Sandy Pritchard-Gordon

Sandy Pritchard-Gordon
Theatre Blog

Wednesday 28 May 2014

Good People at The Noel Coward








I defy anyone not to agree that Imelda Staunton is one of our greatest actresses and if anyone is in any doubt they should go and see her playing Margaret in Good People at The Noel Coward Theatre.

Written by David Lindsay-Abaire, this American comedy with an edge explores the theme of “making your luck”, whilst exposing that, horror of horrors, America is guilty of harbouring a class system.  Set in “Southie”, a working class neighbourhood in South Boston, where Lindsay-Abaire spent his early years before escaping via a scholarship to a prestigious private school, Good People opens with Margaret getting the sack from yet another job for bad time keeping.  Her desperation is apparent from the onset. Being the sole carer of her severely disabled daughter, no wages coming in can mean the difference between a roof over their heads and living on the street. 

This desperation causes Margaret to heed the advice of her wise cracking, outspoken friend, Jean and ask an old school friend, Mike for help in the job seeking stakes.  Mike has managed to escape the drudgery of life in Southie by dint of hard work, intelligence and luck.  Enjoying a “comfortable” existence in more upmarket Chestnut Hill, Mike (the “lace-curtain Irish”) is a successful “reproductive endocrinologist” and is less than happy to see Margaret turn up in his smart, sterile office.  Guilt at being unable to add his, as it turns out, ex girlfriend to his payroll, causes Mike to grudgingly invite her to his house party.  After all, there may be someone there who can employ her.

When this party is cancelled at the last minute, Margaret smells a rat and turns up anyway.  What follows is an at times heated confrontation between Mike’s glamorous and uber friendly African-American wife, Kate and the two old flames.  Secrets that Mike would prefer were kept hidden from Kate are uncovered and we begin to doubt if either he or Margaret are “good people”.  This scene highlights the cleverness of Lindsay-Abaire’s writing, for, underneath the sparkling, whip cracking dialogue, nothing is as straightforward as it looks. I’m sorry but a spoiler alert comes into play here so I cannot reveal more about the outcome except to say that one isn’t necessarily always on the side of the underdog.  Margaret’s desperation sometimes makes her vindictive, whilst Mike’s dogged determination to better himself can’t be viewed as totally contemptible.

Imelda Staunton has some of the best lines, which she delivers with her characteristic aplomb.  She may be tiny, but is certainly not short of energy and whether she be wheedling, desperate, momentarily desolate or  wisecracking survivor, Staunton’s Margaret is above all human.

Jonathan Kent ensures that the action never falters.  The pace whizzes along and his excellent cast always come up to the mark. 
 
Alongside Staunton, Angel Coulby achieves a wonderful brittle civility as the glamorous wife to the excellent Lloyd Owen’s Mike.  The support from Susan Brown as Margaret’s ascerbic land-lady, Dottie, Lorraine Ashbourne as the outspoken friend, Jean and Matthew Barker as the bingo loving (but not gay!) dollar store manager is terrific.  Add Hildegard Bechtler’s clever design to this mix and no wonder the West End was so keen to transfer this wonderful production from Hampstead

Tuesday 20 May 2014

Wolf Hall and Bring Up The Bodies at The Aldwych




There will be those who aren’t familiar with Hilary Mantel and her two consecutive Man Booker prizewinning novels Wolf Hall and Bring Up The Bodies, but I suspect not many.  Similarly, there will be others, a bit like myself, who, on reading Wolf Hall, had some difficulty adjusting to the novelist’s format of setting the books in the present and in the third person, thus making it tricky to work out who is speaking and when.  No dipping in and out of these highly praised tomes, charting the rise and fall of Thomas Cromwell. But then came Saturday and now I can’t wait to finish the first book and devour the second.  Thanks for this must go to Playful Productions in coming up with the brilliant idea of adapting both novels into two stage plays, bringing the RSC on board and, following a sell out run at Stratford, transferring them to The Aldwych. 

These new dramatisations by Mike Poulton, with assistance from Hilary Mantel herself cannot be faulted.  The two almost three hour sessions sped by, gripped and transfixed as I was by the machinations of the court of Henry VIII.  The re-telling of the 1,246 pages of print has been so, so skillfully done, thanks, in no small measure to Jeremy Herrin’s direction and the mighty Christopher Oram’s set and costume design.  There is live music, dancing, and humour, whilst the actor’s move around the pared down box like grey set like chess pieces all the while portraying every character with the clarity Mantel evokes in her books.

I love the pace of the two plays.  Every move, every speech economically moves the plot forward and keeps the tension taught.  There is no need for a lavish set, a minimalist one, that by clever lighting becomes at once home, court, prison cell, even a boat on the Thames, wonderful period costumes and brilliant actor portrayals are enough.  The whole experience reawakens our acquaintance with this part of British history and makes us rethink the personalities and motivations of the likes of Thomases Cromwell, Wolsey and More, Henry VIII and his first three wives.

The main thrust of the plot is the fact that King Henry still has no son, always a problem for the English monarchy.  Poor old first wife, Katherine of Aragon, is now too old to produce another child, let alone a male one to go with her religiously resentful daughter Mary, so, what now?  Enter Anne Boleyn, an intelligently ambitious and sexy young thing who promises she has what it takes to produce a male heir, but only with a ring on her finger.  Be careful what you wish for springs to mind, for, before long, Henry’s eyes wander to the even younger Jane Seymour, whose family home gives the first book/play its title.  Mantel’s main character,Thomas Cromwell, the lowly blacksmith’s son, by dint of his hard work, low cunning and quick humour, quickly becomes Henry’s right hand man, picking up enemies along the way.  In England’s Tudor Court, the walls definitely did have ears and we quickly realise that the volatile Henry, swiftly changing from charm to alarming rage has to be handled with the softest of kid gloves.  Even though we all (at least I’m assuming all) know the outcome, Wolf Hall and Bring Up The Bodies still have the ability to have us gripped.

Several of the actors take on multiple roles and it is to their credit that we are never in any doubt as to which character they are portraying.  It seems rather churlish to single out any performances but because they inhabit the major roles, I will mention Ben Miles, Nathaniel Parker, Paul Jesson and Lydia Leonard.  Ben Miles is Thomas Cromwell, “is” being the operative word.  Charismatic, quick witted, kind, but also chilling at times, the emotional man we see within the pages of the book is also brought into focus on stage following the death of his wife, Lizzie.  The production doesn’t linger on her untimely demise, but depicts it by having her vanish from the stage.  Likewise Ben Miles doesn’t linger on his grief and doesn’t have to.  The initial pain and grief etched on his face is palpable.

Nat Parker makes an excellent Henry VIII.  Lulling us into a false sense of security with his charm and good humour when things are going his way, when they’re not his fearsome temper is even more terrifying.  His Henry is a living, breathing king, vulnerable, spoilt, regal and dangerous.

Lydia Leonard is responsible for bringing Anne Boleyn to life and we’re aware of who she is and what she wants right from the word go.  The play opens with a lively dance and we see her suggestively stroking Henry’s fur collar.  There is no doubt as to what is on her mind and when we eventually hear her speak, we are also in no doubt that this is one intelligent, if peevish young woman.

Clad in scarlet, Paul Jesson’s Cardinal Wolsey is sublime.  Hedonistic and with a wonderful sense of humour, his exchanges with Cromwell are a joy.  How glad I was that his ghost kept returning, the voice of his and the other apparitions in Cromwell’s mind turned into disembodied echoes by the Sound Designer, Nick Powell.

These two plays can be watched separately but I am so glad I was lucky enough to watch both on one day.  The cliff hanger ending of Wolf Hall certainly left me wanting more and, wow, the evening performance did not disappoint.  Please hurry up and finish The Mirror and the Light, Hilary Mantel.  I can’t wait to see how you complete your trilogy.






Thursday 8 May 2014

Birdland at The Royal Court





There was one aspect of the staging of Simon Stephen’s new play, Birdland, at The Royal Court that left me slightly nonplussed.  I mean, why all the water towards the end?  I’m afraid I couldn’t work out the metaphor for that one.  But really that is my only quibble, perhaps because the brilliant Andrew Scott takes the title role of rock star, Paul and I couldn’t take my eyes off him.  Charming, nasty, dangerous, intelligent, sexy, outrageous and electrifying. He is all of these things and much, much more. And my, oh my, what a mover.

Paul, you see is an extremely successful rock star.  He is adored by the fans who go and watch him sing in huge arenas around the world, and can have anything he wants.  Anything that money can buy.  But when it comes to things spiritual he is bereft.  Drugs and adulation have left him wondering who on earth he is.  He has lost his ability to empathise, which costs him the friendship and love of those he once held dear, especially his best friend, Johnny.  He does and says things we will him not to.  His off switch doesn’t function, which ultimately results in the suicide of Johnny’s girlfriend and his cringingly tactless meeting with her grieving parents.

Loneliness drives him to take Jenny, a girl working in one of the many hotels in which he stays, with him on the last leg of his tour, but he ultimately drives her away with his appalling behaviour.  It’s when we see his awkward backstage encounter with the father for which he has lost total regard, that we understand the reason for the title, Birdland (Simon Stephens says that the play was charged by the spirit of the Patti Smith song of the same name).
This is when we begin to realize that there is no way back.  And here’s the rub.  The man who has acquired everything but lost his soul ends up with nothing at all.

The remaining cast, who take on various roles, are exemplary.  Ian MacNeil’s spartan design of plastic chairs and not much else, highlight Paul’s cold and meaningless existence and Carrie Cracknell’s direction is spot on.  But it is Andrew Scott who amazes.  Dead behind the eyes and toxic his Paul may be, but we still somehow feel pity for this poor creature.  What price fame?



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Monday 5 May 2014

The Silver Tassie at The Lyttleton


Sean O’Casey had a bit of a blow to his self esteem in March 1928, when his play, The Silver Tassie, was rejected by Dublin’s Abbey Theatre.  All his previous plays had premiered here but not this one, thanks, in no small measure, to the theatre’s founding director, W.B. Yeats.  In a letter to O’Casey, Yeats stated “You are not interested in the Great War; you never stood on its battlefields or walked its hospitals, and so write out of your opinions.  You illustrate those opinions by a series of almost unrelated scenes as you might in a leading article”. 

A rather imperious response to the playwright’s new offering but, having seen this latest adaptation at The Lyttleton, I do have some sympathies with Mr. Yeats. 

The Silver Tassie consists of four Acts, the first of which is set in a Dublin tenement.  So far so O’Casey.  We are introduced to two old codgers, Sylvester Heegan and Simon Norton who are awaiting the arrival of the jubilant local football team and their hero, Sylvester’s son, Harry.  Joshing with each other, whilst ignoring the protestations of religious crusader, Susie Monican and the domestic violence going on upstairs, their life is worlds away from that to which the footballers will soon be returning.  For they are all too briefly on home leave and will soon return to the horrors of the trenches.  The raising of the victory cup, the silver tassie of the title, and Harry’s loving embrace with his sweetheart, Jessie Taite, will soon be a sweet memory.

And then we have Act Two where everything changes …. completely.  And cohesion is lost.  We are now in a bombed out monastery near the frontline and the realism of Act One has become total surrealism.  Whilst Vicki Mortimer’s visual transition from tenement to battlefield is superbly done, with the design a total onslaught on the senses, the introduction of biblical chanting, music hall rhythms and angry satire left me completely unimpressed.  The pyrotechnics amaze, the explosions startle but the whole scene left me curiously detached.

Acts Three and Four revert to naturalism with touches of black humour and unbearable sadness.  Harry Heegan is now wheelchair bound and has lost his girlfriend to Barney, his friend who won the VC for saving his life.  Bible basher, Susie Monican has become a nurse and falls for the amorous charms of a hospital surgeon, whilst Teddy Foran, the abusive husband is now blind and totally reliant on his previously abused wife.  A little touch of surrealism rears its head in the final few minutes of the play but this time to devastating effect.  The setting is an Armistice Day dance where the women are seen dancing.  But their partners aren’t the actual returning soldiers, but dummies depicting them.  For me the most moving part of the whole play and wonderfully realised by the director, Howard Davies.

Whilst The Silver Tassie disappoints, the performances do not.  Worth a particular mention are Ronan Raftery as Harry, Aidan McArdle and Stephen Kennedy as the two old buffers and Judith Roddy as bible basher turned flirty nurse. 

There is humour to be found during the 2 hours 20 minutes but the bleakness overrules and left me strangely unmoved.