Theatre

Mervyn Stutter’s Silver Jubilee Charity Gala

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Assembly Theatre, George Square, Edinburgh

15/08/16

If the Edinburgh Fringe has anything resembling royalty then Mervyn Stutter is arguably first in line to the throne (now that Richard Herring seems to have abdicated). Amazingly, Mervyn has been running his Pick of the Fringe show for twenty-five years and this special gala has been arranged to celebrate the occasion and to raise money for charity. Think of an old-school variety show, offering short selections of comedy, theatre and music, and you’ve pretty much got the idea. As well as helping those in need, it’s doubtless a great way of alerting the public to performers they might enjoy in more depth – fliers for all the featured acts are available on the way out.

On comes Mervyn in his trademark pink suit, and treats us to a few of his risqué ditties from down the years, before introducing the first act, Tom Binns, in his role as ‘Hospital DJ,’ Ivan Brackenbury. It’s a great start to the show. Binns’ comedy comes from the ineptness of his character, who makes a series of clumsy announcements and then compounds them with selection a toe-curlingly inappropriate songs. It’s a great comic premise and Binns delivers on it, big time. You’ll find his show at The Assembly George Square.

The next act, I Am Rhythm, features a lively troop of eight South African men who perform a couple of frenetic traditional dances from Soweto, which involves them slapping, clapping and chanting in a dazzling display of syncopation. Fans of this kind of music (and there are many) will find their show at Dance Base (Venue 22).

It’s always a pleasure to see comedian Jo Caulfield, even if the short selection she offers here is already familiar to us from earlier shows. No matter, her tales of a louche Londoner adapting to a new life in Edinburgh are cannily observed and very, very funny. You’ll find her at (where else?) The Stand Comedy Club.

Circa are difficult to describe. This four piece contemporary circus troop offer a short extract from their current show, Closer, which is all about relationships and combines incredible balancing with a series of bodily contortions that will astonish you. They are currently appearing at Edinburgh’s infamous cow-shaped venue, Udderbelly.

Angel, a play by Henry Naylor is set in Kobane, Northern Syria and is the true-life tale of an acclaimed female sniper, credited with over one hundred kills. Lead actor Fillipa Braganca treats us to a short extract and I find myself wishing that she’d been granted more time. Naylor’s last play, Echoes, won him the 2015 Fringe First Award and this one is also garnering great reviews. You’ll find Angel at the Gilded Balloon, Teviot.

 Next up is Sarah Louise Young (who we have already seen and loved in Royal Vauxhall). Here she’s in her Cabaret Whore role as La Poule Plombée, a French chanteuse in the vein of Edith Piaf, but played (expertly) for laughs. She sings about baggage (pronounced to rhyme with Farage) and milks the song for every bit of humour. She’s accompanied on the piano by Michael Roulston and, just in case you think she’s not working hard enough, you can also catch the duo in their show Songs For Lovers (and Other Idiots) at Maggie’s Chamber on Cowgate. La Poule Plombé, on the other hand, can be seen at The Voodoo Rooms.

In an extended set, the cast of Showstopper: The Improvised Musical stroll onstage and create songs inspired by suggestions shouted out randomly by members of the audience. They settle on a show set in 10 Downing Street, starring Theresa May and her cleaning lady. It’s quite uncanny how they do it, but there they are, producing lyrics that actually make sense and rhyme, working in the style of Stephen Sondheim and Andrew Lloyd Webber. This Olivier award winning show is at The Pleasance Courtyard twice a day. Go along and marvel.

Rory Bremner is a name that surely needs no introduction, but he gets one anyway. He wanders onstage, tells us about his long relationship with Mr Stutter (they’ve been bumping into each other at the fringe for quarter of a century) and then he throws in a few of his brilliant impersonations. (His Barack Obama is quite something.) His show, Rory Bremner meets… is at The Gilded Balloon at the Museum.

Last but not least, we are treated to a couple of songs by The Jive Aces – purveyors of old time swing. Dressed to the nines in their yellow outfits, they soon have everybody clapping along to their song, before leading the crowd in a chorus of Happy Birthday, as somebody brings out a special cake to mark Mervyn’s anniversary. The Jive Aces are at Assembly George Square Gardens – and Mervyn Stutter’s Pick of the Fringe is at The Gilded Ballloon, Teviot every day at 13.00, with a fresh set of acts each time.

4 stars

Philip Caveney

Rainbow Class

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14/08/16

Assembly Hall, Edinburgh

Wow. This is a hidden gem of a show if ever I saw one, and well-deserving of a bigger audience than tonight’s meagre crowd. Maybe it’s the title that’s uninspiring and failing to draw the punters? It’s certainly not the performance.

Because Vivienne Acheampong can REALLY act. This is a one-woman show that packs a heavy punch: it’s a sharp and witty piece that engages right from the very start. We’re in Tiddlesworth Primary School, where we meet a whole host of characters: there’s Miss Marshall, the pregnant teacher whose vocation means she has no life outside her job; Ty’Quan, the challenging student with ambitions to make it as a rapper; Sheila, the casually racist lunchtime supervisor, who misses the way things used to be. Acheampong embodies each one effortlessly; this is clever, sly, insightful stuff, and it’s beautifully done. We’re reduced to helpless laughter when a terrifying supply teacher forces us to take part in a recorder lesson, and I’m in floods of tears when Acheampong ends the piece with a heartfelt poem about the state of education in England today, and how it lets our children down (this has a particular resonance for me, as I’ve just quit teaching after twenty-two years because of the very issues that she highlights here).

There’s real talent at play in this show, and it merits a wide audience. Miss it, and you really will miss out.

5 stars

Susan Singfield

Tatterdemalion

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12/08/16

The Omnitorium, Assembly George Square, Edinburgh

As soon as we take our seats in the wonderfully quirky Ominitorium, it’s clear that we’re in for some old-school clowning. Performer/director Henry Maynard takes an empty seat and sits among us as if waiting for the show to start. Half dressed and wearing a red fez, he proceeds to make us laugh without uttering one intelligible word – a series of grunts and gestures does the job as eloquently as words might.

Eventually, he’s up on stage rooting through a tattered trunk of props, each of which he uses to tell a little story. It’s hard to review an act like this. Too much description would give away the game and what this set is all about is a series of delightful surprises – but I will say that the highlight for me is a routine he enacts using nothing other than a white shirt, which he manages to turn into something surreal and magical.

There’s lots of audience interaction in this show. People are pulled up onto the stage and made to perform alongside the clown, but don’t let that worry you. This is gentle and charming stuff and all those who are invited to perform leave the stage looking very pleased with themselves. If you’ve a liking for a mixture of physical comedy, mime and puppetry, this is surely the show for you.

4.5 stars

Philip Caveney

Evil

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12/08/16

Spotlites, Edinburgh

Evil is nobody’s idea of a fun day out at the theatre. It’s an emotionally demanding piece.

A searing monologue, adapted by Benny Haag from a novel by Jan Guillou, it’s brilliantly performed by Jesper Arin. It’s the story of Erik, a young Swedish boy who has been systematically brutalised by his father (‘the old man’ as Erik habitually refers to him), ritually beaten on an everyday basis. When the chance finally comes for him to escape to a prestigious boarding school, Erik jumps at the chance; but it isn’t long before he realises that the institution – Stjarnhov near Stockholm – is every bit as vicious as the place from which he has recently fled.

Arin is a compelling actor – he lays out the story in a cool, matter-of-fact tone, never flinching from detail, drawing us completely into the narrative. Perhaps it’s the fact that I had a school background that was horribly similar to the events outlined here, that made this story so personally affecting; or perhaps its simply that it’s so beautifully written, it would have the same affect on just about anyone. Whatever the case, this is a remarkable piece of storytelling that deserves to be seen by as wide an audience as possible.

Just don’t expect to come out laughing…

4.6 stars

Philip Caveney

Paper Hearts : the Musical

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11/08/16

Underbelly Med Quad, Edinburgh

Paper Hearts is the story of Atticus Smith (Adam Small), a lowly bookshop assistant who, in his spare time, is banging away on the keys of a manual typewriter, trying to write a bestselling novel. His life takes an interesting turn when he meets and promptly falls in love with Lilly Sprockett (Gabriella Margulies), who, it transpires is working for (and having a relationship with) Atticus’s villainous Dad, Roger (David Mullen), the head honcho at mega-publishers, Random Books. Atticus and Roger have been estranged for years. When Atticus learns that his father intends to buy the bookshop – probably with the intention of turning it into luxury apartments – he starts to think that his life is ruined. But then he hears about a book competition offering a huge cash prize… a competition that is funded by Random Books.

Anybody hoping for a realistic exposé of the publishing business should look elsewhere. The plot is quite ridiculous; no publishing house in the world has ever carried on in such an unprofessional fashion. If, on the other hand, you have a liking for plaintive songs, brilliant musicianship and a shot of good old-fashioned romance, then this just might be the show for you. I sat there entranced as the ten-strong cast moved effortlessly around a stage with the general dimensions of a postage-stamp, singing, playing instruments, swapping costumes and switching roles with consummate skill. This production could have been designed purely to illustrate the meaning of the word ‘ensemble.’ Choreographer Lindsay McAllister deserves a lot of praise for making this flow so effortlessly.

I like the way the story cuts back and forth between Atticus’s own story and Angel Star, the Dr Zhivago-esque novel that he’s working so feverishly on. I loved the concept of a literary face-off between rival members of the cast and the suggestion (so true) that writers use their fiction to put right the things that never go well for them in real life. Like most others attending this packed performance, I left with a big smile on my face, humming the closing number. Which, for a show like this, is exactly as it should be.

If you like books and you like musicals, then there’s every chance that you’ll enjoy Paper Hearts just as much as I did.

4.6 stars

Philip Caveney (ahem… novelist)

The One Legged Man Show

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10/08/16

Spotlites, Edinburgh

Nils Bergstrand is the one-legged man in question, and this auto-biographical show charts his attempts to come to terms with losing a limb. He was shot in a bar in Thailand one fateful New Year’s eve (wrong place, wrong time – the bullet was never meant for him), and the subsequent amputation changed his life forever. Here, he uses musical theatre as a kind of catharsis, performing a series of original cabaret songs that take us through the dark times until we emerge to see a present that looks remarkably bright.

Bergstrand has a lovely singing voice, and there are moments here that evoke real tears (the song where he begs his girlfriend not to leave him alone is a standout). His diaries from the past reveal  a tendency towards the poetic, and it’s certainly an affecting tale.

It does all feel a little earnest, a little – dare I say? – American, with the kind of self-help vibe that always makes me feel a bit uncomfortable. And the piano is too loud at times, so that I can’t hear all of the lyrics to some of the songs. But, overall, it’s a story worth hearing, and it’s great to know Nils has the happy ending he deserves.

3 stars

Susan Singfield

 

Tom Neenan: Vaudeville

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09/08/16

Underbelly, Med Quad

Tom Neenan is a brilliant raconteur. At last year’s festival he beguiled us with his riff on the Professor Quatermass stories of Nigel Kneale. This year, his influences seem to have come from the Amicus portmanteau films of the 60s and 70s.

We are seated in near darkness when Neenan, dressed as a security guard, enters by torch light. We quickly learn that it’s his birthday and he sits down to enjoy a celebratory Lucozade – then does a wonderful double take as he realises he’s not alone.

He tells us that we are in an old theatre and that there are many stories associated with it. He goes on to regale us with three dark tales in which, as ever, he plays every character, switching effortlessly from role to role. We’re told about a lovelorn magician and his evil ventriloquist’s dummy, Mr Nibbles (shades of Cavalcanti’s Dead of Night, here) then there’s the story of a celebrated Shakespearian actor and his deadly rivalry with a critic (Theatre of Blood?) and finally the tale of an ambitious teenage ballet dancer prepared to give everything in order to win a regional prize. As is customary in such constructions, there’s a final, brilliant twist in the tale, one that ingeniously makes us, the audience, part of the show. It’s brilliant stuff. I read recently that Neenan started off in a double act with Nish Kumar and I would be fascinated to see how that worked, since I can’t think of two more diverse performers.

Vaudeville  was sold out the afternoon we saw it and fully deserved to be. If you can get a ticket for this, do so. You won’t be disappointed.

4.8 stars

Philip Caveney

The Trial

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08/08/16

Summerhall, Edinburgh

Adapted by People Zoo Productions, as part of the Rose Bruford College season at Summerhall, Franz Kafka’s ultimate tale of paranoia and alienation is presented here as an absurd farce with the volume cranked up to eleven. On his 30th birthday, Josef K (William J Holstead) wakes one morning to find himself under arrest. He has no idea what his supposed crime is or even exactly who is accusing him, but he has embarked on a slippery downward path that will eventually lead him to his own destruction.

This stylish and thought-provoking production has already won a couple of prestigious awards at this year’s Manchester Fringe Festival and it’s easy to see why. There are elements of physical theatre here (the stage combat is particularly assured) and characters are played in a grotesque, almost cartoonish fashion. The scene in which K is instructed to beat three teenage girls in order to prove his innocence is particularly chilling. I liked the simple but effective staging of the story and the way in which the six strong cast switched effortlessly from character to character, providing their own musical accompaniment along the way.

It’s always daunting to take on such a famous work but People Zoo rise to the challenge. This powerful and effective play, ably directed by Craig Sanders, is definitely one to watch at this year’s fringe.

4 stars

Philip Caveney

The Blind Date Project

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07/08/16

Zoo Southside, Edinburgh

The Blind Date Project is a delicious slice of improv theatre, with a mischievous wit that makes it a delight. Staged in the cabaret bar at Zoo Southside, the realism here is so heightened that you can almost believe you’re actually witnessing a moment in someone’s life.

As we enter the bar, there’s a relaxed atmosphere. A woman (Margaux Susi) is singing karaoke; we buy drinks, sit ourselves down at little tables, look at the ‘karaoke cards’ laid out before us. If we want, we can request a song to perform. We chat, check our phones, moan about how uncomfortable the seats are, check our phones again, sing along to familiar lines. There are two stools by the bar, elevated on a tiny platform. A woman comes in and sits on one of these. We register her presence, but otherwise just carry on.

It’s all so beautifully done. There’s a subtle lighting change; the Karaoke Queen leaves the stage and goes to tend the bar. A man runs in and sits down beside the woman. They introduce themselves to one another. And the show’s begun.

The woman is Bojana Novakovic, the creator of this piece. She’s playing Anna; she plays Anna every night. The man is Max, played by JJ Whitehead. And this is his first (and only) performance; Anna’s date is different every time. There is no script. The actors are sent directions via texts and phone calls, and have to respond in the moment to everything that is thrown at them. And, my word, it works.

I have rarely been so utterly absorbed in a play. JJ Whitehead is just lovely, gamely dealing with Anna’s neuroses in a kind, accepting, non-judgemental way. He’s confident and funny and, if he’s nervous, it’s okay, because they look like first-date nerves. His performance makes us warm to him, and we resolve to try to catch his own fringe show, if we can fit it in (Fool Disclosure, Liquid Room Annexe, 20:45).

Novakovic is enchanting. Her Anna is drunk and needy, serious and sweet. She seems like a real, complex person, one you’d admire as well as want to protect. Susi, behind the bar, brings a welcome cynicism to the date; her deadpan, sardonic responses are very funny indeed.

I loved this piece. I want to see it again, to see how the dynamic changes when there’s someone else in the other seat. Don’t miss this one; it’s a real treat.

5 stars

Susan Singfield