Theatre

Dear Billy

18/05/23

Traverse Theatre, Edinburgh

Gary McNair’s Dear Billy is a charming and affectionate love letter to the much adored comedian/musician, Billy Connolly. McNair is a self-confessed fan – and, it must be said, that there’s something about his looks and general demeanour that chime with The Big Yin’s own personality. But rest assured, this isn’t some kind of a tribute act.

Instead, McNair has wandered the highways and byways of Scotland, talking to Connolly’s fans – and, over ninety minutes, he recounts the various things they’ve said about the man they (mostly) idolise, assuming their voices and mannerisms to comic effect. If this sounds like an unpromising premise, don’t be fooled. Mostly because of McNair’s consummate skills as a raconteur, I find myself laughing pretty much throughout the proceedings.

He’s joined onstage by musicians Simon Liddell and Jill O’ Sullivan (the latter occasionally given the opportunity to sing some of her own songs in a truly astonishing voice) and it’s fun to note the struggles they have to keep straight faces as McNair lets rip. But this is essentially a showcase for his comic skills, as he strides fearlessly back and forth between four microphones, inhabiting a whole range of personae, from grandmothers to dockers, with testimonies that range from the heartrending to the hilarious.

There may not be an awful lot of substance here, but it’s certainly an entertaining show. McNair references many of Connolly’s most iconic routines, so fans of the Big Yin in particular, will have a field day. But it’s worth saying that you don’t have to be a fan in order to enjoy what’s on offer.

Anyone looking for a much-needed giggle will find what they’re looking for right here.

4 stars

Philip Caveney

Who Killed My Father

11/05/23

Traverse Theatre, Edinburgh

Who Killed My Father is based on Édouard Louis’s 2018 autobiographical novel, Qui a tué mon père. Adapted and directed by Nora Wardell, it’s an eviscerating piece. Part polemic, part memoir, this monologue is presented as an address to Édouard (Michael Marcus)’s invisible father, thus casting the audience in the paternal role. It’s an interesting conceit.

Édouard’s father is disabled, thanks to his (literally) back-breaking work in a factory. But Édouard’s relationship with his dad is complicated: although he feels sympathy for the dependent old man he has become, he remains angry with the alcoholic homophobe, who made growing up gay in their small French village so very difficult. Still, now that he is an adult, Édouard is able to take a step back, and finally recognise the systemic inequalities that have shaped his father’s destiny, and to extrapolate from that the myriad ways in which so many marginalised people’s lives are damaged by political figures, uncaring and oblivious to the consequences of their acts. This play – where he denunciates these figures – is Édouard’s revenge.

It’s a compelling idea, but – for me – it doesn’t quite come off. For starters, there’s nothing to indicate that we’re in France until the very end, when a number of French politicians are named and shamed. This should be a powerful moment, but instead it momentarily confuses me, so that I’m mentally relocating the story rather than focusing on the point being made. In addition, the stage is cluttered with a vast array of props that just aren’t used, including a fabulously complex Scalextric. (I only had the figure-eight version when I was young; this one is the stuff of dreams, so it’s particularly frustrating that it’s given such prominence but never called into play.)

In the end, the message feels a little muddled, lost in a scattershot of anecdotes and directorial flourishes.

2.8 stars

Susan Singfield

Good: NT Live

28/04/23

Cameo Cinema, Edinburgh

We miss the first screening of Good due to health issues and are resigned to our fate, but happily The Cameo Cinema offers this encore screening just as we’re scratching our heads and wondering what we should see tonight.

Written by the comparatively little known C P Taylor (who tragically died soon after Good had its London premiere in 1981) this excoriating piece of theatre feels weirdly askew from the opening scene. Why has set designer, Vicki Mortimer opted to use so little of the Harold Pinter Theatre’s stage, confining the action to a narrow, wedge shaped, performance space, which only really opens up at the play’s startling conclusion?

Well, it’s this confined quality which emphasises the chilling claustrophobia of the piece, the story of a man consumed by his own hubris and his willingness to repeatedly spin his own heinous crimes as the actions of a ‘good’ person.

The man in question is Halder (David Tennant), a German literary professor whose published works catch the eyes of important people in the rising Nazi party, and who is invited to join their swelling ranks. But there’s an obvious problem with this suggestion: Halder’s best friend, psychiatrist Maurice (Elliot Levey), is Jewish and doesn’t see why he should be expected to hide the fact. Meanwhile, Halder is struggling to maintain a marriage to his hapless wife, Helen (Sharon Small), whilst looking after his mother, who is stricken by dementia – and he’s also starting an affair with one of his students, Anne. How is he going to square all these issues to his own satisfaction whilst proudly taking his place in the ranks of the SS? And at what point will he decide that he’s being asked to go too far?

Tennant, making his long awaited return to the West End, is incredibly assured in the complex role of Halder, switching from slyly funny to chillingly mercenary with aplomb. At one point, he even sings and dances with absolute authority, personifying the charmer with a steely inner self. Levy too is excellent, both as Maurice and in the other roles he inhabit, but for me it’s Small who really commands the stage, flicking effortlessly between her three female characters – and the persona of an alpha male SS commandant – simply by changing her voice and her posture. It’s a superbly nuanced performance that ensures I’m always fully aware of who she is embodying at any given moment.

Essentially a three-hander (although the play does feature other performers in its final stages), Good is an ambitious and original piece of theatre that makes me wonder what Taylor might have achieved if only he’d lived longer.

4 stars

Philip Caveney

The Shawshank Redemption

26/04/23

Festival Theatre, Edinburgh

It’s been a long journey for The Shawshank Redemption. Stephen King’s novella, first published in his Different Seasons collection in 1982 was adapted into a feature film in 1994. Nominated for a clutch of Oscars (none of which it won), the film became a slow burner and has often featured on critics’ ‘best of’ lists. This adaptation, by comedians Owen O’ Neill and Dave Johns, premiered at the Gaiety Theatre, Dublin in 2009, and then reappeared in Edinburgh in 2013 (where coincidentally, we saw it on one of our first forays to the Fringe). Now, in a significantly rewritten version, it lands at the Festival Theatre.

It’s the tough and relentless tale of Andy Dufresne (Jo Absolom), who – wrongly accused of murdering his wife and her lover – finds himself incarcerated in the titular prison in the 1950s. Quiet and unassuming, Andy is repeatedly bullied (and even sexually abused) by a couple of hard cases he’s obliged to share space with. But he makes one real friend in the prison, Ellis ‘Red’ Redding (Ben Onwukwe), the Shawshank’s resident fixer. You need something bringing in, something that’s not officially available? Red’s the guy who can get it for you… at a price.

As the years slip inexorably by, the timescale effortlessly enforced by a series of popular songs from the period, Andy keeps his head down, doing his time and ingratiating himself with the prison’s crooked ruler, Warden Stammas (Mark Heenahan). Through it all, his Andy’s determination to escape from this hellhole never diminishes…

This is a dour and workmanlike retelling of what must rank as one of King’s bleakest stories. Gary McCann’s stark set design, coupled with David Esbjornson’s taut direction, reflects the hopelessness and depravation of prison life well enough, but the action feels somewhat dwarfed by the enormity of the Festival Theatre. This would surely have been better suited to the more intimate surroundings of The King’s but, for obvious reasons, that isn’t a possibility right now. There’s a distancing effect in that huge auditorium and I find myself wanting to be closer to the action, to feel more of the the physicality of the piece. Furthermore, I become increasingly aware of the many, quite complicated, scene changes that punctuate the proceedings and I feel unconvinced at what is revealed when that famous poster of Rita Hayworth is ripped away.

The performances are strong, though it’s the two central characters who dominate. Absalom handles the quieter, more restrained role of Andy Dufresne with ease, but its Onwukwe, as the story’s acerbic narrator, who is given more of an opportunity to shine, particularly in the second act, as events build to a stirring and optimistic conclusion. Of course, the latter was always intended to come as a startling revelation, but the tale is so well known by now, there surely can’t be a soul in the theatre who doesn’t know what’s coming in the end.

3. 5 stars

Philip Caveney

The Ocean at the End of the Lane

19/04/23

Festival Theatre, Edinburgh

Neil Gaiman’s novel, The Ocean at the End of the Lane, is a complicated beast – the story of a man reliving his childhood experiences of a series of bewildering supernatural happenings. This adaptation, by Joel Horwood, sticks pretty closely to the original, picking up the tale when, many years later and now grown to adulthood, the man returns to his old stamping ground to attend a funeral. Whilst there, he takes the opportunity to visit a farm, where he encounters its matriarch, Old Mrs Hempstock (Finty Williams). But why does she look exactly the same as he remembers? And how does she know so much about him?

Suddenly, effortlessly, the man is replaced by Boy (Keir Oglivy), the man becomes Dad (Trevor Fox), and Boy relives the tragic events of 1986, when he made his first visit to the farm, meeting Mrs Hempstock’s daughter, Ginnie (Kemi-Bo Jacobs), and Ginnie’s teenage daughter, Lettie (Millie Hikasa), with whom he instantly has a connection. Lettie is a precocious child, who claims to be skilled in magic. She offers to take Boy on a dangerous journey in search of ‘The Flea’, but warns him that, if she allows him to accompany her, he must never, NEVER let go of her hand…

And of course, he does.

I don’t want to say too much more about the plot because this is the kind of story that’s entirely open to personal interpretation. You can take the magical rituals and the weird demon-like creatures at face value, or you can choose to interpret them as allegories, the experiences of a troubled boy, a boy moreover who is completely addicted to fantasy fiction and who is haunted by his own childhood imaginings. But what really makes TOatEotL fly is the soaring magnificence of the production. The astonishing set designs by Fly Davis and the vibrant lighting effects by Paule Constable conspire to transform the Festival Theatre into a mysterious labyrinth, utilising every single inch of the large stage.

I also love the way the team of supporting players, all dressed in black, assume the role of stage hands, making the scene transitions an integral part of the story.

Katy Rudd directs with consummate skill, particularly with the arrival of sinister lodger, Ursula (Charlie Brooks), who worms her way into the affections of Dad and Boy’s ‘Sis’ (Laurie Ogden). A sequence featuring a whole series of illuminated doorways through which Ursula disappears and reappears is so brilliantly played that I find myself gasping aloud at each new revelation. Be warned, things get very spooky in the later stages and the production’s suggested thirteen plus recommendation is not just there for show. Impressionable younger viewers could find themselves disturbed by some of the scenes enacted here.

National Theatre productions are renowned for the ingenuity of their stagecraft and this is no exception. It’s triumphantly spectacular. Currently on tour, if it should come to a theatre near you, don’t miss your chance to see it. It’ll blow you away.

4.6 stars

Philip Caveney

Family Tree

05/04/23

Traverse Theatre, Edinburgh

Henrietta Lacks is not a household name – but she should be. The cervical cancer that killed her also produced one of the most important cell lines in medical research, HeLa. Harvested from her tumour without consent, Lacks’ immortal cells (which continue to divide when most would die) have been crucial in the development of the polio vaccine, AIDS and cancer treatments, IVF and more. She died in 1951, but her cells live on, even proving invaluable in the fight against COVID.

So why haven’t we heard of her? The answer is sadly obvious: because she was a Black woman.

Mojisola Adebayo’s play sets out to right this wrong, to give Lacks the recognition she deserves. It also raises some very important questions about consent and compensation. This isn’t just an historic issue. Sure, the USA now has the ‘Common Rule’ clarifying the principles of ethical research, but certain biotech companies have made huge profits from patenting HeLa cell products – and none of the money has ever found its way to her descendants.

Directed by Matthew Xia, Family Tree is a challenging and confrontational piece of theatre, Adebayo’s writing poetic and arresting. Lacks (Aminita Francis) rises from her grave to undo her erasure, to demand we hear her version of the tale. She’s not alone in the graveyard: three slave women also rest there, finally at peace after enduring years of intrusive experimentation at the hands of the so-called father of modern gynaecology, Dr J Marion Sims. There are three Black NHS nurses too, felled by the pandemic in 2020. Ain (Mofetoluwa Akande) is full of righteous anger, mostly against the ‘Why People’ who claim to be allies until it’s inconvenient. Lyn (Aimée Powell) and Bibi (Keziah Joseph) are quieter and more philosophical, the latter using the leisure time that death affords her to finally read Toni Morrison. Although Lacks’ is certainly the most compelling narrative – she is, quite literally, centre stage – the other women’s stories are important too, contextualising Lacks’ experiences, and showing how she is just one link in a shocking, still ongoing chain. The actors are all electric, their performances poised and bold, intense and heartfelt.

However, despite the painful subject matter, this is not a piece of trauma porn. Although the story is about the horrendous ways Black women have been abused, Adebayo also shows the women’s strength and joy, turning them into dancing goddesses, recognising them for the queens they are.

4.3 stars

Susan Singfield

The Spark

04/04/23

Traverse Theatre, Edinburgh

It’s hard to believe it’s taken until now – the 2020s – for the term ‘perimenopause’ to enter popular discourse, although, ironically, my computer has just underlined it in red, signalling an unknown word – so maybe we’ve still got a way to go. Nevertheless, we’re moving inexorably away from hushed murmurings about ‘the change’ and oblique references to ‘hot flushes’, and instead naming all of the physical and mental symptoms of this life-altering process. It turns out it’s not just your periods petering to a halt. No such luck. Instead it’s some or all of the following: joint pain, exhaustion, menstrual cramps, decreased (or increased) libido, mood swings, anger, vaginal dryness, brain fog… it’s quite the gut punch. Almost literally.

In The Spark, playwright Kathy McKean explores the impact of the perimenopause on a politician. Robin (the brilliant Nicole Cooper) is struggling in a system that seems designed to constrain her. And whereas, in her younger years, she might have bitten her lip and done what needed to be done in order to get ahead, she’s at ‘that age’ now, and the fuck-it factor has set in. No, she won’t stand by while a group of men harass a young girl at a bus stop. No, she won’t deliver the anodyne presentation her speech-writer, James (Johnny Panchaud), has concocted – a bowdlerised version of her own from-the-heart first draft. No, she won’t accept that she’s powerless to affect change. Because otherwise, what’s it all for?

Directed by Gordon Barr, the three actors effortlessly illuminate the chaos inside Robin’s head, as her adversarial discussions with both James and her long-suffering GP, Maggie (Beth Marshall), build to a cacophony. Maggie’s got enough problems of her own – and she blames Robin for some of them. After all, Robin was, until recently, the minister for health. She knows how over-worked the nation’s doctors are; how can she possibly think Maggie has time to deal with what seems on the surface like a pretty bog-standard set of symptoms? Except that Robin’s menopausal heat seems to manifesting itself outside her body, and who knows where that will end…

The writing here is sharp and the delivery fast-paced and engaging. The Spark seems like a fitting finale to what has been a particularly strong season of A Play, a Pie and a Pint. It’s not perfect – it’s a simple idea that builds well at first, but doesn’t deliver the shocking crescendo it perhaps should, and maybe takes aim at the wrong target (I can think of many institutions more deserving of a middle-aged woman’s ire than the parliament at Holyrood). But it’s good to see this subject aired, and in such a witty, thought-provoking way.

4 stars

Susan Singfield

Castle Lennox

31/03/23

Lyceum Theatre, Edinburgh

The titular Castle Lennox is a hospital, but not as we know it. Places like this – providing long-term residential care for people with learning disabilities, shutting them off from the outside world – no longer exist. Here, playwright Linda McLean explores the pros and the cons: the deep, affecting friendships forged and the toxic regime, rife with bullying.

It’s 1969 and teenager Annis (Emma McCaffrey) is proving too much of a handful for her stepmother (Fletcher Mathers). Annis is lively, independent and full of fun, and she also has a learning disability, which means she’s eligible for enrolment at Castle Lennox. Simultaneously entranced and terrified by its fairytale appearance, Annis enters with hope as well as trepidation. But the staff nurse (Mathers again) takes against her, and – as the years tick inexorably by – Annis’s spirit seems to be quashed. Thankfully, there are also some moments of joy, such as her tentative romance with fellow patient, William (Gavin Yule) – but is she too institutionalised to cope when, twenty years later, Castle Lennox finally closes down?

Castle Lennox, directed by Maria Oller, is a joint production between the Lyceum and Lung Ha, Scotland’s leading theatre company for learning disabled actors. It’s a superb example of how empowering and inclusive drama can be, a cleverly-woven narrative that both supports and enables its fine cast, as well as engaging a sold-out house. McCaffrey shines in the lead role, but fellow actors Yule, Emma Clark (Jo) and Nicola Tuxworth (Marie) also stand out, the latter clearly relishing her devilish character.

But, although the individuals are great, it’s the choral scenes that really make this piece. Movement director Janice Parker creates a bold dynamic, evoking the cheerful chaos of the laundry and Saturday tea parties, and the performers are all absolutely on their game, singing and dancing with gusto and aplomb. BSL interpreter Rachel Amey is nicely integrated into the production, subtly assuming the role of Annis’s dead mother, reassuring her daughter when she’s feeling low.

Karen Tennent’s nifty set places us first in an enchanted forest, where a grand gateway yields to an altogether more prosaic and clinical space, where white curtains segregate the patients from outsiders – and from each other. The costume design (by Alison Brown) also helps to locate us both in time and place, and I like the way Annis’s clothes become drabber as the institution wears her down.

All in all, Castle Lennox is a delight, well-deserving of the standing ovation it receives tonight.

4 stars

Susan Singfield

Life of Pi

31/03/23

Cineworld, Edinburgh

Yann Martel’s novel, Life of Pi, was published in 2001 and won the Booker Prize the following year. In 2012, it was adapted into an impressive film, directed by Ang Lee. Of course, the inevitable next step was to adapt it for the stage, but that’s a very tall order. Would it be possible to convincingly present such a fantastical story in a theatre? Well, never underestimate what can be achieved with a suitable budget and state-of-the-art special effects. This version, beamed direct from London’s Wyndham Theatre as part of the NT Live season, is absolutely eye-popping.

The play opens in a hospital ward in Mexico, where our eponymous hero is being interviewed about his extraordinary survival in an open boat for 227 days, but his recollections are suddenly punctuated by a scene change so slick, I barely notice it happening, – until it has. 

It’s the 1960s and Piscine Molitor Patel (Hiran Abeysekera) lives in Pondicherry, India. Named after a swimming pool in France, he prefers his adopted nickname ‘Pi.’ His parents run a small zoo and Pi and his sister spend much of their time looking after the animals – including the latest arrival, a fierce Siberian tiger called Richard Parker.

And now it’s 1976 and, due to violent political unrest, Pi’s parents have decided to relocate their animals to a zoo in Canada. Pi, his family and all the animals board the Japanese freighter Tsintsum, and set off on a sea voyage. What could possibly go wrong? Well, plenty, as it happens. Pi ends up stranded in a lifeboat with only a zebra, a hyena, an orangutan and er… Richard Parker for company. 

Which is awkward, to say the very least.

To give him his due, Abeysekara offers an extraordinary performance in the lead role but, as you might expect, his efforts and those of his fellow performers are somewhat dwarfed by the aforementioned puppetry and special effects, which are quite frankly, off the scale. 

Let’s begin with Tim Hatley’s ingenious set designs, particularly those that deal with Pi’s adventures in the fateful lifeboat tossed upon stormy seas. Raging torrents of water appear to flood across the performance space, while shoals of fluorescent fish speed along just below the surface. I even gasp out loud at one point when Pi takes a nose dive onto an apparently solid stage… and disappears right through it, only to resurface in an entirely different spot a moment later. How have they done that? (With trapdoors, obviously, but it’s astonishing nevertheless.)

As are the animals – or, more accurately,  the puppets, designed by Nick Barnes, which are so intricately made that I actually keep forgetting they’re mechanical, which is ridiculous because I can quite clearly see the people operating them… and yet… and yet, I still believe they’re real, which is some accomplishment. Richard Parker is, of course, la bête du jour, the very essence of feline power, even able to switch into a comedic role as a fan of haute cuisine and back to a snarling, powerful predator, but – to be fair – every creature I see, right down to the swarms of multi coloured butterflies, is an astonishing creations.

Adapted by Lolita Chakrabarti and directed by Max Webster, Life of Pi is like a magician’s box of tricks. There’s a small part of me that feels sorry for the cast of (mostly excellent) actors struggling to make themselves seen amidst all that sturm und drang, but I guess it’s just – ahem – the nature of the beast.

4.3 stars

Philip Caveney

How Not To Drown

29/03/23

Traverse Theatre, Edinburgh

The first thing that captures my attention as I enter the auditorium is Becky Minto’s extraordinary set: a raised island of wooden planks, stark, powerful, simultaneously ramshackle and magisterial. There’s no other set dressing here, just two high towers of lighting on either side of the island, leaving lighting designer Zoe Spurr and composer/sound designer Alexandra Faye Braithwaite to layer on the atmosphere. Onto the dramatically sloping set climb the performers, five actors led by Dritan Kastrati, whose real life story is the inspiration for what we are about to watch (and who co-wrote the script with Nicola McCartney). But it’s clear from the outset that this will be an ensemble piece, as each of the actors in turn – Ajjaz Awad, Esme Bayley, Daniel Cahill and Sam Reuben – step forward to announce that they too are Dritan.

The drama unfolds, as the cast move back and forth on that precarious island, each actor in turn slipping into the role of Dritan, and skipping nimbly out again to portray a whole selection of other characters. There is never a moment’s confusion as to who is who. Director/ choreographer Neil Bettles has the cast drilled to perfection, as – with a modicum of props – they evoke a series of diverse locations and situations… and then, in a jaw-dropping coup de théâtre, the island begins to move.

Dritan’s story is one of abandonment and survival. At the age of eleven, he’s despatched by his well-meaning father from the family home in Albania, as war threatens to engulf the country. What follows is Dritan’s arduous attempt to get to his older brother somewhere in England, a difficult and sometimes dangerous journey. A sequence that portrays a perilous sea crossing feels horribly immersive, capturing the panic and uncertainty of the situation.

 Once in the UK, Dritan is confronted by the punishing series of hurdles faced by all young asylum seekers – a thankless procession of foster families, social workers and interpreters, each trying to give this boy whatever he asks for, but failing to provide him with the one thing he really needs: a family. We watch as his hopes and expectations crumble into dust.

How Not to Drown isn’t easy viewing, yet I wholeheartedly recommend it. It’s a powerful and affecting examination of the failure of bureaucracy, demonstrating all too clearly the problems that occur when it comes to caring for a child, cast adrift from everything he knows. Dritan Kastrati is only one of millions of people who have survived this awful situation, but his play brilliantly illuminates the experience like a beacon shining in a storm.

4.4 stars

Philip Caveney