The House of Bernarda Alba - Lyttleton (NT)

I found as she is so taken with style and her own way

The text comes secondary to this

In this play it means there is a lack of explosive sexual tension

Other than some gyrating against a gate

I actually enjoyed the first half

After the interval despite it being only about 40 mins

It dragged and I found and tension had evaporated

The set was also distracting and did not evoke the presence of outside space or heat whatsoever

Interesting you say this, as I thought her productions of Cabaret, R&J and Streetcar were all brilliantly coherent and arguably the best productions of all of those shows I've seen for a long while...

Saw this on Monday, so I've had a time to thick about it. Basically it's another play about a dysfunctional family. Lots of swearing, & violence. Harriet Walter dominated the stage as the controlling matriarch but for me the actress playing the grandmother was outstanding. She was so like my own demented mother. I don't think I have given too much away. I liked the set but there were times when things were happening at several places at once. I went to see it as my girlfriend had it in her Spanish classes. I think it scores 3 stars with me.
I can't remember any music. The NT does great music so I thought that some Spanish music might be there.

Something like this that seems to be spanning the range of opinion is always worth seeing for oneself, I think. It's not like it is being universally slated or anything even close.

I quite liked this. The overlapping dialogue getting interwoven between scenes took a while to get used to (not helped by the fact that I was front row and so I couldn't see half of the scenes so I had no idea who was speaking lol), but I didn't think the play was a slog to get through or anything. Glad I caught it, but wish I had sat further back.

I find her a very derivative director. Her mannerisms are all taken from other directors, you can check them off: the dance is Carrie Cracknell, the slow movement is Katie Mitchell and so on. That’s not to say she isn’t a good director but she isn’t innovative. And being a director with mannerisms risks the Richard Jones problem where they get applied irrespective of whether they are appropriate for the play or not.

Those elements are currently seen in theatre all over, they are commonplace, they just happen to be fashionable now. To take a different example, the countdown clock (a comment up the thread suggests there is one here ? Probably not). I’d never seen that in any production at all until quite recently yet then I saw several productions use the idea. Those directors didn’t just independently come up with the idea. A genuinely innovative director used it first (was it Ivo Van Hove ?) and the rest followed. Same with slow-motion/speeded-up motion/backwards motion - never saw that before Katie Mitchell, now it’s everywhere.

And van Hove is the director perhaps most derided for his trademarks, in a way that has grown out the sphere of just ardent theatregoers, no matter what technical innovations are ascribed to him.

Moreover, most of Frecknall's success particularly among the critics, is jotted down to her ability to reconceive or reframe characters and stories, whether you agree with that or not. And she has genuine sense for theatricality and ability to create striking visuals, so it is kind of obtuse to compare her to Carrie Cracknell of all people.

I thought this was very good and held my attention thoughout.

Having read the thread, I came prepared for not much Spanish heat and the unnecessary f words from the adaptor Alice Birch.

I’m a big fan of Rebecca Frecknall’s work, having enjoyed Summer and Smoke, Streetcar and Cabaret. She was less successful here, but the use of slo-mo in one scene, colour changes and dance for Pepe worked well for me. What I think she brings though is an understanding of the characters and the best performances from her actors, so the director’s tricks aren’t imposed on the production for no effect.

4 stars

Caught last night's performance. A show stop about 30 minutes into Act Two just after Poncia's scene with Bernarda, actors called to clear the stage and maybe a 15 minute or so pause followed by announcement from (i'm assuming) the stage manager that for the duration of the performance Georgia Silver would be playing Martirio. I missed completely if something happened that took her out but was a shame as I found Lizzie Annis to be a total standout in the first half. I think they finished as well they could and the audience certainly perked up after that (the understudy even getting her own individual bow and a very warm hand from both the crowd and cast) but it's tricky to sort of have the momentum interrupted like that.
I agree with the previous poster in that I found the first 30 minutes borderline obnoxious with the cacophony of dialogues which I found almost impossible to follow but once they decide to put that to bed the play settles into something that becomes quite gripping. Fantastic performances all around with particular shout outs to Lizzie Annis as mentioned, Pearl Chanda who although not given that much to do manages to make a lasting impression, Thusitha Jayasundera is just as phenomenal as everyone has said, I found her to be the perfect mix of FUNNY, fiery and completely worn down. I couldn't take my eyes off her. Harriet Walter I would definitely agree with the above poster in that she certainly isn't Lorca's Bernarda and while in the first act I had somewhat written her off for not being terrifying enough (or at all really) her performance grew on me and I found her quite fascinating by the end. 
A solid 4/5 for me. Not all of it works but what does is very strong.

that being said, the audience last night...started me off with my blood pressure racing as during the opening set reveal, with pepe dancing and the women all standing facing us head on, not one but TWO different people in different parts of the first three aisles, without a CARE in the world lifted their phones into the air and snapped away at the set and actors. One woman in particular I saw recorded the first 20 seconds , in direct view of the actors, third row scanning to get the scale of the set like it was for her IG story.  Absolutely appalling. Ushers must not have seen it but I was fuming (and stuck in the middle of the row too far away to say something) but the most delicious karma, one of the young ladies who was snapping away ending up getting stuck next to a pair who, my god, sounded like they were well into the third stage of Tuberculosis. CONSTANT, loud harsh coughing which you could clearly tell at the interval was getting on everyone's last nerves (I was frankly surprised the pair even came back or weren't individually spoken to or at least, i don't know, offered water?) The house manager came down to speak to the front section of the audience just before we started act two and while doing so spotted someone eating a sausage bun which she promptly confiscated. Was definitely a memorable night out

I am not a fan of "adaptations" where a minor living play wright or someone specialising in dramaturkey takes equal billing with a giant of the stage but Harriet Walter is one of our modern greats so I gave this a chance.

A splendid-looking stage but the dolls house effect ends up distracting from the action and adding little of substance beyond dumb-show gesturing. Harriet Walter is indeed very good as the austere, dictatorial matriarch but the action has not so much been extracted from its historical setting but left there, languishing in a misunderstood context. The continual swearing has already been mentioned - it is unthinkable that women in that type of household in that era in that country would have used a single expletive, there were plenty of euphemisms developed as a result. And there's the rub, this family - which is presented as some sort of freakshow in the production - would have been totally recognisable and fairly normal to at least half the population of Spain at the time. This is the context in the years before the Spanish Civil War where the conservatism of church and countryside clashed against the modernity of town and progress; the failure to reconcile or find a middle way led to a murderous war and regime which lasted forty years.

So this is not a simple tale of a frustrated set of daughters and an overbearing mother, this is a parable for a country on the verge of a cataclysm. But it is totally realistic, this is not poetry and this is not fantasy. What part of Lorca's own explanation of the nature of the play "Reality! Realism!" did the National's team fail to understand?