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Post by peelee on Jun 13, 2016 0:57:44 GMT
In this play one character being a writer does essentially explain the social and work circle in which he met his wife, an actress. I think she says she likes the villa they are holidaying in because it's somewhere that her husband can write with little distraction and where she can learn her lines.. Early on, her husband refuses to discuss his writing with one of the visitors to the villa despite the latter's persistent curiosity. Years pass and some mention of his writerly success or failure is made, as slight exposition and to indicate the passing of time and the personal transformations undergone.
In 'Apologia', another of this writer's plays, a character has written a memoir, but that relates to the life she has lived and what another character will say they think of that life. I liked the performed production but have forgotten some characters in 'The Faith Machine', though recall that somewhere in it a Greek island features. These sorts of characters and locations variously feature as significant or incidental factors. So in new play 'Kenny Morgan', for instance, one character being a famous writer is integral to the story and the social world being depicted, whereas in the recent 'Lawrence After Arabia' one character's fame as a writer, he being George Bernard Shaw, helps explain and assist what else playwright Brenton wants to do in the play. All different again from 'Seminar', a a recent play at Hampstead, which really was about writing as an occupation.
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Post by peelee on Jun 1, 2016 18:13:35 GMT
I quite like the Arcola, and I'm looking forward to this play.
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Post by peelee on May 31, 2016 16:55:27 GMT
"Returning to the topic - anyone seen this apart from Mister I-Hate-Everything? I fancy it because of Sam Crane & Ben Miles and 20 quid front row Friday Rush seats but it if proves to be that awful by everyone I might give it a miss.. Not too many days in London to spare and so much I want to see!" — wrote rumbledoll It's not awful at all, rumbledoll, though if your spare days are few then please note that, at present, tickets look a little more available from mid-July. I'd booked because when early this year I had read of it being set "..on a Greek island in April 1967" I had an inkling of what the author might deal with and also the year and month set off memories of those times. In the foreground on stage, a domestic setting where a holiday villa and sea view inspire love and longing in one couple, while for its Greek owners their longing is eventually confronted by necessity. Other holidaymakers, or rather US international travellers, represent a link to what is in process and presumably seething in the background. Two links here, a quirky, personal one by a fellow who seems to know the country, and a Wiki link to events in Greece (that the play does not spell out about this troubled Eden). The closest to any consideration of that, is a fascinating article about Chile in the 1970s by Latin American specialist Arturo Valenzuela, in the theatre programme, Chile being a parallel on another continent to what Greece had undergone and, incidentally, involving Chicago School economist Milton Friedman (whose nostrums also made themselves felt in 1980s Britain): www.ahistoryofgreece.com/junta.htmen.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greek_military_junta_of_1967–74But you have to read around for this, well away from the play, to the extent you are at all curious about the background and why Harvey (Ben Miles) is so influential in the unfolding of this story. He was the only one of the excellent cast I recognised, though I realised later I had seen Elizabeth McGovern in US films years ago. It was lovely to hear Greek spoken on stage, the play a reminder too of Greece's current state. There is the authenticity of the writer's connections to the land of his birth, and presumably heartfelt thoughts about times past, present and what the future there could hold for the Greek people. All of these events, influences and concerns bubble away behind this apparently idyllic scene, and they present the audience with plenty to think about. While democracy and Greece and theatre and Greece eventually surface, the play has echoes too of Greek myth — so that it is like watching something that is at once very old, yet timeless and contemporary. It's really rather good: a lovely piece of writing, the cast plays it well, the production is lovely to look at, and it is worth seeing.
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Post by peelee on May 19, 2016 14:36:29 GMT
Excellent play. Thought-provoking and amusing, and surely some of the tersest dialogue for such taciturn characters ever presented on stage.
It's saying something important about contemporary life and the situations people find themselves in, and I suspect that many people 'out there' would acknowledge that were they ever to see this.
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Post by peelee on May 19, 2016 14:25:11 GMT
Fascinating subject. Good writer. Enjoyed this.
Though I particularly liked Geraldine James as Charlotte Shaw and Jeff Rawle as George Bernard Shaw (what a clever choice of characters for a play like this) and Jack Laskey was a convincing TE Lawrence, it had a good cast in general. I liked this a lot. I was struck by the direction but also the production design that provided the look and sound required, and scene changes took place in seconds.
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Post by peelee on May 19, 2016 14:12:51 GMT
The National Theatre will have a ticketing policy that is stated, probably on its website. But not spelled out is the range of situations facing the theatre, cast members, or individual or corporate buyers of tickets such that tickets for sale can appear hours or even days before any given performance of a play. I rather like the way that tickets can be booked months ahead at a range of prices and according to how many other buyers there are at the time, but also well after those booking periods whether full price or discounted in order to fill the theatre when something has not been selling that well. You take a punt, don't you?
I've got bargains on the day, online. I have queued for day tickets although not always getting tickets as a result. I have booked months ahead so keen was I to get tickets for certain plays, then found that others lacked my keenness and later they got the ticket-discounts. I guess I've bought tickets originally bought by people who could not get to London as intended, or who have had to leave London suddenly, or from people suddenly bereaved. Three or four times in the last couple of years, I've acquired tickets returned because of imminent London Underground strikes, worked out how to get home by non-Tube means, and then the strikes didn't take place because both sides returned to the negotiating table so I got home without any inconvenience.
You keep your wits about you, in the London manner!
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Post by peelee on May 18, 2016 12:39:02 GMT
I see that it is coming to the National Theatre in London, running from 08 August to 01 October.
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Post by peelee on May 15, 2016 14:18:27 GMT
I quite liked this & don't regret seeing it, though had I waited for the reviews, I doubt I'd have booked. I did however wonder whether the references to carrot cake were anachronistic; I think of that as a relatively recent US import. Worth a glance: www.carrotmuseum.co.uk/carrotcake.html
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Post by peelee on May 7, 2016 9:52:26 GMT
Sean O'Casey's The Bishop's Bonfire Henry Chapman's You Won't Always Be On TopEric Bentley's Are You Now Or Have You Ever Been?Giles Cooper's Everything in the GardenHoward Brenton's The Churchill PlayStephen Poliakoff's Strawberry FieldsTrevor Griffiths OccupationsShelagh Stephenson's An Experiment With An Air PumpAlan Bleasdale's On the Ledge
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Post by peelee on May 5, 2016 8:30:08 GMT
It's odd how after all this cyberspace-time, some institutions still get their websites wrong. Occasionally they even manage to make what was not bad at all into something much worse than its predecessor.
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Post by peelee on Apr 24, 2016 17:03:32 GMT
Thanks, showgirl, I'll bear that in mind and look out for any deals that could get offered.
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Post by peelee on Apr 24, 2016 14:05:24 GMT
I was going to book seats for this some weeks ago before it began the run, but thought all the seats left were too expensive. It's a venue I have been to for plays half a dozen times at least and have mostly chosen well, though it has always largely depended on what my money could stretch to. I have been pleased to read some nice reviews for this production, so am confident that those attending will have enjoyed themselves.
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Post by peelee on Apr 20, 2016 8:46:57 GMT
I know two people who have booked to watch from cinema seats, knowing that the TV broadcast will become the filmed record of the occasion.
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Post by peelee on Apr 19, 2016 19:17:33 GMT
That'll be because Bruce Norris is one of those playwrights who thinks a bit and lets his imagination run. Rather like Lorraine Hansberry all those years ago learned that Jean Genet had written a play called 'The Blacks' and that set her thinking about, researching and writing 'Les Blancs'. All have some worth to them.
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Post by peelee on Apr 18, 2016 17:06:57 GMT
I think that is pretty much it, TheatreDust, although you say you welcome the improvements for phone users. The changes to the website as seen from my desktop iMac look odd and presumably the new NT site is designed primarily for smartphone users.
Apple itself has done this very thing: redesigns for smartphone users while the rest of us can just fall in and tag along. So that menus look like child's-choice options where once Apple design had been a delight. And the updates of word processor software like Pages that come with less than the older versions because the smartphone people aren't using it as much more than a passing word processor that'll do for someone on the move. Or the way that the elegance of iTunes has given way to an inability of the new versions to simply list items and even to accept sound files or for me to know what the heck is going on when an iTune page now comprises a jumble of icons, lines of text, numbered files and 'unknown album' icons for reasons I cannot fathom.
It's a shame they cannot offer the various site-users some proper choice, rather than an implicit 'This'll have to do all online users' .
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Post by peelee on Apr 15, 2016 16:23:56 GMT
There was an excellent revival of his 'Chicken Soup with Barley' at the Tricycle Theatre only a few years ago, and then the well-choreographed staging of 'The Kitchen' at the National Theatre. But he wrote rather more than just these and wrote well about the 1950s, 1960s and 1970s. He also deserves praise for what he tried to make of that old railway turnabout Centre 42 in Chalk Farm/Camden Town later better known to its users as The Roundhouse.
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Post by peelee on Apr 15, 2016 16:14:11 GMT
It sounds like the telephone booking-fee is the equivalent of the donation level suggested to ticket-buyers when purchasing online, though that is optional.
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Post by peelee on Apr 15, 2016 16:07:13 GMT
When I turn to the NT website, I get a screen-wide picture (I don't know why that is required) of the bloke in 'The Suicide'. The rest of the screen uses up remaining space to tell the intending-user not that much.
That 'Activate Seating Map' shaded cover is annoying and erratic and seems unnecessary.
I must admit the first few times I called up the website in the last few days, my heart sank at the prospect of using this site.
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Post by peelee on Apr 6, 2016 15:00:09 GMT
The awards show broadcast on TV on Sunday night was weakly compered and much of it rather flat. I don't think that an even bigger venue, at the Royal Albert Hall next year, is what has been missing so far.
Years ago, the South Bank Show awards were set in a fairly low-capacity venue, yet the relative intimacy of it all made it more of an event. Or did it need to be better lit than it was last Sunday? Whatever, it requires more thought and self-criticism before next year's awards night comes along.
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Post by peelee on Apr 4, 2016 17:44:46 GMT
The preview on Wednesday night has been postponed until next week.
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Post by peelee on Apr 4, 2016 17:42:19 GMT
Peter O'Toole was tall and blond but that was the film company's casting decision.
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Post by peelee on Apr 4, 2016 10:04:47 GMT
This is a really good production of a fascinating play. Congratulations to everyone involved.
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Post by peelee on Mar 29, 2016 17:58:49 GMT
If you haven't already watched it, download the first episode of the new series of the usually brilliant BBC TV thriller 'Line of Duty', because while Daniel Mays is in it there are also so other things about the production to admire.
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Post by peelee on Mar 29, 2016 10:18:42 GMT
Good Friday has religious significance, but it may be a bank holiday too. Staffing shops and the like at Easter in a city like London nowadays, is likely to depend on the religious affiliations of staff.
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Post by peelee on Mar 24, 2016 16:43:23 GMT
This is some play and some production.
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Post by peelee on Mar 24, 2016 16:36:21 GMT
Is this play due to go on tour outside of Sheffield?
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