Archive for July, 2009

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Arts Council Theatre Assessment 2009

In theatre on July 30, 2009 at 1:52 pm
The Arts Council has published its Theatre Assessment for 2009, which promises an “up to date picture of theatre in England” and examines whether the extra £25 million invested since 2003 has been worthwhile. You can read the whole thing here. Key points are:

  • Generally good news. Audience levels flat. Number of productions up. Access up. Street arts massively up.
  • A big slap down for those theatres which are “playing it safe, in spite of a period of relative prosperity”. Learn from the success of others, apparently. You have been warned. See page 12.
  • “Digital opportunity” is a big deal for the Arts Council. So much so that it is a “development priority”. Wow. Apparantly “few theatre organizations are yet making full and effective use of technological developments”. Presumably this doesn’t apply to NT Live and Pilot Theatre who clearly are total rock stars when it comes to this sort of thing.
  • Good news for new writing: “the range of regularly funded organisations producing and presenting new work increased; changes in artistic leadership at London venues have meant that new writing was no longer necessarily confinded to new writing houses”. See page 74.
  • And some bad news for writers: “Emerged” and “mid career” writers are suffering from more collaborative processes and they are more dependent than ever on the influence of directors and dramaturges (and I thought those didn’t exist any more). Some carping about how “the focus on the new has jeopardised the careers of those who are no longer new”. See page 76.
  • The number of volunteers at the regularly funded theatre organisations has almost doubled since 2001/2. See page 65.
  • The number of adults attending arts events in England has risen from 24.4% in 2001/2 to 30.7% in 2005/6. While the latter statistic is still depressingly small (especially since this includes people who attend less than once a year) it’s a truly staggering rise. Unfortunately it’s difficult to get too excited, since even the authors seem to be confused as to their sources: (“Source: BMRM-Target Group Index NOTE: should this be BMRB, ie British Market Research Bureau?”) See page 59
  • Surprisingly, there are apparently only two kinds of audiences in London: “the traditional theatre audience that is loyal to its local venue, and a younger Black and minority ethnic audience that will travel across the city.” See page 77.

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Every Good Boy Deserves Favour returns to the National in 2010

In london, preview, theatre on July 29, 2009 at 4:59 am

The superb Stoppard/Previn collaboration Every Good Boy Deserves Favour is slated to return to the National in 2010. The 2009 production, directed by Felix “Punchdrunk” Barrett, combined acting, music and dance in an utterly compelling and convincing way, and was one of the highlights of 2009.

No word on whether the 2010 production is going to be with the same cast, or whether it’s going to be a new production, but definitely one to add to your list for January 2010: tickets on sale now.

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Bite09 at the Barbican

In london, preview, theatre on July 12, 2009 at 11:23 am

The new season at the Barbican looks very, very exciting indeed. Quite serious. And certainly not for the faint hearted. Probably best to avoid for first dates.

Most exciting for my money is Roman Tragedies, a six hour canter through Coriolanus, Julius Caesar and Antony and Cleoptra back to back. Utilising film and live television, the audience is invited to view the action close up, moving between the auditorium and the stage. In Dutch with English surtitles. £27.50 and unreserved seating.

by The TEAM and National Theatre of Scotland promises a requiem for modern America. Developed at BAC, this looks well worth a look, despite a slightly cringe-worth YouTube clip. £15.

The Farenheit Twins is a stage adaptation of a beautiful short story by Michel Faber. Two twins living in an Arctic science station have their lives turned upside down by their mother’s illness. £15.

Also worth a look, if only to see if it can match its terribly serious PR write up, is Gospels of Childhood by Polish outfit Teatr ZAR: a three-part ritualistic lamentation on birth, death, pleasure and pain told through song, chanting and movement drawing on sources as diverse as little known apocryphal gospels, the polyphonic singing tradition of Georgia, Bulgaria and Greece, the music of Corsica, Icelandic and Chechen songs, the Polish romantic poet Juliusz Slowacki and Byzantine and Sardinian Paschal hymns. Performed in three parts at two different venues, Teatr ZAR (who take their name from two thousand year old funeral songs performed by inhabitants of remote mountain villages of Caucasus) will create theatre out of the spirit of music and show audiences that theatre does not only pertain to the Greek ‘thea’ (seeing, in case you wondered) but that it’s something that above all should be heard. By the way, in case it didn’t sound intellectual enough for you, much of this work is informed by extensive research into ancient religious music during annual investigative expeditions to Georgia in the years 1999-2003.

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Edinburgh Fringe Picks – Part the Second

In comedy, edinburgh, preview on July 12, 2009 at 3:09 am

The number of theatre shows has stayed broadly flat since last year’s fringe, but there’s once again been a sharp increase in the number of comics, with a staggering 775 acts performing this year. My thoughts below.

Rhod Gilbert at Pleasance Courtyard

The superbly funny Welshman is making the transition to the big time at the moment – slightly awkwardly, seeming a bit much for TV and repeating material from 2007 which feels a wee bit stale. But he’s back at the Fringe this year, back on [adopted] home turf and with an all new show. Hard to bet against, and one not to miss.

All his Saturday shows at The Pleasance are sold out, save for one ticket on the 28th! Sadly I wouldn’t be forgiven if I went alone, but if you don’t any friends then at least go along solo and have a laugh about it.

Update: Most of Rhod’s shows are now sold out, but there’s a new batch of tickets available for two late shows on the last two Saturdays of the festival. Get ‘em while they’re hot.


Reginald D Hunter at Udderbelly’s Pasture

Now officially big time (Have I Got News For You and everything) RDH is a sure fire bet for any Fringe visit. Ever since he wowed the world (and shocked London Underground) back in 2006 with Price and Prejudice and Niggas, he’s always been top of any list of comics to guarantee a funny evening.

He’s back at the Fringe in 2009, with The Only Apple in the Garden of Eden and Niggas (spot a theme?). Tickets are still available at edfringe.com or from the Pleasance.


WitTank at Just the Tonic @ The Caves

University revue shows tend to have a delicate nature about them, like a fine wine. Groups can be superb for a couple of years while a few talented undergraduates pass through, before disappearing from view when the key members move on, or fall out, or fail to nurture the right talent below them. The Durham Revue were on undeniable top form between 2002 and 2004. The Leeds Revue had a glorious renaissance around 2005 or so. The Cambridge Footlights are generally pretty solid most of the time but their best recent vintage was 2002 and 2003. Oxford have been a bit hit-and-miss for the last few years, so they’re probably due a bounce back soon.

All are worth a look in, but one not to miss is WitTank. Hailing from Durham, the group was founded a few years ago as a response to the official revue which had become a little stale and complacent following a very successful run. Difficult to tell how any of them will perform in any given year, but this lot are probably reaching perfect drinking age right now.

Also recommended: Cambridge Footlights, Durham Revue, Oxford Revue.


Nick Mohammed at Pleasance Courtyard

You won’t see him on Live at the Apollo, so all the more reason to put this show into your Edinburgh calendar. Very funny bloke, has been consistently for years. Not much more to say.

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Edinburgh Fringe Picks – Part the First

In edinburgh, preview, theatre on July 6, 2009 at 9:23 am

The Fringe. Where to start? 2098 shows, every young theatre company and comic in the country if not the world, descending on the Forth for an entire month, a festival of theatre and music and comedy and drunkenness.

What to pick? A programme the size of a phone book, and some gems hiding in there, surely.

It’s a difficult game, but half the fun is exploring, seeing dross you thought would be good and finding the unexpected gem that you were conned into seeing by an overenthusiastic flyerer on the Royal Mile. So by all means read the various critical suggestions of top picks for the Fringe (including mine, presented below strictly sans taste, you understand) but whatever you do, head to the Frozen North, enjoy the beer and enthusiasm and nutters and see some theatre.

The Assassination of Paris Hilton at Assembly @ George Street
Site specific (ladies room of a Hollywood nightclub, if we’re being really specific) new play exploring female relationships and celebrity. Any theatre company claiming that “if Andy Warhol and William Shakespeare got married and adopted a third-world child, we would be that child” has to be worth a look.

Kursk at University of Edinburgh Drill Hall
If you missed it at the Young Vic in London, then don’t miss possibly the best play ever written about a post cold-war submarine disaster.

Faust in the Box at Underbelly
Goethe. Pop music. Hand puppets. Now if that’s not fringe, I don’t know what is.

Don Juan in Soho at C Cubed
Patrick Maber’s version of Moliere. First presented at the Donmar in ’06.

The Critic at C
R.B. Sheridan’s 1779 restoration comedy, arguably the first play to seriously focus on the impact of blogs and twitter on the London theatre scene.

Coffee at Pleasance Courtyard
New play from Glyn Cannon, Fringe First winner for 2004’s modern take on Antigone, Gone.

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Theatre, Live

In theatre on July 5, 2009 at 3:42 pm

NT Live, the new access project from the National Theatre, has been a recognized success. Even the critical press seemed to like it, although quite what “multi-video cameras” are remains a mystery to me at least. Broadcasting live performances to screens is nothing new: the ROH’s BP Summer Screens project is a similar idea, and the Met Opera in New York have been broadcasting to cinemas around the world in High Definition for a number of years, but the project from the NT is the first time that drama has had this level of exposure and access in the UK.

What the success of the NT’s project shows is that the theatre is more than a familiar institution: the National does a superb job of acting as a civic space but in some senses this can seem to detract from the performance itself. Does the audience come because they want to see the play or because the whole experience is a nice way to spend a Saturday night, with the play a pleasant addition to the bookshop and the reasonably prices bars and the live music and the photographic exhibitions and the platform speakers? By stripping this away and showing the same performance in venues entirely devoid of these peripheries, the performance becomes in some way even more pure than when it is seen at the theatre itself. Ensuring access for all to quality theatre is why we need a national theatre, and NT Live is a superb part of this programme.

Going arguably one better than the NT are Pilot Theatre based in York. Last weekend they became pioneers when they broadcast their production, Catcher in Their Eye live to the internet, free to all. This is an inspiring experiment in access and one which seems to have been a resounding success: Pilot Theatre plan to stream all their future productions in the same way.

This medium of live broadcast retains everything superb about live theatre (in a way that recording productions for film or television, such as the RSC are to do with Hamlet – interesting as that project is in itself – does not): the spontaneity, the potential for imperfections, the character, tenor and feeling of a given performance and the shared group experience. Very exciting.