Tag Archives: theatre review

Hope Place, Theatre Review. Everyman Theatre, Liverpool.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10

Cast: Michelle Buttery, Neil Caple, Ciaran Kellgren, Tricia Kelly, Emma Lisl, Joe McGann, Eileen O’ Brien, Alan Stocks.

The power of memory is one that can either hold you back so hard that it feels as if the weight of the future is too difficult to deal with, or can be such an aid in which it can only set you free. What if the place in which those memories are of also retains those memories, the very bricks and mortar that keep you safe from the outside world are able to hold onto an image of a time perhaps best forgotten?

Hope Place, Theatre Review. Everyman Theatre, Liverpool. full post

(449 words, estimated 1:48 mins reading time)

Sex And The Suburbs, Theatre Review. Royal Court Theatre, Liverpool.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *

Cast: Claire Sweeney, Lindzi Germain, Carl Patrick.

Radio has come a long way since its early days. It has seen many advancements, dedicated music channels, digital, analogue being banished to the wasteland of history but still lingering on coughing and spluttering in a superhuman effort to keep a vessel of the past open. Pop stars come and go and in some cases come back again and of course the advent of talk radio, the small bubble in which people can lose their rag at a voice a hundred miles away and confess all to an aural-voyeuristic nation. It seems nothing is off limits and when it comes to Sex and the Suburbs, everybody has a story to tell and an opinion to express.

Sex And The Suburbs, Theatre Review. Royal Court Theatre, Liverpool. full post

(565 words, estimated 2:16 mins reading time)

Under Milk Wood, Theatre Review. Playhouse Theatre, Liverpool.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * * *

Cast: Ifan Huw Dafydd, Hedydd Dylan, Richard Elfyn, Sara Harris-Davies, Sophie Melville, Steven Meo, Caryl Morgan, Simon Nehan, Kai Owen, Christian Patterson, Owen Teale.

Listen…the applause at the end of the performance says it all. Dylan Thomas’ seminal classic Under Milk Wood has the power to catch the attention of anybody willing to open their ears and truly pay attention for a couple of hours.

Under Milk Wood, Theatre Review. Playhouse Theatre, Liverpool. full post

(463 words, estimated 1:51 mins reading time)

This May Hurt A Bit, Theatre Review. Playhouse Theatre, Liverpool.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10

Cast: Frances Ashman, Stephanie Cole, William Hope, Natalie Klamar, Hywel Morgan, Brian Protheroe, Jane Wymark, Tristram Wymark.

The patient has been seen by many consultants over the years, some with the very best of intentions, some whose intentions are perhaps dubious at best and down- right scandalous at worst and yet somehow the patient is still here and still keeping society going. The N.H.S. still carries on delivering from cradle to the grave.

This May Hurt A Bit, Theatre Review. Playhouse Theatre, Liverpool. full post

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

Beside The Seaside, Theatre Review. Unity Theatre, Liverpool.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 71/2 /10

Cast: Jennifer Bea, John Burns, Anna Hudson, Leon Tagoe.

There is almost nothing better in life than a day at the seaside. The chance to eat an ice cream as the sun causes it to dribble and linger upon your fingers, to take in the maritime air and generally have the type of day that at one time was the staple of British life up and down the country. The seaside was where it was at and families flocked there in their thousands. Places like Blackpool, Scarborough, Southend and Brighton were the destinations of choice in which to blow off steam and have some much needed downtime.

Beside The Seaside, Theatre Review. Unity Theatre, Liverpool. full post

(441 words, estimated 1:46 mins reading time)

An August Bank Holiday Lark, Theatre Review. Playhouse Theatre, Liverpool.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10

Cast: Barrie Rutter, Emily Butterfield, Darren Kuppan, Jack Quarton, Ben Burman, Elizabeth Eves, Sophie Hatfield, Lauryn Redding, Brett Lee Roberts, Mark Thomas, Russell Richardson.

An August Bank Holiday Lark, the chance for some men to become heroes, for some to find some meaning or importance in life away from the remote villages they may have been raised in all their lives or even the chance to be looked at differently by those they need validation or even respect from. An August Bank Holiday Lark, the hazy days of summer before Gavro Princip took a gun and assassinated one man and his wife and started the ball rolling on the first mechanised whole sale slaughter of soldiers and civilians that tore through Europe and beyond.

An August Bank Holiday Lark, Theatre Review. Playhouse Theatre, Liverpool. full post

(577 words, estimated 2:18 mins reading time)

The Grid, Theatre Review. Everyman Theatre, Liverpool.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *

Cast: James Bibby, Esta Bickerstaff, Catherine Brown, Georgina Cummings, Philipa Gaskell, Lucy Harris, Heidi Henders, David Jackson, Gus Kearns, Chloe Nall-Smith, Emily Rainbow, Keeley Ray, Anthony Roberts, Grace Sandison, Josie Sedgwick-Davies, Whitney Suku, Kieran Urquhart, Matthew Woods, Nick Crosby, Tiegan Byrne, Caitlin Carey, Cortney Carey, Poppy Hughes, Kate Keeton, Niamh McCarthy, James O’ Neill, Mark Powell, Darren Pritchard, Jamie Pye, Paislie Ried, Joe Roberts, Nathan Russell, Harry Sargent, Kaila Sharples, Daryl Wafer, Nadia Anim Mohammad Noor, Rachel Barry, Lewis Bray, Jennifer Briggs, Daniel Fitzgerald, Tom Harrington, Tammy Holland, Sean Hyland, Nina Levy, Scott Lewis, Hannah McGowan, Kathryn McGurk, Spencer Montague, Joe Ringwood, Jenny Stock, Jonathan Taylor, Theo Thompson, Tommy Williams, Curtis Wilson.

The Grid, Theatre Review. Everyman Theatre, Liverpool. full post

(567 words, estimated 2:16 mins reading time)

An Extraordinary Light, Theatre Review. Unity Theatre, Liverpool.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *

Cast: Katherine Godfrey

An Extraordinary Light is amongst one of the rare moments in theatre, an excellently written monologue for a female performer by a male writer and one which smacks completely of teaching an audience something that they possibly didn’t know was important to understand. For without An Extraordinary Light, what people might know about one of the most important discoveries in the history of humanity, the construction of the D.N.A. Double Helix, could be clouded by the thoughts of those who shouted loudest.

An Extraordinary Light, Theatre Review. Unity Theatre, Liverpool. full post

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

Special Measures, Theatre Review. Royal Court Theatre, Liverpool.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *

Cast: Eithne Browne, Paul Broughton, Stephen Fletcher, Jessica Guise, Colin Hoult, Adam Search, Angela Simms, Michael Starke.

St Jude’s Primary School has been placed into Special Measures, the universal, one size fits all term, to denote that somewhere something is not right with the system.

When Tory M.P. Thomas Winters feels the wrath of the P.M.s anger at being hit by a croquet mallet in a particularly painful constituency, he is dispatched to tick the right sort of boxes in a North of England school and make amends. The fall out, the so called oppressed kicking downwards is not new but for the Head Master and staff of St. Jude’s the fall of basic humility and understanding looking them in the eyes is one that is too much to bear.

Special Measures, Theatre Review. Royal Court Theatre, Liverpool. full post

(499 words, estimated 2:0 mins reading time)

Desert, Theatre Review. Unity Theatre, Liverpool.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *

Cast: Giles Roberts, Lucy Farrett.

One of the advantages theatre has over other forms of media is its ability to be intimate, to bring the innermost thoughts and feelings of an individual in front of your face and force you to confront them. The Molino Group does exactly that with Desert, the story of Private Chelsea Manning, formerly Bradley Manning, a soldier in the U.S. Army who leaked footage on Wikileaks of what is often referred to as “Collateral Murder”, and consequently, today is serving 35 years in prison.

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

(559 words, estimated 2:14 mins reading time)