaimed Lionboy to the Liverpool Playhouse Theatre.

Lionboy, Theatre Review. Playhouse Theatre, Liverpool. full post

(418 words, estimated 1:40 mins reading time)

Failure (And other opportunities for non-linear success), Theatre Review. Unity Theatre, Liverpool.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *

How many dreams or unfulfilled desires do you still have left in your life? One? A few? Maybe there is whole list of wishes, a whole grasping of seeds in which you hope will all germinate and take root. Every success then will be yours…life though doesn’t work that way and in amongst all those seeds you might miss the one that will flower as you chase them all. Mary Pearson explores how not to succeed, in other words how to grasp Failure.

Failure (And other opportunities for non-linear success), Theatre Review. Unity Theatre, Liverpool. full post

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

Floating, Theatre Review. Unity Theatre, Liverpool.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10

There is a reason why the foundation of the country since the end of the Second World War is built upon the cornerstone, the epitome of decency that is the N.H.S. and it is down to doctors and nurses that put up with, laugh alongside, shed tears of agony, frustration and remorse in the midst of insurmountable daily pressure from the sick and the dying and from those trusted with its care who seem to want to destroy what makes the U.K. civilised.

Floating, Theatre Review. Unity Theatre, Liverpool. full post

(378 words, estimated 1:31 mins reading time)

Rutherford & Son, Theatre Review. Playhouse Theatre, Liverpool.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10

Cast: Barrie Rutter, Nicholas Shaw, Andrew Grose, Sara Poyzer, Kate Anthony, Catherine Kinsella, Richard Standing, Gilly Tompkins.

Not for nothing was Githa Sowerby compared to Henrik Ibsen, the father of theatre realism. Her play Rutherford & Son was a powerful statement in a world where the writing of a female playwright was not expected to be as bold, so groundbreaking in its fury at a world that put male pride and arrogance before the thought of the family. The absolute realism she bought to her characters, especially that of the bombastic and near tyrannical father John Rutherford, the anguish and near heart breaking life of his daughter Janet and that of the stranger to the house, the woman who makes the Faustian-like pact with her father-in-law when all else around her goes awry, the woman whose head for business sees her keep a roof over her head, the young Mary.

Rutherford & Son, Theatre Review. Playhouse Theatre, Liverpool. full post

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

A Wondrous Place, Theatre Review. Unity Theatre, Liverpool.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10

Cast: Kathryn Beaumont, Joshua Hayes, Sally Hodgkiss, Adam Search.

From 18^th century novels through to turn of the last century and the black and white kitchen sink dramas produced after the war and on to stereotyped and cliché ridden mass produced television, the idea of the north is one that can be hard to dispel, to make some of those that live in alleged splendour somewhere past the Watford Gap. Not all is grim up north and the harshness that is fostered upon the area is usually one that is made by those who are jealous of the rich tapestry of life that the northern half of England holds dear.

A Wondrous Place, Theatre Review. Unity Theatre, Liverpool. full post

(416 words, estimated 1:40 mins reading time)

Blue Remembered Hills, Theatre Review. Playhouse Theatre, Liverpool.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *

Cast: James Bolt, Phil Cheadle, Tilly Gaunt, Adrian Grove, Joanna Holden, David Nellist, Christopher Price.

It may not be considered as the pinnacle of Dennis Potter’s career as a playwright, that surely goes to the plays Pennies From Heaven and The Singing Detective but Blue Remembered Hills is certainly a Potter classic and one that shows that cruelty is not just confined to the adult world in which the backdrop of the Second World War rages but resides within us all from birth.

Blue Remembered Hills, Theatre Review. Playhouse Theatre, Liverpool. full post

(420 words, estimated 1:41 mins reading time)