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Post by theatrelover123 on Apr 26, 2018 16:09:37 GMT
We're pleased to announce today the cast of Machinal,Natalie Abrahami's visceral new production of Sophie Treadwell's masterpiece, coming this summer.
The full cast features Nathalie Armin, Emily Berrington, Khali Best, Denise Black, Demetri Goritsas, Andrew Lewis, Jonathan Livingstone, John Mackay, Alan Morrissey, Kirsty Rider, Augustina Seymour and Dwane Walcott.
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Post by Deleted on Apr 26, 2018 16:14:53 GMT
Ummmmm, où est Matthew Needham?
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Post by theatrelover123 on Apr 26, 2018 16:31:01 GMT
It's not exactly a top drawer cast (I think I was expecting a bigger 'name' for the lead female role) but I am sure they are all great actors
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Post by jasper on Apr 26, 2018 16:47:27 GMT
We're pleased to announce today the cast of Machinal,Natalie Abrahami's visceral new production of Sophie Treadwell's masterpiece, coming this summer. The full cast features Nathalie Armin, Emily Berrington, Khali Best, Denise Black, Demetri Goritsas, Andrew Lewis, Jonathan Livingstone, John Mackay, Alan Morrissey, Kirsty Rider, Augustina Seymour and Dwane Walcott. How do you know it will be visceral?
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Post by Rory on Apr 26, 2018 16:52:30 GMT
I think that's a quote from the Almeida's own press release.
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Post by jasper on Apr 26, 2018 17:54:33 GMT
I think that's a quote from the Almeida's own press release. There were no quote marks in the post. So my question is still pertinent. If it is I would ask the writer of the press release the same question.
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Post by jadnoop on Apr 26, 2018 18:11:50 GMT
I think that's a quote from the Almeida's own press release. There were no quote marks in the post. So my question is still pertinent. If it is I would ask the writer of the press release the same question. As Rory says, it's the text marketing email from the Almeida that came out about an hour ago. So probably best to treat the more qualitative stuff with a pinch of salt, as that's just marketing bumf.
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Post by jasper on Apr 26, 2018 18:48:25 GMT
There were no quote marks in the post. So my question is still pertinent. If it is I would ask the writer of the press release the same question. As Rory says, it's the text marketing email from the Almeida that came out about an hour ago. So probably best to treat the more qualitative stuff with a pinch of salt, as that's just marketing bumf. If it is part of marketing it cannot be misleading, so is it materially misleading if it is not visceral?
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Post by Deleted on Apr 26, 2018 19:41:45 GMT
Yeah, I think it's way more likely that theatrelover123 forgot the quotation marks than is noticeably pleased to share the news and is a part of the "we" mentioned in the press release. Honestly, I do love a good bit of pedantry, but this is bottom-drawer pedantry at best.
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Post by theatrelover123 on Apr 26, 2018 20:17:26 GMT
Yes!!!! CAN EVERYBODY JUST SHUT UP ABOUT QUOTATION MARKS AND VISCERAL!!!!!!!!
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Post by alicechallice on Apr 28, 2018 11:29:20 GMT
Ummmmm, où est Matthew Needham? Alan Morrissey looks nice, though.
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Post by jasper on Apr 28, 2018 12:35:03 GMT
Yeah, I think it's way more likely that theatrelover123 forgot the quotation marks than is noticeably pleased to share the news and is a part of the "we" mentioned in the press release. Honestly, I do love a good bit of pedantry, but this is bottom-drawer pedantry at best. 'Nothing is as peevish and pedantic as men's judgements of one another.' Erasmus
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Post by samuelwhiskers on Apr 28, 2018 13:53:07 GMT
We're pleased to announce today the cast of Machinal,Natalie Abrahami's visceral new production of Sophie Treadwell's masterpiece, coming this summer. The full cast features Nathalie Armin, Emily Berrington, Khali Best, Denise Black, Demetri Goritsas, Andrew Lewis, Jonathan Livingstone, John Mackay, Alan Morrissey, Kirsty Rider, Augustina Seymour and Dwane Walcott. How do you know it will be visceral? The Court accidentally announced that their current production was a "viscous judgement" of... something (patriarchy maybe?) the other day.
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Post by Deleted on Jun 8, 2018 14:38:33 GMT
Have booked for this after reading about the play and playwrite. Still seems to be reasonable availability. I don’t think I have ever seen any expressionist drama, so quite excited to see what they do with this.
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Post by Cardinal Pirelli on Jun 8, 2018 15:03:28 GMT
Have booked for this after reading about the play and playwrite. Still seems to be reasonable availability. I don’t think I have ever seen any expressionist drama, so quite excited to see what they do with this. You've probably seen expressionist writing and staging as part of a number of plays; sections of 'Curious Incident' and 'People, Places and Things' for example. It's one of those styles that has been subsumed into playwriting so much that it's not really noticed.
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Post by showgirl on Jun 8, 2018 17:26:29 GMT
I see one blogger has complained bitterly on Twitter about the poor sight-lines due to the use of a proscenium arch.
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Post by Deleted on Jun 8, 2018 18:14:20 GMT
I see one blogger has complained bitterly on Twitter about the poor sight-lines due to the use of a proscenium arch. I am now worried about the £20 seats I bought today.
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Post by showgirl on Jun 9, 2018 3:56:30 GMT
Don't worry but do contact the theatre to ask. Most are more careful about this and would change the seating configuration/hold some seats off-sale/contact those who have booked if necessary, but better safe than sorry.
This was the tweet:
"If you’ve bought a ticket for the side stalls at #Machinal @almeidatheatre please be aware that you view will be severely obstructed by an unnecessary & unusual (for the theatre) proscenium arch. No doubt it is part of the designer’s (extremely restricted) vision. #SpoiledTheShow"
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Post by foxa on Jun 9, 2018 7:17:34 GMT
I'm in for this tonight. Trying to remember where I booked - I think it a £10 pillar seat.
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Post by nash16 on Jun 9, 2018 7:34:53 GMT
We were in E23 and E24 on Wednesday, first two seats on the right hand side side stalls block, and missed a few people in the back right hand corner of the stage in the first typing pool scene and again near the end of the play.
The issues staging wise is that Abrahami/Buether have chosen to place a lot of the scenes in the mid centre stage area when they should/could actually be much further forward.
This, along with the fact that Buether has also chosen to put the side wall blacks in to create her old school photographic effect in between and during scenes, does severely restrict the cheaper seats side-stalls in quite a few of the scenes.
If you saw The Twilight Zone, it's basically that effect design wise that Buether has gone for. However the seating arrangement is "normal Almeida" thus the restirictions.
A blessing not many have noted during Goold's reign here is that many of his directors/designers have (maybe flukily) favoured opening up the stage space and getting rid of the side-blacks when mounting their shows. For the £20 and £10 side Stalls seats, this has meant, a single pillar aside, their views have been much improved. I for one have been glad of it and breathed a sigh of relief when going into shows like Summer & Smoke, Carmen Disruption, and others there.
Maybe it could be something early Preview visitors could mention when feeding back on a show's design here: if the stage is fully open, or if they've tabbed it and out in the fake walls at the sides to create a proscenium.
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Xanderl
Member
Not always very high value in terms of ticket yield or donations
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Post by Xanderl on Jun 9, 2018 7:58:07 GMT
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Post by lonlad on Jun 9, 2018 9:05:48 GMT
No actual remarks about the production? Am curious to hear, given how vivid my memories are of the two NY productions (including Lyndsey Turner's with Rebecca Hall), not to mention Fiona Shaw almost being eaten alive by the design for the play when Daldry did it at the Nash.
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Post by zahidf on Jun 9, 2018 9:05:54 GMT
Anyone know the running time?
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Post by Steve on Jun 9, 2018 16:04:49 GMT
Anyone know the running time? Almeida's Twitter says 90 minutes. A running time I know Showgirl will be pleased with. Me too. Hope Emily Berrington has more to do in this than in Season 3 of Humans, so far. She was great in Children's Children at the Almeida, and in previous Humans seasons on Channel 4, but the writers don't seem to care about her character this year.
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Post by mallardo on Jun 9, 2018 16:24:52 GMT
Not positive but I believe Emily Berrington is the lead in this? I hope so. I too have fond memories of her in Children's Children.
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Post by nash16 on Jun 9, 2018 16:42:28 GMT
No actual remarks about the production? Am curious to hear, given how vivid my memories are of the two NY productions (including Lyndsey Turner's with Rebecca Hall), not to mention Fiona Shaw almost being eaten alive by the design for the play when Daldry did it at the Nash. Some remarks: The production isn't great. Abrahami has chosen to take us, with each named scene, across the decades from the 1920's, when Treadwell wrote it, through to the present day, but this seems to do little for the play itself, other than clang the audience over the head in a sort of "this is relevant to today" kind of way. I'm not sure if the story of "young woman" being choosing to get married and then having an affair because she's unhappy is desperately new or relevant to today though? Maybe female viewers would find more to the play than we did though. It is a woman "stuck" in her marriage and position in society. Which I, of course, would empathise with, but the young woman chooses this, or seems to, so the actual level of sympathy towards her is actually quite low. It's a strange beast because of this. Alongside the "expressionist" writing, which distances us maybe? Or is it the continual blasts of blinding light Miriam Buether inflicts on us (for reasons neither of us could actually fathom?). It genuinely becomes painful each time, and then sort of funny. The woman next to me giggled into her husbands armipit every time we had another blinding session. Take the strongest sunglasses you can find. The design seems at odds with the production, which in turn seems at odds with the play. It just all felt too distant and non involving. We became passive as an audience. Watching rather than feeling. There were two big student groups in who screamed their heads off at the end, a bit like at Julie. But we weren't quite sure which elements of the production they were screaming in appreciation for? The acting is fine. Berrington looks right but speaks all her lines monotone and robot like. I'm sure she's been directed this way, (in keeping with the style of the original maybe?) but it screams out for a more personal, emotional, empathetic performance, which could be surrounded by the Westworld robots of the other characters. I wanted Denise Gough, or similar, looking around her in desperate shock as her life gets consumed. Berrington's young woman is all too neat. Even the head shaving scene is refined. A few hairs being taken from her wig all too easily. I think Buether's set could have been better put to use in a better production. One that drives the action forward in a nightmarish whirlwind descent into hell. The play seems to read this way. This production doesn't do that.
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Post by Cardinal Pirelli on Jun 9, 2018 17:37:57 GMT
Expressionism in its pure form, as in ths play, doesn’t bother with driving ‘the action forward’, it’s deliberately episodic and disrupts the audience’s desire for narrative clairity and the cause and effect of realism. The story and characterisation are very disjointed but they are absolutely meant to be, as though the main character sees her life in blinding flashes of moments. The character isn’t one to empathise with either, she is contradictory, makes bad mistakes but, yet, challenges an audience to think ‘fine, but nobody deserves that’.
Given mentions of both Humans and Westworld already (both great shows in my opinion), maybe it should be noted that all characters in this are human!
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Post by nash16 on Jun 9, 2018 20:39:47 GMT
Expressionism in its pure form, as in ths play, doesn’t bother with driving ‘the action forward’, it’s deliberately episodic and disrupts the audience’s desire for narrative clairity and the cause and effect of realism. The story and characterisation are very disjointed but they are absolutely meant to be, as though the main character sees her life in blinding flashes of moments. The character isn’t one to empathise with either, she is contradictory, makes bad mistakes but, yet, challenges an audience to think ‘fine, but nobody deserves that’. Given mentions of both Humans and Westworld already (both great shows in my opinion), maybe it should be noted that all characters in this are human! Yep, but the problem with this production is you don't even think that at the end: "but nobody deserves that’. " You just think "oh, that's happened to her"...
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Post by nash16 on Jun 9, 2018 20:45:05 GMT
"as though the main character sees her life in blinding flashes of moments"
Not sure about this idea you've mooted though, if you're trying to justify Buether's ACTUAL blinding of the audience.
It did become hilarious watching the audience cower from it and laugh at each other as they did so.
I think it bonded us more than the story did! 😂 😎
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Post by Cardinal Pirelli on Jun 9, 2018 21:47:51 GMT
"as though the main character sees her life in blinding flashes of moments" Not sure about this idea you've mooted though, if you're trying to justify Buether's ACTUAL blinding of the audience. It did become hilarious watching the audience cower from it and laugh at each other as they did so. I think it bonded us more than the story did! 😂 😎 No, it’s just the way the structure comes across to me. As though we are seeing her life in shards of lucidity.
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