Tag Archives: Site-specific Theatre

“The Drowned Man: A Hollywood Fable” at the Temple Studios

When it comes to ‘immersive’ theatre, Punchdrunk are at the top of the list and their return to London with The Drowned Man: A Hollywood Fable is a hot contender for theatrical event of the year. Amazingly there are still some tickets left for August, so stop reading this, now, and book them.

Creating ‘The Temple Film Studios’, the production is unprecedented in its size. The scale, breathtakingly ambitious, is part of the point. As you venture around unaccompanied, ostensibly a guest at a wrap party waiting for filming to finish, you see behind the scenes and inside the minds of its inhabitants. There are spooky rooms of special effects and shrines to movie stardom, film sets and multiple characters you can choose to follow or ignore. You’re given a clue that the overriding story line follows two lovers, with infidelity driving one of them insane. You might see William killing Mary. Or vice versa. But there’s more going on here – an exploration of fantasies and fears dripping with a drug-induced hedonism. Mind-blowing stuff.

A whole movie-set town is recreated, along with a saloon bar and a cabaret room, a Twin Peaks style ball room and offices, oh, and a forest. Dancing on top of caravans? No problem. Or you might be drawn into a dressing room to watch one of the numerous cast prepare or perform some opaque ritual. But listing the sights seems to miss the point – the project is so mammoth selectivity is forced upon you and you come to live in this world rather than watch it. That each visitors experience will be unique is what makes it so especially theatrical.

Back to size again. It’s all a little overwhelming and the danger the whole thing will implode in on itself is clear. It’s no small achievement that the choreography, from Maxine Doyle, who also directed the show along with Felix Barrett, manages to makes a stand. There are times, in the dark, with the music very loud, you wonder where the action is and the sets, with Barrett working alongside Livi Vaughan and Beatrice Minns, are so crammed with detail you approach sensory overload – they even smell fantastic.

The masks the audience wear don’t make it comfortable (this seems a game for a young crowd all around) but they manage to claim back a strange intimacy for the show. They might also enable its sexiness; the plays on voyeurism are skilful and the casts’ interactions with the crowd bold. It’s a mixture of eroticism and death with a meta-text concerning the creation of our deep and dark desires that is potent. For atmosphere The Drowned Man surely can’t be beaten. It’s tempting to suggest it marks an apogee for this form of theatre that must not be missed.

Until 6 July 2014

www.punchdrunk.com

Written 8 July 2013 for The London Magazine

“Julius Caesar” at St Paul’s Church, Covent Garden

For their fifth year of summer residence at St Paul’s Covent Garden, appropriately enough ‘The Actors’ Church’, Iris Theatre presents Julius Caesar. Shakespeare’s political thriller is given a contemporary touch, these Romans are riot police rather than Republicans, but the exciting thing is the collusion of two theatrical treats – outdoor theatre and a promenade performance – that make a winning combination.

Unlike some open-air venues, St Paul’s Church is surprisingly quiet, the acoustics are lovely, so it seems a shame that the acting is often too declamatory. But there are fine performances here: from Matthew Mellalieu, whose Tudor-inspired Caesar is a joy to watch (anyone looking for a Henry ?), Daniel Hanna’s streetwise Casca and Matt Wilman’s virile Mark Antony. Not forgetting Laura Wickham who has a busy night doubling up as two wives and also playing Cinna the Poet – acquitting herself admirably in all three parts.

This is a hard-working show all round. With only seven in the cast there are occasions when members of the audience take on non-speaking parts and all of us are cast as the Roman “rabble”. I am no fan of audience participation but can’t remember seeing it done this well before; director Daniel Winder shows intelligent restraint, creating complicity as we move around to characters’ homes or the steps of the senate.

Taking you through the church’s charming gardens proves ambitious and moving the audience around takes time, this short Shakespeare becomes a long evening, but it’s worth every minute. While the sound design from Filipe Gomes is effective, the actual music accompanying the show is its biggest problem, an inappropriate mismatch of styles, cinematic in inspiration and far too intrusive. It’s a rare bum note in this fine production. The intimacy created is remarkable – at times it’s difficult to work out how big the audience is – and the moments we enter the church itself, with scenes aided by Stephanie Bradbury’s movement direction and Benjamin Polya’s lighting, are coups de theatre you won’t forget in a hurry.

Until 26 July 2013

www.iristheatre.com

Photo by Phil Miler

Written 2 July 2013 for The London Magazine

“The Last Days of Judas Iscariot” at St Leonard’s Church

Director and producer Antony Law has achieved the not inconsiderable coup of staging his latest production in St Leonard’s Church in Shoreditch. It’s a superb location that’s sure to appeal to adventurous theatregoers. Also commendable is Law’s taste in plays. A remarkable work by Stephen Adly Guirgis, The Last Days of Judas Iscariot is a surreal imagining of a courtroom trial that aims to free Judas from hell.

Guirgis’ text rockets back and forth through history calling to the stand not just biblical figures but also Sigmund Freud and Mother Teresa. Sadly, Law’s direction doesn’t quite match the pace, so the production lacks the bravura appeal that the writing demands. More vitally, The Last Days of Judas Iscariot should be bitingly funny. Maybe the church atmosphere stifles the laughs, but the humour just doesn’t come through.

The production is ably guided by the prosecuting and defence councils, played with humour and skill by Michael Aguilo and Laurence Bouvard. Unfortunately, the rest of the casting is uneven. For all the strength of the play, it feels as if Guirgis has written devices rather than developed characters, and short scenes on the witness stand that should excite are played too long.

A notable exception is Shereen Russell who plays Saint Monica with a provocative streetwise style – her scene is one of the moments in the production that really works. And St Leonard’s fantastic acoustics are used to such great effect that, despite its flaws, the opportunity Law has provided for seeing this fantastic work is worth taking advantage of.

Until 19 May 2013

Photo by Sheila Burnett

Written 22 April 2013 for The London Magazine

“Above and Beyond”at the Corinthia Hotel

Although it’s a tough job, theatre critics should aim for some semblance of objectivity when they write. That makes Above and Beyond, currently playing at the Corinthia Hotel, difficult to deal with. Billed as “one-on-one immersive theatre” the thrill is that each audience member can make of it what he or she wills. Participation, which many, including reviewers, dread, plays a big part. It’s an exciting adventure, best commended by saying that at the end it’s something you’ll want everyone to do.

When it comes to the ‘doing’, Above and Beyond is a tremendous achievement on the part of its cast and apparently super-human director Mimi Poskitt. After being escorted to the starting point in the lobby, you launch on a solo journey in and outside the hotel, up and downstairs, meeting all kind of characters. Of course your every move is plotted to perfection and the mechanics of the operation are almost distractingly smooth – you can’t help looking out for other participants and maybe start to feel a little paranoid that everyone you see is a member of the cast. The plethora of details is delightful and the execution faultless. And give yourself some credit – interacting with the cast like this, no matter how skilfully encouraged, is unusual and engrossing.

Such is the level of complicity established, I confess my allegiances lie with the team behind the show, the Corinthia’s ‘Artists in Residence’, Look Left Look Right. There’s a charge from the unexpected that they utilise so any plot spoilers would be unfair to this hard working crew. Suffice to say, don’t expect a narrative as such, rather of collection of stories, written by Morgan Lloyd Malcolm and Katie Lyons, inspired by the hotel, its staff and the international elite who stay in a place like this.

The scenes designed to provoke sentiment and nostalgia, with a nod to the location’s history, worked less well – for me anyway – but the majority of Above and Beyond has a sense of fun, a welcome change from much theatre in this format, and an intelligent wit that recognizes the bizarre situations. This is one of the funniest nights I’ve had in ages – I couldn’t stop laughing in several scenes. And a couple of teasers: expect a real giggle in the spa and check your face for make-up before you leave.

Lloyd Malcolm and Lyons have an impressive sense of independence despite the overwhelming generosity of the hotel. Going behind the scenes could prove awkward and a marketing seminar you are invited to join is close-to-the-bone funny. But the Corinthia is its own advertisement, with interiors gorgeous enough to awe a humble theatre critic and a penthouse suite I felt privileged to visit. The real members of the hotel staff deserve credit as well since the experiment must make more work for them. Let’s hope they get a chance to experience some of the magic themselves.

Until 14 April 2013

Written 20 March 2013 for The London Magazine

“In The Beginning Was The End” at Somerset House

dreamthinkspeak is an internationally renowned theatre company that specialises in site-specific promenade works. Conceived and directed by Tristan Sharps, its latest piece, In The Beginning Was The End, takes over the basement of Somerset House and parts of King’s College London, ambitiously and occasionally wittily transforming them to present a dystopian vision of science and materialism. The show’s scale may be impressive, but it struggles to live up to the ideas it tries to present.

Although the Bible is name checked, In The Beginning Was The End takes its inspiration primarily from the work of a visual artist – Leonardo da Vinci no less. I confess I’m not confident I’d have worked this out without some prior knowledge and that can’t be good thing. It’s great fun to wander around the building admiring what they have done with it, and there’s a thrill about attending some parts of the performance on your own (if you get lucky), but the level of engagement theatre of this kind should generate isn’t reached, and that’s a woefully missed opportunity.

The dangers of technology and big business are all too clear: the initial scene forces small groups of audience members to evacuate a meeting room via a laboratory. You then join an ‘open day’ for the company Fusion International keen to present its new technology. These products, presented by a polyglot cast, are witty and the numerous actors deal with close audience contact well. But as the machines go wrong, and the company culture (and its staff) are driven by muzak and customer complaints to insanity and stripping, it all becomes a little obvious.

There’s a great deal of video work in the piece: clever silent films full of conversations you aren’t privy to that add to the paranoia with their reflexivity. But neither they, nor the increasingly derelict displays of Fusion International’s Tension Negation Technology, really add much menace or atmosphere. The ideas behind the piece are predictable, with a lazy left-wing sensibility and generic sci-fi approach. The TNT on offer doesn’t make much of an explosion.

Until 30 March 2013

www.dreamthinkspeak.com

Photo by Jim Stephenson

Written 7 February 2013 for The London Magazine

“The Hotel Plays” at the Grange Holborn Hotel

Tennessee Williams spent so much of his later life living in and writing about hotels that staging his plays in one seems so obvious, so very neat, that it’s instantly appealing. Site-specific theatre has to be special stuff to excite, and this thrilling trilogy of short works does just that at the Grange Holborn Hotel.

The Hotel PlaysGreen Eyes, The Travelling Companion and Sunburst – afford glimpses into tawdry, lonely lives: a young couple arguing on their honeymoon, an ageing homosexual writer with his unwilling escort, and an elderly lady held hostage in her room by staff turned ineffectual thieves. Being late works by Williams, they are peopled by extreme characters and bold to the point of being blunt.

crop-6236_3
Clare Latham and Matt Milne

These are difficult roles to pull off (and unfortunately the accents prove too much of a challenge) but all the cast manage to establish their characters with commendable speed. John Guerrasio does particularly well as what is surely a merciless self-portrait by Williams – a “much too much” homosexual writer with a camp performance that has an eye on the stereotype the author must have seen himself becoming. His co-star, Laurence Dobiesz, also impresses as a fragile hustler who becomes intoxicated during the short duration of the play. But the best and bravest performances come in the first work, with Clare Latham and Matt Milne playing newlyweds acting out trauma with a sado-masochistic twist.

The Grange Holborn Hotel may not be the most charismatic property, but all credit to its farsighted management for cooperating with the Defibrillator Theatre Company. Staging the plays in the hotel adds immeasurably to them. Performed in rotation, you can hear the arguments from one as you sit in the room above watching another, with careful supervision from a trio of directors (James Hillier, Anthony Banks and Robert Hastie) who embrace the claustrophobia of the setting. This evening of morbidly powerful vignettes is captivating theatre – incredibly intimate and excruciatingly voyeuristic.

Until 27 October 2012

Photo by Simon Annand

Written 9 October 2012 for The London Magazine

“Anastasia” at Pushkin House

When the Bolsheviks massacred the Tsar and his family, they knew that any trace of the corpses would cause uproar. They took dramatic measures – not just burning the bodies but covering them in acid. Therefore, when someone claiming to be Anastasia, one of the Tsar’s daughters, is presented to the world as a survivor it captivates imaginations worldwide. Marcelle Maurette’s play uses all the dramatic potential of the tale, presenting a moving human drama.

The play begins as a thriller, with conspirators plotting to present an unknown girl as the Princess. We see her cruel recruitment and then trial by interview as various members of the Russian émigré community challenge her identity.

Director and adapter Kate Sellers builds upon Maurette’s 1950s play in a satisfying manner by highlighting the character of Andrews Byron’s imposing Bounin, a Mephistophelean figure, full of menace. The fiction Bounin constructs, providing, “new manners, new clothes, new memories” make him a formidable impresario.

However, the triumph of the show is the role and performance of The Girl said to be Anastasia. Alice Bird takes the transformation from pauper to princess in her stride. The real achievement is presenting such an unstable enigma. The trauma experienced and the power of the dreams Anastasia provokes are dangerous to all. And there’s a twist you won’t see coming.

Sellers secures fine performances from her large cast and utilises them in tableaux that evoke harrowing scenes of murder. They are just a memory, part of the real Anastasia’s story, but seem so real to the “small world” of the Russians in exile. The production benefits greatly from its location: Pushkin House, a Russian cultural institute based in a beautiful townhouse in the elegant Bloomsbury Square, that is a perfect match for this sophisticated and intelligent play.

Until 21 April 2012

www.pushkinhouse.org

Photo by Jack Ladenburg

Written 3 April 2012 for The London Magazine

“The Sea Plays” at the Old Vic Tunnels

Filing through the Old Vic Tunnels to your seat for The Sea Plays you pass a tableau of a ship’s boiler room. The scene has an energy that continues into the first thing we see on stage – a storm at sea with the crew struggling against the elements. It’s an exciting piece of theatre that stirs the blood.

Unfortunately, matters go downhill as soon as The Sea Plays properly start. Eugene O’Neill’s three sketches show an injured crewman facing his death, a sailor subjected to the espionage-fuelled paranoia of his shipmates and finally a tavern scene with a criminal landlord exploiting those just off the boat. It’s honest of director Kenneth Hoyt not to make more of these pieces than they deserve; they are short and sharp but have little point. Critics often like brevity, but most audience members should beware if they are in search of a satisfyingly full night of theatre.

The cast sometimes struggle with roles only outlined and seldom developed. Matthew Trevannion gets the best bargain, in all three plays playing a character named Driscoll, a fiery Irishman he portrays with appropriate vigour. There are also good performances from Raymond M Sage and Amanda Boxer as a sailor with a dream and an elderly prostitute who helps swindle him. Van Santvoord’s set and Alex Baranowski’s music and sound design cleverly use the space of the tunnels, but creating these fascinating male-dominated environments is a tough ask and the swaggering machismo of the cast often falls short.

The Sea Plays are interesting for O’Neill fans but they are difficult to be passionate about. The scenarios are powerful enough and Hoyt’s direction taut and strong – he is clearly convinced of the trilogy’s power. But these vignettes are so short, and the writing often surprisingly melodramatic, despite O’Neill’s naturalist credentials, that the evening is more a matter of squalls than storms.

Until 18 February 2012

Written 27 January 2012 for The London Magazine

“The New World Order” at Shoreditch Town Hall

Promenade theatre has been fashionable for several years now. Theatre practitioners often want us to leave our comfy auditoriums and test an audience’s dedication by taking it to new and often less salubrious locations. It’s best to be agnostic about the practice but Hydrocracker has a production of five short Harold Pinter plays, presented as The New World Order, which is worth going a long way for.

Certainly, at least as far as Shoreditch Town Hall. After being frisked and given identity cards, the audience is taken to meeting rooms and then travels down to the building’s scruffy basement, shovelling around its seemingly labyrinthine rooms. The constant theme is Pinter’s nightmarish vision of a state slipping into totalitarianism. The short plays unfold with increasing violence and fit well with the promenade format, but that is the only comfortable thing about the evening – this is powerful political theatre.

Whether The New World Order is more forceful because of this format is an open question. Director Ellie Jones does a superb job: not only in marshalling the audience (although it must help to have a cast playing soldiers who can shout at people) but also in maintaining tension, atmosphere and linking the scenes. Nonetheless, the complicity with the soldiers that is hinted at can’t really grow. You are given the chance to try and help one of those held prisoner but few will, not because they are unfeeling, but for fear of disrupting the performance. Putting actors into the audience never really works – you can sense them a mile off! And while the often incredibly close proximity to the action is intense, it can be intimidating which, sadly, stifles Pinter’s savage humour.

Jones’ direction is impressive because she appreciates the urgency of Pinter’s late political writing. As a recent production at The Print Room demonstrated, these plays are strong enough to be performed with minimal sets, and Jones anchors her work in the script, bringing out a stringent performance from Hugh Ross, who plays the terrifying Minister of Cultural Integrity, and a small but remarkable cameo from Jane Wood. And Jones has a final trick up her sleeve: as one of the victims is released, the audience follows him into the night. This denies the cast its well-deserved applause, yet provokes thought on the long journey home.

Until 11 December 2011

www.barbican.org.uk

Photo by Matthew Andrews

Written 21 November 2011 for The London Magazine

“Beautiful Burnout” at York Hall

Beautiful Burnout was inspired by a brief trip to a boxing gym. Entranced by the experience, its co-directors, Scott Graham and Steven Hoggett, set about examining the pugilistic sport and have created an immersive and powerful theatrical experience.

Touring to the York Hall in Bethnal Green, they have found a great venue for their highly theatrical production, they are perfectly at home in this well known boxing venue.

The text, written by Bryony Lavery, is unfortunately thin. Interactions between the trainee boxers, and their formidable coach, are underexplored and the play ends at its most interesting point. Lavery struggles to convince regarding the world of “freely shared opinions and self-promotion” that she has researched. Only the older characters truly convince. Ewan Stewart plays the trainer with great presence and Lorraine M McIntosh almost steals the show as one of the boxers’ mothers.

But when the boxers actually train and fight, you really want to go the full 12 rounds with them. A period of extensive training as part of rehearsals has left the cast glowing as they perform Graham and Hoggett’s intense choreography.

Unlike often superfluous instances of technology in the theatre, Ian William Galloway’s video design adds greatly to the drama. The combination of film and movement is fascinating, supporting tension and emphasising a beauty that can be seen in the sport. While Beautiful Burnout doesn’t quite achieve the complexity it aspires to, it contains some knockout moments of theatricality.

Until 2 October 2010

Beautiful Burnout at York Hall is presented by Frantic Assembly and the National Theatre of Scotland in association with the Barbican
www.franticassembly.co.uk

Photo by Gavin Evans

Written 17 September 2010 for The London Magazine