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Post by joem on Dec 10, 2016 12:14:26 GMT
What is the most you would pay to watch a play or musical at today's prices?
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Post by joem on Dec 10, 2016 1:20:21 GMT
I didn't even like those. Their acting was wooden, and added nothing to the performance, so far as I could see. Someone must have pulled some strings for them.
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Post by joem on Dec 8, 2016 22:22:23 GMT
Mediocre play which Rylance can't save because, in any case, he's too busy playing his Rylance persona. I've read the posts which praise the poetry. I love poetry and will happily go to a poetry reading. But I see no need to parcel it as a play.
There are some good lines - both comic and poetic, sometimes even both - but as a play it simply does not add up.
Loved the puppets.
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Post by joem on Nov 20, 2016 18:12:49 GMT
Interesting idea to check on how Enoch Powell's pronouncements in the sixties relate to the modern debate on immigration. In the end, though, there is something missing in this play.
The idea of introducing a modern dimension where two academics of different races have had previous due to different interpretations the "Rivers of Blood" speech but now look for ways in which they can work together is introduced for dramatic tension, to create another story arc. But you're left a bit frustrated by these fictional characters. Enough happened in real life without having to graft them into the story.
Admittedly Hannan isn't writing a straightforward biplay. He is trying to establish (did anyone say Brexit?) if it is possible to have dialogue between radically opposing views. So it is certainly an ambitious play, probably worth toruing in my view.
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Post by joem on Nov 13, 2016 1:26:12 GMT
He was one of the last links with the Hollywood golden era, even if he wasn't a big film star himself. Television seemed to be his medium and not many can boast of having had three major hit series (at least): UNCLE, The Protectors (a personal favourite) and the wonderful Hustle.
He didn't seem to fluff any lines the night I saw 12 Angry Men.
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Post by joem on Nov 13, 2016 0:58:33 GMT
A normal human being normally feels compassion at the passing of another human being unless the person who has died is an obvious ogre.
The celebrity thing does it take to silly heights at times. I was upset at Bowie's death because he was a great artist and a part of my life. I grew up to a soundtrack of Bowie and others.
But the death of Leonard Cohen has had a more profound effect on me because he was, for me, the most talented, humane and funny artist of his generation. A poet of substance not just a songwriter.
During his long final tour, which took a couple of years, I actually saw ten concerts and met him at Manchester Airport where he proved to be as charming personally as his public persona had become. So I was very upset and it has nothing to do with Diana or being a professional mourner. It is becaue I've lost a small (in terms of personal contact) but important figure in my life.
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Post by joem on Oct 31, 2016 21:35:23 GMT
This is apparently on at the Birmingham Rep. Has anyone been to see it?
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Post by joem on Oct 31, 2016 21:29:21 GMT
I am going to a concert there in February. Very large venues like the Palladium and the Coliseum might have to go down that route.
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Post by joem on Oct 28, 2016 13:14:18 GMT
I think too much is made of this. British people are traditionally on the prudish side, which is why nudity on stage is a big thing. If people were more relaxed about nudity there'd be less smut around.
As a point of fact: when female and male nudity on stage statistics are compared, I assume female breasts count as nudity but male chests do not. Is that part of the reason for the imbalance?
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Post by joem on Oct 26, 2016 22:24:11 GMT
An ambitious play with an epic feel and a genuinely interesting lead role, played superbly by Anne-Marie Duff. If the ambition isn't quite matched by the achievement then I, for one, can take that. Interesting theatre isn't always the most technically accomplished but if you don't try to do something new then the theatre deteriorates into a diet of seaid old favourites.
This plays with the medium, tells an interesting story and kept the audience - at least when I saw it - entertained. I thought the last scene was the weakest as the fat suits immediately took it into the realm of farce and the dystopia was, frankly, ill-conceived and simply not credible.
Some of the arguments, when they finally got going, were simplistic. To the point where I felt at times the point of view was arguing against the text. But boring this mst definitely is not.
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Post by joem on Oct 26, 2016 22:16:04 GMT
Is it time that someone should demand more transparency on this? Practically every West End theatre is charging this now but is the money only spent on restoration? And once the theatre is restored shouldnt the levy cease until the next restoration - surely decades down the line - is required?
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Post by joem on Oct 26, 2016 6:34:01 GMT
But at the end of the day theatres, even the subsidised ones Shakespeare's Globe is a not-for-profit Trust, so it's neither subsidised nor a business. That's at the root of today's news issue. Individual Board members and major donors are too disruptively influential because of its structure. A not-for-profit Trust still depends on punters, it is a decision on where the money goes to rather than where it comes from. No punters, no theatre.
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Post by joem on Oct 25, 2016 22:25:43 GMT
My first visit to a West End theatre was as a tourist. I have been going back for forty years now.
It is interesting how some people want to feel they are part of a cultural elite because we go to plays. But at the end of the day theatres, even the subsidised ones, are businesses with doors open to anyone who will pay; the more who pay the merrier because it guarantees the continuity of what we love. I don't care if they are locals, tourists, theatre fanatics or economic migrants. All are welcome.
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Post by joem on Oct 25, 2016 22:14:22 GMT
Howard Davies has died. All My Sons remains one of the best productions I've ever seen. This story is nowhere on the net. You are sure?
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Post by joem on Oct 24, 2016 22:19:03 GMT
This has been going on for a couple of weeks and still has some days to go. The play I saw was "The Wicker Hamper", a comic rip-off of "The Wicker Man", "Psycho" and others. It kind of proved the point being discussed elsewhere on this site about horror on stage. Agreeable nonsense but confirming for me that horror is more often a sub-genre of comedy than a genre in its own right.
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Post by joem on Oct 24, 2016 8:29:31 GMT
Many there ? This theatre has been on life support for decades. Decent turn-out. I'd say 75/80% full. I didn't get the impression that it is organised along the lines of what you could call similar outfits, those well outside central London such as the Rose, Orange Tree, Hampstead or the Park Theatre. Such programme as is adertised for the coming weeks appears bitty and haphazard. It's a shame. Quite a decent space.
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Post by joem on Oct 23, 2016 22:46:00 GMT
I think Michael Billington and Rufus Norris would be many peoples' top job. The coverage of the arts is a big selling point for the Guardian and they would try and maintain the status quo, but certainly agree you couldn't replace Michael on a 1 for1 basis, but agree I worry the demise of quality art journalism. I worry about the quality of culture as a whole. The internet theoretically created a whole new space to work in and to publicise cultural events. But modern media has also balkanised culture whilst depriving many artists of the rightful fruits of their labour. And a contrast current has concentrated great power in the hands of a few broadcasters. If artists cannot make an income from their work their commitment to their work will be on a hobby basis and creativity will suffer.
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Post by joem on Oct 23, 2016 22:28:11 GMT
I've been to a couple this week and Halloween (dread festival) is just round the corner. So this is kind of semi-topical, not just on a frolic of my own here hopefully.
The big question is: has anyone ever seen a play in the horror genre which really frightened them? Do they exist? I am not referring to violence, or thrillers or anything like that. I'm thinking supernatural, psychological thriller and so forth. "The Woman In Black" is a huge box-office hit but I saw it in amatinee performance with a bunch of sixth-form kids and very few of them seemed to find it terrifying. Likewise "Ghost Stories" which has had a couple of decent runs.
Is it simply a case of wrong medium? Any ideas?
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Post by joem on Oct 23, 2016 22:20:36 GMT
It would be one of my dream jobs, theatre critic. Not specifically at the Guardian - I suspect it's on its last legs anyway - but anywhere reasonably respectable.
I always stay for the whole show as you know.
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Post by joem on Oct 23, 2016 22:13:13 GMT
A one-off performance and a first visit from me to this theatre. Nice to have options on a Sunday.
This is adapted from HP Lovercraft's story "The Rats In The Wall" and is basically a two-hander. I guess "The Woman In Black" is the model for the production. It is an atypical Lovecraft story in that it is set in UK rather than the US and that the mention of his Ctulhu mythos is fairly peripheral.
Horror on stage, as has been said elsewhere, is the most difficult genre to pull off. So if this doesn't come off as a spine-chiller it merely joins a long and honourable tradition of other works which don't reduce the audience to screams of terror. The specific problem with this play, which haunts many others in the genre, is the overwhelming narrative content. It is hard to feel scared at what someone is telling you in the same way as when you are experiencing it yourself. "Show, don't tell" is the mantra of many filmmakers. It partly holds true for theatre as well. Whilst anyone will happily put up with a second-hand descriptive but marvellously poetic speech by the likes of Shakespeare, eg the first description of Cleopatra in A&C, prosaic accounts in modern plays can be tedious and unengaging.
The actors, particularly David Gilbrook in the quite demanding role of Robert Delapore, the heir to the mysterious Priory, which features stupendously long monologues, make a decent stab of it; but get someone with a good voice in a darkened room to simply read the original text of the story in a dramatic manner and it would probably be a creepier experience.
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Post by joem on Oct 22, 2016 22:11:00 GMT
Upstairs at the Gate in Highgate is quite large I think. The Coronet on Notting Hill Gate too.
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Post by joem on Oct 22, 2016 21:59:10 GMT
A revival of two one-act plays - "Heart's Desire" and "Blue Kettle" - for an evening of surprisingly surreal, bordering on absurdist drama, by Caryl Churchill.
Some spoilers below, maybe.
"Heart's Desire" is the more successful play of the two. A scene where a family (husband, wife, aunt and occasional drunken irruptions by son) anxiously await the return from Australia of the daughter of the house. The scene is replayed time and time again, with minor variations, gradually moving forward in time but without a definitive version of what really happens - if anything happens at all. During the process we learn, or think we learn, different aspects and nuances of the characters and the state of the family. Is it a dream? Is it different versions of a potential truth? Who knows, but naturally the premise provides enough comic opportunities for the audience to enjoy plenty of laughs and perhaps think a little about what on earth is going on.
"Blue Kettle", ostensibly about a conman trying to get something out of a string of plausible but probably false biological mothers, soon abandons plot for playing on words with "blue" and "kettle" featuring increasingly in every sentence as substitutes for other words. What bothers me is how this is described in reviews and elsewhere as being outstandingly innovate when it had been done more than twenty years before, with regularity, by the Monty Python team. Think "Spam, spam, spam..."
Some playwrights are very lucky indeed to be the darlings of critics and reviewers!
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Post by joem on Oct 15, 2016 22:22:22 GMT
Goodness. Was there anyone on this board not there tonight???
I was neither shocked (not that this was Ravenhill's stated intention) nor very disturbed.
The staging was good and the cast was enthusiastic and gave their all. But the play is an extremely blunt and rather flabby instrument. It seems to have one point and it might get this through more effectively with more subtlety, less repetition and more sympathetic characterisation.
Inventive theatre and theatricality but textually speaking clumsy and obvious.
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Post by joem on Oct 15, 2016 21:00:29 GMT
There may well be Dylan songs which work as poetry, excuse my ignorance - and I'm certainly not about to comment on Sondheim about whom I know even less. But it seems to me he operates as a songwriter, in the main, not a poet and there are differences in what consitutes one or the other.
I think the issue here is do song lyrics count as literature or not? The consensus is probably "no", although the Nobel committee may think it is "yes". What many are suggesting is that the committee may have made the wrong decision for this award because what they are giving it (song lyrics which they may think are poetry) for is not what they are supposed to be awarding it for (literature).
That is the conundrum.
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Post by joem on Oct 15, 2016 20:54:09 GMT
You are probably both right. But since I hadn't seen them on either occasion.... ticked them off my list!
To be fair there's (hopefully) a whole new generation of theatregoers now since 1989.
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Post by joem on Oct 15, 2016 11:50:25 GMT
That is one way of "leaning heavily"! Really? In toto?
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Post by joem on Oct 15, 2016 11:49:36 GMT
Two late plays ("I Can't Remember Anything" and "Clara") by Miller on the related theme of memory.
These really feel like vignettes more than one-act plays. "Clara" has more dramatic possibilities but also fizzles out in a haze of indeterminate dialogue. Perhaps that was Miller's intention but I get the feeling his mojo sadly left him in his last years.
Sparse staging as you would expect, and you don't need much more for this, and the actors have a decent stab at the unpromising material.
Thanks to Theatro Technis for having the courage to stage this, thus giving me the opportunity to see it on what was my first visit to this Mornington Crescent venue, but it's Miller for completists. I hope there will be enough of those to make it worth their while.
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Post by joem on Oct 15, 2016 11:17:22 GMT
I played Herod in this as a teenager in a production so bad that, with hindsight, it was probably very funny in bits. At the time it was a nightmare.
It has some wonderfully lyrical language as I remember but can easily become soporific without tight direction and variety of pace.
One of the best operas I've seen was a Swedish production of Richard Strauss' version of the story which I beleive leaned quite heavily on Wilde.
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Post by joem on Oct 15, 2016 10:58:53 GMT
I have nothing against Dylan who is a fantastic songwriter but, as has been said, song lyrics - including his - are rarely poetry or literature.
If they had given it to Leonard Cohen I would also have been surprised but would have understood it better since he was a poet before being a pop artist and has produced a good number of volumes of critically acclaimed poetry.
The Nobel has over the years made a number of strange awards, presumably to publicise itself. I tend to think this is one of them.
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Post by joem on Oct 10, 2016 22:36:34 GMT
I wouldn't mind about The Mousetrap being a long runner, if only it thrilled and was a good production of a good play. It is none of those. Has there ever been a thrilling Agatha Christie on stage, full of unbearable tension? I suspect not. I saw a decent "Cards On The Table" once with Gordon Jackson it. But these plays are what they are, everything has its style or genre or authorial mark. I have yet to see a play by Shakespeare which doesn't rely heavily on iambic pentameter. At the end of the day we either accept they are (or were) popular for whatever reason or we decide that the millions of people who've enjoyed Agatha Christie are unmitigated fools.
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