How do you feel about ageing? Do you dread your body’s gradual deterioration, or do you look forward to not caring what others think whilst living a life of leisure? Do you worry about how you will be provided for in this era of low wages, no savings and deteriorating pensions?
What with the prominent use of music in Twelfth Night, an actor-muso production is certainly a reasonable concept. Original Impact also sets the play in modern-day summertime, playing up the drunken frivolity at the forefront of the story. The recontextualisation largely works, though combined with some brutal editing, it glosses over the more sombre themes of grief and displacement. The cast demonstrate a range of ability with verse and performance skills, and there are some signs that the director isn’t familiar with Shakespeare. It’s not a terrible production by any means, but some minor adjustments would lend it a more professional feel.
Fancy Chance was born in Korea, abandoned as an infant, adopted by a conservative American family, then moved to London. After working as a table dancer and then in a peep show in Seattle, she moved into burlesque, drag, cabaret, live art and circus. Her CV that’s more varied than her cultural make-up, Fancy’s latest endeavour is her first solo performance, Flights of Fancy. Drawing on current politics, cultural clashes and expectations, and her performance history, the show is a collection of sketches that create a quirky autobiography of sorts. Endearing and fun with a biting finale, the piece’s through-line is woolly with loose connections between individual moments.
Discovery of the evening: Louis Braille was a child when he developed the alphabet of raised dots into the writing still used by blind and visually impaired people around the world today. It’s an especially impressive feat considering the run down and under-resourced institution he attended, Institut National des Jeunes Aveugles in Paris. However, the prevalent hostile attitude towards disabled people was a constant obstacle towards the system’s adoption; even the belief that blind people could be academically educated was radical at the time.
In his introduction to the Nuclear War text, Simon Stephens explains that as a playwright, he does not want directors and performers to revere him. Rather, he wants them to see his scripts as a starting point for their own creativity. The third line of the stage directions is, ‘a series of suggestions for a piece of theatre’; from these suggestions, choreographer-director Imogen Knight shapes a haunting landscape of physicalised despair.
Nick Cassenbaum grew up in London’s Jewish community and experienced all the cultural mores that go with it – Spurs games, dubious summer camps, trips to Israel and discovering his willy isn’t like the other boys’ at school. Like many young people as he got older, he hadn’t quite found his place in the world. Until he went with his grandfather, Papa Alan, to the Canning Town bathhouse.
A self-described modern rep company, Merely Theatre is addressing Shakespeare’s gender problem with 50/50 casting. Five male/female pairs each learn a set of characters in two plays, then on the night it’s decided who will perform. The result is a focus on clear storytelling rather than unimportant details such as the appearance or gender if individual characters. It’s a great device, and partnered with simple staging and a pace that doesn’t hang about, artistic director Scott Ellis has created a distinctive style of performance honouring the historical aesthetics of travelling players, though there’s a lack of nuance dissatisfying to modern audiences.
There’s a lighthouse on a barren stretch of America’s east coast that has seen more than it’s fair share of tragedy. It’s now the height of WWII and the building is inhabited by the surly Miss Lily, her Japanese housekeeper Mr Yasuhiro, and a couple of ghosts. A young boy arrives. Christopher is inquisitive and patriotic, the son of Lily’s brother who died in the war. With Lily less than enthusiastic about negotiating life with a child and the ghosts occasionally trying to lure him to a watery death, it’s understandable that Christopher acts up. But the story isn’t so much about the boy, even though it starts off as such. Part ghost story, part history lesson, part dealing with repressed feelings, and partly about learning to overcome prejudice, The Whisper House has the rumblings of a storm but never gets past the threat of rain.
Humayun and Babur have known each other since they were boys. Now the newest of emperor Shah Jahan’s imperial guards in Agra, the best friends work side-by-side on the night shift. Today is different, though. The first light of dawn will reveal the completed Taj Mahal, previously hidden from anyone other than its makers. Fit to burst with excitement, the two don’t know that the day to come will irrevocably change them as they fall prey to the giant cogs of the imperial machine.
By guest critic Rebecca JS Nice
Short and sweet, this half hour lunchtime show feeds feisty and giggly kiddies with a banquet of characters performing a range of tricks. A bearded ring master charms a female acrobat snake out of a trunk, and two musicians run around in monkey and pyjama costumes as their underage audience scream and shout at them. Programmed for the Easter holiday, the work is a strong contender among the ever-growing popularity of children’s theatre in London. Particularly special is Jackson’s Lane support for circus, which enriches their programming and sets a precedent for accommodating circus in small theatres.
The Play's The Thing UK 