DIDO, QUEEN OF CARTHAGE

DIDO, QUEEN OF CARTHAGE

Hill House Productions at the Rose, Bankside

30.03.13

for Remote Goat

Kit Marlowe knew the Rose well, though he would have been as surprised as anyone to see the actors' breath hang in the chilly Easter air, the audience wrapped in blue woollen blankets.

First performed by the Children of the Chapel Royal, and written in collaboration with Thomas Nashe, this early Marlowe tells a familiar tale – the love affair between Libyan Queen and Trojan Hero.

House on the Hill brought us a traditional take on this neglected text – spoken with exemplary clarity, using the resonance of the vast excavation, even if the accents were a little posh – more Kensington than Carthage.

The setting was inevitably simple, with countless candles replacing the red neon ropelights, and a cats' cradle of cords above the cramped arena. The shallow lake was effectively used, with one scene played out on the farther shore.

Some noteworthy performances from a young cast, directed with pace and precision by Alex Pearson and Jeremy Smith. Rhiannon Sommers was a very watchable Dido, sympathetically drawn by Marlowe, transformed by Cupid's dart from proud Queen to infatuated teenager. Her increasingly desperate farewells to Aeneas – flirtatious, frantic, fearful – were excellently handled, as was her death, falling backwards into the silken fire.

Her sister Anna, thwarted in her secret love for Edward Walters' Iarbas, was passionately played by Julia Taylor. Natasha Percival was the Puckish Cupid, and there was an impressive double from Samantha Spurgin as the aged Nurse and the voluptuous Venus – the opening scenes show how the Gods use mortals for their sport.

James Burgess was a confident Aeneas, relating the "woeful tale" of the fall of Troy and wrestling with his conscience, torn between Libya and Italy. His faithful Achates – doubling Jupiter in the opening – was Carsten Garbode.

A welcome chance to see this rare Marlowe in this uniquely evocative setting.

THE LITTLE BADDOW PASSION

THE LITTLE BADDOW PASSION

open air production on Good Friday

29.03.13

Billed as A Walk of Witness with dramatic interludes, Kenton Church's take on the Good Friday story was inspired by Stephen Cotterell's "The Nail".

Played out in real [Jerusalem] time, it shows some of the key players in the Gospel story looking back over the events of the day, and attempting to justify their actions.

Along the Ridge, down North Hill, from the General's Arms to the Rodney we encountered snow flurries, Roman Soldiers [the Crucifixion], Pilate and his wife [the Trial], Caiphas and Annas [the Veil of the Temple], Peter and Mary [the Denial]. Perhaps the most effective scene saw the lone figure of Judas Iscariot, forcefully telling us his side of the story, before, disillusioned and defeated, he took a length of rope and trudged off along the narrow path to Scrub Wood.

This compelling piece of promenade theatre ended with the acting company – the military, the politicians, the priests and the people, mingling with the sixty-strong crowd in the Rodney Inn, singing together "Were You There When They Crucified Our Lord?".

JOHN CLARE

THE LONG LIFE AND GREAT GOOD FORTUNE OF JOHN CLARE

EasternAngles at the Quay Theatre Sudbury

26.03.13

Peasant poet John Clare was born and died in East Anglia, and its countryside inspired much of his work. Eastern Angles are touring this new play around that same region; I saw it in the Quay Theatre, Sudbury, which Clare would have known, had he encountered it on his travels, as part of a busy little port on the Stour.

There have been many words written about poor Clare. The myths and legends are alluded to in Tony Ramsay's piece, but its full title reminds us that, despite the demons and the blue devils,  the poet lived to see 70, and had many admirers and supporters throughout his career.

James Turner's simple design – based on Clare's Helpston cottage, where an early version of this piece premièred last year – has reeds and teazels, a garden shed, decking with table and chairs and the all-important hat-stand for the costume changes.

For the three actors play many parts, changing from Clare's time to ours in a twinkling.

First we meet John, making notes and consulting a well-thumbed, post-it punctuated binder, listening to Neil Diamond and reading the poems, – "I am …" the ingenious link here. He's joined by Melody, a psychiatrist, and it becomes evident that he has many of the symptoms of autism – he recites word for word not only verses but the pub listings for The Blue Bell and the Exeter Arms. Melody's partner, Rafe, is trying to pitch a drama-doc about the gypsy poet – there is conflict between "the shrink and the storyteller". John is convinced he is Clare – they share an all-pervading sense of loss - and the "thorned and narrow road" merges magically with the "scenes where man has never trod", as we move towards some understanding of these two troubled minds, and a final symbolic act which is one of the finest moments of theatre I've seen in a long while. To say more of the resolution of these two stories would spoil the suspense and the sense of discovery. You should see this fine piece of work for yourself – it's touring the region until May 18.

The performances are superb – almost unbearably moving in this intimate space. Richard Sandells is wonderful as poet and patient; they are not the same, their sufferings are not identical, but the one constantly illuminates the other. Louise Mai Newberry is Melody, as well as one of the "two wives", a society lady and a flower seller, while Henry Devas is the good doctor Skrimshire as well as the obstinate "Mr Zhang".

Ivan Cutting's direction is clear and uncluttered; he lets the words, and the actors, speak, and the mood is often light, the action and the emotion always compelling. And at the end of the two hours, you will certainly want to read more by, and about, John Clare, and maybe listen to more Neil Diamond …

Delighted to catch the show again in the slightly less evocative surroundings of the Cramphorn; the story of the "nineteenth century farmhand and poetic genius", born with a sense of loss, just as powerful. More keenly aware of the parallels within the structure - Mrs Emerson and Mrs Zhang, for instance. And the echoes of Curious Incident and Equus a little more insistent ...

I am, yet what I am none cares or knows
My friends forsake me like a memory lost
I am the self-consumer of my woes
They rise and vanish in oblivious host
Like shadows in love's frenzied, stifled throes
And yet I am, and live, like vapours tossed

Into the nothingness of scorn and noise
Into the living sea of waking dreams
Where there is neither sense of life or joys
But the vast shipwreck of my life's esteems;
Even the dearest, that I loved the best
Are strange - nay, rather stranger than the rest

I am
I said
To no one there
And no one heard at all

Not even the chair

THE HIRED MAN

THE HIRED MAN

The Mercury, Colchester

23.03.13

Melvyn Bragg's beloved Cumbrian fells form the arena for this epic tale, a stage version of his Tallentire trilogy.

Juliet Shillingford's stunning design at the Mercury has massive slate slabs for actors and musicians, surrounded by a misty suggestion of the distant hills, dominated later by the pits and factories that will lure the men from the farms.

The simplicity of the setting points up the strength of the story, which begins when John [a searingly honest performance from David Hunter] joins the other lads to ply for hire, as farmers recruit for the "war with the land". In half a dozen scenes and two dozen songs, we follow the family through troubles, turmoil and the tragedy of war. John's Emily [poignantly acted and superbly sung by Julie Atherton] struggles with loss and illicit love as her menfolk risk their lives in the trenches and the mines.

The thirteen actor musicians – there's fiddle, trumpet and recorders as well as the piano and harp trio – give wonderfully committed performances in large roles and small: the recruiting sergeant, the farmers in the pub, brothers Isaac and Seth, the idealist dreamer. Kit Orton is a powerful presence as Jackson, Emily's secret lover, and the next generation, May and Harry, are given lively, rounded characterizations by Jill Cardo and Jamie Barnard.

As well as the sweeping saga of this very English family story, there is Howard Goodall's music, folk-inspired, stirring and tender by turns, it arises naturally from the dialogue and adds another dimension to an already stunning show. Day Follows Day, a later addition to the 1984 score, was especially memorable, as was Get Up and Go Lad, with its energetic choreography. Richard Reeday, like director Daniel Buckroyd no stranger to this show, is the MD at the onstage upright.

Buckroyd's direction asks a lot of his company, in this, his first major show for the Mercury. They've certainly come up with the goods – a dazzling ensemble in a solid gold revival of this seminal show. It plays the Mercury until 6 April, then transfers to the Curve in Leicester.

VISITING HOUR

VISITING HOUR

Latchingdon Arts and Drama Society at The Tractor Shed

23.03.13

Richard Harris [no, not him, the other one] has a long pedigree of scripts for telly, plus a couple of popular hits for the stage.

Visiting Hour [1990] is a lesser work, a sequence of six scenes set in a hospital ward. From The National Health to Our Boys, it's a potent metaphor for the wider world.

LADS' production boasted a lovely ward in two-tone green; real beds too.

Not well lit, with much of the area in shadow. The transitions were smoothly handled, with curtains drawn round beds, the visiting bell and the beep of cardiac monitors.

The writing, and the acting, were patchy. Two of the pieces are monologues. Carole Hart coped well with Keeping Mum: a little bedside housekeeping, a few home truths and then a darker dénouement as her marriage breaks up and she is chillingly revealed as a serial, compulsive hospital visitor.

The other monologue, which had very little to do with the rest of the scenes, saw Robin Warnes' Mr Archer sharing a lifetime of memories and snatches of song with no-one in particular, his only visitors two ghosts from the past.

Lighter moments elsewhere, with Gill Bridle confronting her paralysed husband with the farcical infidelity that led to his accident. Bill Wright was excellent as the unfailingly cheerful Mr Darbon, bemoaning the dearth of Ronnie Ronalde on his hospital headphones. He's the unwitting star of a transplant documentary, made by his media-whore of a surgeon and a comically camp crew.

Going Home saw Tricia and Cheryl, stewed prunes and apple tart, recovering from hysterectomies while the voice of doom and the busybody pass through the ward. It did boast one of the few laugh-aloud lines of the evening: "Monday she loses her womb; Friday they take all her furniture."

And the slightly surreal last scene – Magic – was enlivened by Keith Spencer's amateur magician and Holly Hallam's Sandra, feeding the payphone with 10p pieces in a vain attempt to rescue a relationship.

By their nature, these scenes are static. Director Arthur Barton moved his actors as much as plausible, and sometimes more, but there were still some dreary longueurs, punctuated sporadically by interesting, touching or amusing moments. Much like life on the ward, I suspect.