Theatre

Derby Day

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28/08/15

Gilded Balloon, Teviot, Edinburgh

The Ballard brothers have just attended the funeral of their father. What better way to celebrate the old man’s life than to head to the Oaklawn Park race track and lay down a few bets? Eldest brother, Frank (Robert M. Foster) is over from Chicago and has booked a luxury box for their private use. He’s soon joined by loose-canon middle brother Ned (Malcolm Madera) and youngest sibling, Johnny (Jake Silbermann), newly released from prison and looking to pick up the pieces of his shattered life. The trio begin to gamble, they drink alcohol and as their inhibitions break down, so the realities of their troubled upbringing start to manifest themselves. It’s no great surprise to discover that Ballard Senior wasn’t a very nice man at all. Little wonder his sons still carry the scars of unresolved issues. Meanwhile, waitress Becky (Teresa Stephenson) is charged with the thankless task of dealing with the Ballards as they hurtle towards alcohol-fuelled oblivion.

Samuel Brett Williams has written a gritty melodrama about familial love and hate and the three male leads of Camisade Theatre Company throw themselves into this powerful drama with gusto, delivering strong performances with the accent on physicality. A scene where Frank throws Johnny onto (and through) a table is shocking in its impact, though ultimately maybe there’s a little too much fighting in there for comfort – these guys seem ready to punch each other at the drop of a hat. We’re even warned as we come in to avoid sitting in the front row, in case we get caught up in the affray!

I particularly liked Silbermann’s portrayal of the not-very-bright Johnny, a man who may as well walk around with the word ‘doomed’ tattooed on his forehead, but the play doesn’t always convince us that these are real characters in a real situation. Too many of the lines seem to be addressed directly to the audience and there are places where the pre-recorded race commentary overpowers the characters’ dialogue.

However, this is a credible production that’s worth catching before it’s gone. As the story gallops into the final furlong, it’s clear this is not going to end well… and all bets are off.

3.5 stars

Philip Caveney

Charolais

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27/08/15

Spotlites, Hanover Street, Edinburgh

With such a variety of shows on offer at the Fringe, there’s inevitably a range of quality here too. Now and again, though, it’s possible to see something really rather special.

And Charolais is one such thing.

Written and performed by Noni Stapleton, this is an unlikely comedy about a young Irish woman and the jealousy she feels towards a beautiful heifer. The cow, a Charolais belonging to her farmer boyfriend, takes up far too much of his attention, and his mother, Brede, demands what’s left. Siobhan, it seems, must fight to win his love.

It’s an unusual tale, as beautifully written as it is acted. This is truly an object lesson in characterisation: a one-woman performance that not only makes us laugh and cry, but also brings to life a horny cow. Really, the episodes where Stapleton embodies ‘Charolais’ are extraordinary: she drops her jaw, lowers her stance, sticks out her backside, and becomes the cow. The lowing-singing is a lovely touch, and the French accent an added delight.

As this year’s festival heads towards its end, there are only three more chances left to see this show. Don’t miss out: get a ticket now.

5 stars

Susan Singfield

It Started With Jason Donovan

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26/08/15

New Town Theatre, George Street, Edinburgh

It started with Jason Donovan is an odd little show – amusing, sweet, ridiculous and fun. It’s essentially a monologue, interspersed with dance and song, where ‘shaker, movement-maker’ Sarah Blanc reveals the story of her troubled love life.

The premise is this: an early crush on Jason Donovan meant that Blanc formed an unrealistic view of what to expect from relationships, based on JD’s cheesy song lyrics and the “perfect” Scott-Charlene marriage.

Blanc presents this as a self-help lecture, illustrated with tales from her own dating disasters, all charmingly and self-deprecatingly told.

She’s an engaging performer, and the audience tonight is most definitely on her side, willingly participating in a range of scenes. It’s a little ramshackle, but Blanc works this to her advantage, and the show certainly succeeds in making us laugh.

OK, so there’s not a lot of substance here. Most of the humour comes from deliberately dodgy dancing (though there’s clearly a ‘proper’ dancer behind those funny moves) and over- frequent costume changes; it’s a bit like a Cosmo article: ‘Seven Ways to Keep Your Man.’ It’s fluffy, whimsical stuff – but, you know what, Kylie? I liked it.

3.2 stars

Susan Singfield

Acts of Redemption

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26/08/15

Underbelly, Cowgate, Edinburgh

Ken Jaworowski’s Acts of Redemption is a series of six disparate monologues, presented with pleasing simplicity by director James Wren.

First, in Never Smile, Never Wave, we meet a spoilt little rich girl: self-satisfied, judgemental and very privileged indeed. But, when a stranger in a bar tells her she looks sad, her vulnerability is revealed, and we are left wishing that we could find out more. This is, I think, the strongest of the set, exquisitely performed by Akila Cristiano, who manages to make us root for someone quite unlikeable.

Next comes Pulse, where three separate stories are interwoven. They’re loosely linked, each dealing with familial love, and this is another success. A young man (James Huntington) comes out to his father; a man (Dan Lees) teaches his little boy to fight the bullies who are hurting him; a young woman (Amee Smith) sacrifices her dreams to care for her ailing dad. All three pieces are well-crafted, and the acting powerful.

The last two monologues are perhaps the weakest. In Luck of the Draw, Rachel Parris plays a miserable woman, who dreams of winning the lottery and leaving home. The character is interesting, and there are a few nice twists, but it feels a little under-developed, and perhaps a tad cliched. Timberwood Drive, performed by Joe Wreddon, is the slightest of all, telling the rather far-fetched tale of a hapless womaniser whose wife and mistress co-own the same dog. It’s a little bit silly, and doesn’t connect with the audience in the way the others do.

All in all, this is a decent production, and I certainly enjoyed the hour spent watching it. I couldn’t help but wish, however, that the pieces were more unified, and that there were something more to hold them together than the tenuous idea of ‘redemption’ (especially as they’re not all redeemed).

An interesting – if mixed – show, with some genuine talent on display.

3.3 stars

Susan Singfield

old man’s Gift

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25/08/15

Venue 13, Lochend Close, Edinburgh

old man’s Gift (capitalisation theirs) is billed as a dark comedy. It tells the tale of four friends, using a birthday celebration to seek vengeance on the ‘old man’ who abused them in the past. It’s a student production, featuring four under-graduates from Trinity Saint David University in Carmarthen, and it’s clear that they’ve worked very hard to bring this drama to the fringe.

Sadly, however, it doesn’t really work. There are issues with all aspects of the production, from the script to the set design, from the direction to the performance style. None of it is quite convincing, and it doesn’t hang together well.

Let’s start with the set. It’s supposed to be a garden, or a patio, I think: the grounds of the old man’s house. There are chairs and a table, and – for some unfathomable reason – a fence. The fence stretches across the front of the stage, creating a barrier between the audience and the performers, which seems an odd thing to do in such a venue, where intimacy is perhaps the biggest selling point. It blocks a lot of the upstage action too, so that we cannot see the actors’ faces during several crucial scenes.

The script is problematic too. It’s not funny enough to work as a comedy, and there’s a strange intensity to the whole thing – a kind of teenage-angsty-melodrama vibe, where the emotions are cranked up to full volume throughout, with all four characters  yelling, hyperventilating and flouncing off the stage at every opportunity. Despite all the histrionics, it’s a curiously empty play, and none of the heartbreak feels even remotely real. The characters’ motivations are spurious (really – why does Liz swallow the condom instead of just hiding it in her hand?) and their relationships are somehow ‘off.’

The direction is also weak. There are so many exits and entrances that it’s almost like a farce – but without the precision and humour that a farce demands. The constant traffic isn’t helped by the fact that the stage is a wooden box, and the actors all wear ‘solid’ shoes, meaning that the sound reverberates around the room. The performances look like acting, with none of the natural ease that makes a drama good.

All in all, this play just didn’t work for us. It’s an ambitious project, but one that – this time – hasn’t quite paid off.

1.5 stars

Susan Singfield and Philip Caveney

Tom Neenan: The Andromeda Paradox

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24/08/15

Pleasance Dome, Edinburgh

Professor Bernard Andromeda has devoted his life to researching strange phenomena – so when a mysterious prehistoric artefact is discovered in a disused London tube station, his curiosity is immediately aroused – especially when said artefact is inscribed with his name. He sets about trying to discover its origins and finds himself embroiled in a mystery that will challenge his scientific beliefs to the core, one that leads to the realisation that alien forces are at work. Soon much of the population of London has been turned into hordes of zombies all chanting his name and he is the only man who can avert disaster…

Tom Neenan has written a wonderfully affectionate parody of Nigel Kneale’s landmark sci-fi tale, The Quatermass Experiment, in which he plays all the characters – from a strange German professor who has taken his experiments with flowers a bit too far, to Andromeda’s adoring female assistant who is prepared to use her feminine charms to help him solve the mystery. Neenan is an expert story teller and he milks the comic potential of the 50s setting with great skill, aided and abetted by a script that is laugh-out-loud funny – the scene where one of Neenan’s hands transforms into an adorable alien creature… ‘no bigger than my hand,’ is a particular delight. There’s wonderful stagecraft here too. A whole range of locations are evoked simply by the positioning of a table and chair and Neenan’s sweet posh-boy persona is exploited to the hilt.

The performance is peppered with plenty of in-jokes but you don’t need to be familiar with the original material in order to enjoy this deliciously silly slice of nonsense, which is designed to appeal to people of all ages. Fabulous stuff, I urge you to catch it.

4.5 stars

Philip Caveney

Edith in the Dark

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23/08/15

Momentum @ St Stephens, Stockbridge, Edinburgh

I was looking forward to seeing this play. I loved E. Nesbit’s books when I was a child (although, even at eight years old, I used to laugh at their over-privileged world-view – expecting readers to identify with a family whose idea of poverty means only being able to afford the one servant to do all the cooking and cleaning), and was intrigued to learn that she had also written a collection of ghost stories for adults. The play’s premise is strong: Edith meets a fan, and reads some of these stories to him, allowing us some insight into the author’s world, as well as bringing the ghostly tales to life.

Unfortunately, it doesn’t really work here. We’re told that the stories are dark and horrifying, but then they are played for laughs; the tone is so muddled it becomes incoherent. It’s not funny enough to work as a comedy, and it’s not frightening at all. Playwright Philip Meeks acknowledges a debt to the old Amicus horror films (“They’re schlocky and almost camp…”) and that’s clearly the angle director Keith Hukin is aiming for here, but he doesn’t really pull it off. It all ends up seeming just a little bit silly, which is a shame, because it could have been so good.

Blue Merrick, as Edith, is clearly a talented actor, and she manages to hold the piece to some extent. But she’s wasted on this material, and her fellow actors don’t fare as well in their supporting roles. It’s dispiriting stuff: four people walk out half way through the piece, and I can’t say I blame them. It’s a rare sunny day in Edinburgh, and there are far better places to be than this.

2 stars

Susan Singfield and Philip Caveney

Fully Committed

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24/08/15

Underbelly Potterrow (Venue 358)

We all know Marcus Brigstocke as a stand up comedian and radio show host, but can he act? On the strength of Fully Committed, the answer is a resounding yes. This sprightly one-hander tells the story of Sam Peliczowski, an affable out of work actor who, for the moment at least, has the more mundane task of running the reservation phone lines at Manhattan’s most exclusive restaurant. We join him at the beginning of an absolute day from hell, when his co-worker has failed to turn up and Sam is left to run the show single-handed. But didn’t I say that this was a one-hander? Well, yes, because the trick here is that Brigstocke voices all the characters that Sam speaks to on the phone lines (40 of them in total) supplying their respective accents and mannerisms into the bargain. It’s a monumental undertaking and the script must have been a nightmare to memorise, but Brigstocke handles it effortlessly, giving us amongst others, a foul mouthed Bronx chef, an anxious female socialite and his own father. Most of the characters are American and the wonder is that the audience never struggles to know which character is speaking at any given point.

For the first few minutes, I wasn’t sure the play was going to work, but once into his stride, Brigstocke manages to convey the madness and anxiety of the situation spelled out in Becky Mode’s frothy script, snapping from character to character at lightning speed and as the demands on Sam become ever more frenetic, you can’t help feeling for him.

This is classy stuff and Brigstocke seizes the opportunity to extend his range. Catch it before it’s gone.

4.2 stars

Philip Caveney

Confessions of a Redheaded Coffeeshop Girl

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20/08/15

Gilded Balloon Teviot, Edinburgh

Rebecca Perry is Joanie Little, an anthropology graduate, working as a barista and dreaming of a different life. The monologue is interspersed with songs, and the story moves from a wry contemplation of the mundanity of a dull McJob, into a fantasy about love and possibility.

Perry is a charming performer with a lovely singing voice, and she tells her tale with wit and warmth. She takes us with her into Joanie’s world, and paints a vivid portrait of the characters she meets.

It’s an enjoyable show, as frothy as cappuccino – but, ultimately, the espresso doesn’t have much kick. The people-as-wildlife trope has perhaps been done too many times to have much impact now, and it’s all just a little too feelgood and saccharine to really make its mark.

If you like your theatre decaffeinated, this might be the show for you.

3.4 stars

Susan Singfield

Gruesome Playground Injuries

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19/08/15

Basic Mountain, Venue 106, Hill Street, Edinburgh

Phantom Owl Productions have given themselves a tough act to follow here. We’ve already awarded five star reviews to both Filthy Talk For Troubled Times and Fault Lines. What are the chances they can pull it off a third time? Well, when the production in question is Gruesome Playground Injuries by Pulitzer Prize finalist Rajiv Joseph, the chances, it turns out, are very good indeed. This is a fabulous play that covers thirty years in the lives of its two protagonists.

Doug (Brad Fleischer) is a hapless, accident-prone kind of guy. He first runs into the already troubled Kayleen (Jules Willcox) when they are both eight years old and he has just ridden his bicycle off the school roof and cut his face open. We are then reintroduced to them through a series of non-sequential encounters that zip back and forth in time as Doug continues to carry a torch for Kayleen, who is too preoccupied with her own troubles to realise that he has fallen in love with her from the moment he first set eyes on her.

A word too about Larissa Kokernot’s direction of the piece – it calls for quite a few changes of scene and costume and I loved the way that these were all carried out by the two actors in full view of the audience, whilst exchanging tender looks and touches with each other, making it as much a part of the drama as the acting itself. This is a delightful Brechtian conceit that works beautifully. Fleischer and Wilcox make a captivating duo, never faltering as they switch their ages from kids to adults with total conviction and there are several moments here where tears will fill the eyes of all but the most stolid members of the audience.

I’ve said it before but it’s worth saying again; this is the best collection of plays we’ve seen at the Fringe this year – and trust me, we’ve seen quite a few. Seek them out and watch them while you still have the chance.

5 stars

Philip Caveney