Carmen, Alhambra Theatre, Bradford (On behalf of The Reviews Hub)

This was originally reviewed for The Reviews Hub and the link can be found here.

(Contributed image accessed from http://www.thereviewshub.com)

Opera & Ballet International is taking Ellen Kent’s Carmen all over the country, including a stop at Bradford’s Alhambra Theatre.  Bizet’s tragic and convention-breaking opera stars an international cast of soloists and a critically acclaimed orchestra.

Carmen was adapted from a novel of the same time by Prosper Mérimée and also the poem, The Gypsies, by Aleksandr Pushkin.  It was first premiered in 1875 at Paris’ Opéra-Comique.  The opera has come a long way from the poor reception and controversy from its premiere then, to becoming one of the most popular operas ever staged.  Carmen is performed in many opera companies’ repertoires worldwide and has been adapted to a number of screen and stage productions.  The music from the opera is synonymous to many things to many people, especially the overture and musical numbers Habanera and the Toreador Song.

Carmen is set around 1820 near Seville in Southern Spain.   It concerns a gypsy whose beauty seduces a soldier to desperation and their encounter leads to tragic consequences.  The music is popularly emotive and the orchestration musically interprets each of the story’s characters backed by the lyrics sung.

Liza Kadelnik, a Romanian international mezzo-soprano, portrays a seductive, dramatic, manipulative and fiery Carmen.  Kadelnik excellently projects Carmen’s strong personality and passions to her suitors, Don José and Escamillo. One particular highlight is when she first enters the stage in Act one and flirts with the soldiers during the passionate Habanera.   Other enjoyable highlights are the powerful duet by Kadelnik and Vitallii Liskovetskiy (as Don José) singing Seguidilla in Act one and in Act two the Toreador Song by Iurie Gisca’s Escamillo.  The chorus supports the ensemble roles including the younger performers from Stagecoach Theatre Arts across West Yorkshire.

There are some lovely touches including a local rescue donkey and horse appearing on stage.  Ben, the donkey, makes a presence among villagers and smugglers in the first and third Acts while ABFilmhorses provides us with Caspian, a white stallion horse, whose dressage skills by the rider impresses the audience to the overture in the final Act.

The Moldavian orchestra, under the direction of Nicolae Dohotaru, plays the passionate and dramatic music with enthusiasm and to Henri Meilhac and Ludovic Halévy’s libretto.  There is a presence of tambourines and castanets in the music which reflects the Spanish culture throughout.  The opera is sung in French with English surtitles which allow the audience to appreciate Bizet’s masterpiece in the original language as well as understanding what is sung.

Carmen is a fiery and passionate four-act production, which makes for an enjoyable evening.

Macbeth by Leeds Arts Centre

Image credit:  Leeds Arts Centre

(Accessed from http://www.leedsartscentre.org.uk)

I recently saw Leeds Arts Centre's production of Macbeth.  This production coincides and commemorates Shakespeare's anniversary of his death (23rd April 1616).

Macbeth is one of Shakespaeare's well known tragedies.  At the time when it was written witchcraft and  regicide were punishable by death.  So Macbeth with these themes certainly have been appropriate.  Jealously, murder and revenge also certainly feature.

This production is certainly dark and contemporary.  Dimmed lighting is used throughout. The limited props used are suited to the tragedy and doesn't distract the audience - which excessive props can.  The costumes worn are modern and fits the staging ambience.

It is important to see the witches (performed by Ayshea Megyery, Margaret Savage and Paige Shaw) in position during some of the scenes.  It reminds one that witchcraft and witches were frightening issues when Shakespeare wrote Macbeth.

Lovely use of visuals particularly at the end of the second act, with the backdrop of trees representing the Dunsinane Woord where Macbeth fought his final combat against Macduff.

Excellent performance by the casts particularly performances from both Rick Brookes and Ruth Berkoff as the disturbed Macbeth and Lady Macbeth respectively.  All under the direction of Rich Francis.

Macbeth is certainly a favourite tragedy and each production I've seen makes me appreciate Shakespeare's mastery as a playwright with his writing style and the contextual themes considered at the time.  Certainly a lot to ponder about.  Another successful production by Leeds Arts Centre.

WiLd, Carriageworks Theatre, Leeds - 30th April 2016

Tutti Frutti is presenting Evan Placey's WiLD this season.  Placey, an award winning writer, teams up with Tutti Frutti and Nottingham University's CANDAL to create this play on stage
.

Rhys Warrington as Billy in WiLD

Photo credit: Brian Slater

This one actor and one live musician play opens up the world of a vulnerable and imaginative boy who is often misunderstood.  Children with ADHD (Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder) is often perceived as 'different', disruptive and naughty.  Billy, played by Rhys Warrington, invites the audience to see life from 'his eyes'.

The use of bees as illustrations for explaining the challenges Billy encounter 'Everything builds up like a swarm of bees' and 'words fly out and hover above me'.   He experiences exclusion and isolation along with being referred as third person in conversations between family, school and hospitals and expresses feeling of being like 'a bug in a jar with a sticker'.  When he has been given medication for his condition, he would describe the treatment for the 'bees in my brain'.

Rhys Warrington as Billy and Molly Lopresti

Photo credit: Brian Slater

The play shares his passions for keep bees physically as well as relating to them figuratively.  They are grounds for his imagination, energy and passions amidst his innocence.  It draws to how unique Billy is and how much he is misunderstood from this circles around him.

The performance is versatile and energetic.  An intimate staging with a climbing frame and a beehive, which are used effectively.

Warrington sells the show with maximum velocity, athleticism and energy with 'bees flying through the illustrations of a bees' honeycomb on a screen and illuminated 'bees' flying.  The smoke creates the poignancy of the issue with its soundscapes and music with chordal echoes of the vibraphone.  Courtesy of Molly Lopresti and Elliot Clark.

The narration is the boy's matter of fact of life and, from his point of view, he is unable to comprehend why people perceive him negatively and his family's frustration.

This excellent play, directed by Wendy Harris, hopefully will open people mind's about ADHD and seeing the young boy's point of view.  This should lead to a great understanding and awareness for people and for parents to be sought appropriate support.

Tutti Frutti will be touring regionally including York Theatre Royal during this year's Yorkshire Festival.

Brideshead Revisited, York Theatre Royal - 26th April 2016

It is lovely returning to York Theatre Royal for its first show, world première's production of Evelyn Waugh's Brideshead Revisited.  The theatre reopened recently following a 13 month redevelopment.  The work done certainly pays dividends with its well used space and lighting.  The front of house is extended and remodelled with a eclectic mix of past and present.  The audience can sit in and enjoy the redecorated and main audience.  Certainly worth the wait!

Brian Ferguson as Charles Ryer, Shuna Snow, 

Christopher Simpson as Sebastian Flyte 

and Nick Blakeley as Anthony Blanche

Photo Credit: Mark Douet

Brideshead Revisited is produced jointly by York Theatre Royal and English Touring Theatre.  Waugh's classic novel is adapted and re-imagined by Bryony Lavery and directed by Damian Cruden.  It is about Charles Ryder (Brian Ferguson) who returns to Brideshead in 1943 and remembers the memories of the summers there spent as a youth with a privileged but eccentric Flyte family.

The journey Ryder takes and narrates is a discovery of memories and things which the audience can relate to in their life journeys including love, society, family, religion, creativity and death and how travel and war crucially shaped Ryder for who he was and who he is now.  All set round the household and livelihood of Brideshead Castle.

The cast is led by Brian Ferguson and Christopher Simpson (as Sebastian Flyte) and they successfully ride on the journeys with excellent portrayals of the characters involved,

The simple staging is impressive - the visual backdrops create an atmosphere appropriate for the storytelling.  The bright and calm colours (and combined) lighting, courtesy of Richard G Jones, is stunning and with its breathtaking contrast with Sara Perk's dark staging.

Another excellent production at The York Theatre Royal in conjunction with English Touring Theatre.

Two, Carriageworks Theatre, Leeds

(Image accessed from http://www.bitemythumb.co.uk)

Jim Cartwright's play, Two, offers a realistic insight in a Northern working class town from the eyes of two joint pub owners.  Two actors, Sophia Becic and Neil Knipe, run the show from beginning to end.  They portray the lives of many who visit the pub including the widower, the 'fat bobble-hatted' crisps loving couple who take pleasure in the pub's TV and the confrontation between the 'other' woman and lover.

Atypical to social issues with its problems and the projection of human emotions, the small intimate stage space makes one feel one is an observer in the couple's pub and be part of the working class town's community.  Poetically humourous which is ultimately met with poignancy when a tragic event is shared later in the latter stages of the play - affecting the couple's present and future.

This 90 minute play, presented by Bite My Thumb, is familiarly enjoyable.  Applause is deservedly given to Becic and Knipe for their multiple roles performances and its smooth transitions. 

The Merry Wives (On behalf of North West End)

Image contributed

(Accessed from http://www.northwestend.co.uk)

This was originally reviewed for North West End and the link can be accessed here.

Critically acclaimed Northern Broadsides is reputed for classic productions where actors perform in their natural voices. This production, The Merry Wives, in collaboration with The New Vic Theatre is no exception.

Adapted from William Shakespeare’s comedy, The Merry Wives of Windsor, it is about Sir John Falstaff who pursues two women of considerable wealth, Mistresses Ford and Page. The pursuit leads to hilarious consequences which are unravelled throughout.

This production is no doubt entertaining albeit a slow start at the beginning until the mistresses decide to “entertain him with hope” and carries out the first trick on Falstaff.

The comedic nature of this play brings out to the maximum caricature, farce, irony, sarcasm and light-heartedness. The colourful language, the double meanings, sexual innuendoes and local references, such as the “fat woman from Ilkley” are relayed in a northern localised language which the audience is able to relate to.

It is certainly not a traditional setting but set in the 1920s and the light colours compliments the staging. The wooden trees on the set look out of place and perhaps topiary looking trees could have been naturally and suitably better. Admirable use of the sports equipment such as the tennis rackets and lacrosse sticks for weaponry and “Herne the Hunter” costume Falstaff (Barrie Rutter) wears in the final scene. The costumes the characters wear reminds one of the times of The Great Gatsby era and more so with the music and dancing at the end of the final scene.

Rutter, the director, plays the leading role, Falstaff, and isn’t at all intimidated by the tricks played on him and continues his determination to court both mistresses whose “attractions for my good attractions aside”.

The acting overall by the cast is excellent especially Nicola Sanderson and Beck Hindley as the two mistresses who plot to bring Falstaff down a peg or two. Neither of them are deterred nor flattered from his descriptions of them being “the rule of her husband purse” and “East and West Indies...made to their gold”.

The themes raised even if humorous are love and jealously. There are underlying themes of social class and financial status. This is particularly so when Page (played by Ray North) forbids his daughter, Anne Page (Played by Sarah Eve), to marry Master Fenton (played by Adam Barlow) who squandered his fortune. Not to mention the love chaos and suitors Anne is drawn to.

The Merry Wives, like Shakespeare’s comedies, “ends all well” with a song and dance, excellently performed by the cast and some doubling up as musicians. A light-hearted comedy for an enjoyable evening with plenty of laughter!

The Fruit Trilogy (On behalf of The Reviews Hub)

This review was originally written for The Public Reviews and the review can be accessed here.

Photo Credit: Alice the Camera

(Accessed from http://www.thereviewshub.com)

Eve Ensler’s The Fruit Trilogy consists of three plays, Avocado, Coconut and Pomegranate and is receiving its world premiere at the West Yorkshire Playhouse in conjunction with the Southbank Centre.  This follows on from the successful run of Avocado last year which formed part of the theatre’s Play Pie & Pint series.

Each play, amid different settings, explores honestly the widespread exploitation of women’s bodies and their struggle to claim them as their own.

The trilogy opens with Pomegranate, where two women who work in a brothel and are on “sale”.  They share a contrast of opinions between the impossible possibility and hope and the realistic reality of being figuratively dead.  Lily Arnold’s clever staging illustrates how both a typical day is seen and emotions being expressed by Amelia Donkor and Carla Harrison-Hodge as Items one and two placed on a shelf.  This poignantly indicates that their bodies are owned by others but themselves.

Next follows the one woman play, Avocado; Harrison-Hodge performs intensely and dramatically as the young woman in this condensed revival and echoes emotionally how trapped she is.  The “container” symbolises the existence of being a victim of forced slavery and prostitution.  Numerous innuendoes and metaphoric references to objects and scents, imply that she doesn’t have any control over her life whatsoever.   Peter Rice’s dramatic soundscapes accompany the woman’s narration and the stage is dark which reflects metaphorically the young woman’s plight.  There is some lighting on stage, albeit very restricted.  Lizzie Powell’s lighting cleverly interprets the young woman’s escape and her yearning to be free.

Finally, Coconut intimately explores, from a mystical experience in the bathroom, how a woman is finally connected to something she never owned.  Suspense, atmospheric soundscapes and candles intimately build up the woman’s experience; Donkor, playing the woman, begins by “opening a portal” to her foot where she applies coconut oil and shares her body experiences literally and figuratively.  She recalls how her body was a commodity to others and now wants to feel her own flesh from “dancing in the fire” and being the “messenger of own deliverance” from softness, moisture to light.

This trilogy certainly raises awareness and gives voices to many women who are enslaved through forced servitude, human trafficking and prostitution.  This 70 minute well presented condensed play certainly gives a lot of food (fruit) for thought, and how sad that these issues are at the forefront of the headlines which today affect many ordinary women.