Caroline Worswick

6Aug

By Caroline WorswickNo Comments

Scotland

Antigone – the Space @ Niddry Street

Written by Sophocles, and first performed at the Festival of Dionysus in 414 BC, Antigone is a popular Ancient Greek play and is one of the favourites of the ancient cannon to be performed and studied in schools and universities. Performed by Crook and Ivy, the show has an all-female cast, and is staged in the round. The story is set in Thebes, a city in Ancient Greece, and the new King, Creon (Martha Barratt) is imposing new laws, which will affect Antigone (Isabella Williamson) and her sister, Ismene (Ella Searl). Antigone and Ismene are the only members of her family to survive a battle for the throne of Thebes. The sister’s two brothers who fought over the throne and were both killed. Eteocles was granted a normal burial with all funeral rights, but King ...

Michael Brunstrom: Copernicus Now – Hoots @ Potterow, Big Yurt

6Aug

By Caroline WorswickNo Comments

Scotland

Michael Brunstrom: Copernicus Now – Hoots @ Potterow, Big Yurt

Recommended to me by a friend, I tootled along to the Big Yurt to see how you can possibly make a comedy show out of a Renaissance polymath called Nicolaus Copernicus and his work. Well, if your name if Michael Brunstrom you can! Drawing his material from the mathematician/astronomer that was under his microscope, his show is both clever and ridiculous. We are briefed about his process, which lures the audience in his balmy scheme, but he is so endearing, that you want to come along for the journey. His material is refreshing, no mother-in-law jokes here, but the fact that he chooses to use such a high-brow intellectual as the subject of his humour, makes this show so interesting. Brunstrom has a natural delivery, a self-deprecating humour which you cannot help ...

5Aug

By Caroline WorswickNo Comments

Scotland

After Troy – the Space @ Surgeon’s Hall

Following the battle of Troy, what was left for the survivors? Homeless and suffering the loss of loved ones, the women of Troy grieved on the past, and faced uncertainty about their future. Based upon the tragedy ‘Trojan Women’ written by Euripides which was first performed in Athens in 415 BC, this exploration into the aftermath of the defeat of the Trojans following ten years of war, tells the tale of the women who were left behind to pick up the pieces. Presented by Badminton School, the story is weaved with actual threads, each character has her own thread, and when they share their experiences, they weave another part of life’s tapestry. Andromache is grieving over the loss of her husband; the Trojan prince Hector, she must now face the loss of her chil...

The Cambridge Impronauts – Gilded Balloon Patter House

5Aug

By Caroline WorswickNo Comments

Scotland

The Cambridge Impronauts – Gilded Balloon Patter House

I cannot go to the Edinburgh Fringe Festival without seeing improvisation, and as I have never seen the Cambridge Impronauts before, I thought I would pop along. The Cambridge Impronauts as a company were formed in 2003 and have been calling the Gilded Balloon home for the last seven years. In their home town of Cambridge, they run open workshops for students and locals, and show off their improv skills in local shows. Today at the Gilded Balloon, we saw the team using short-form improv in a ‘Whose Line Is It Anyway’ style. For those young ones who are too old to remember this show, there are short scenes improvised after taking suggestions from the studio audience. There is a director setting the scene for the audience, who encourages ideas that will help to...

4Aug

By Caroline WorswickNo Comments

Scotland

Penthesilea – The Royal Lyceum Theatre

This passionate fictional play set at the gates of Troy, was written in 1807 by Heinrich Von Kleist, who four years later would commit suicide with his married lover aged only thirty-four. This may be an indication of his passionate nature, and why at age thirty, he could write such a romantic, but also violent play. Part of the Edinburgh International Festival, the ITA Ensemble who are the in-house team at the Internationaal Theater Amsterdam, are behind this bold production which is part rock concert, and part classical play. The director Eline Arbo, who achieved great success with ‘Weg Met Eddy Bellegueule’ winning a director’s award in 2020, is working with Thijs Van Vuure who created the music which acts as the beat for the play. Staged at the wonderful Royal Lyce...

4Aug

By Caroline WorswickNo Comments

Scotland

1984 – Summerhall, Old Lab

I do not wish to state the obvious, but I will, this play is set in 1984 and written by George Orwell in 1949. In just thirty-five years from writing his novel, Orwell was imagining a time when the government would be an oppressive, intrusive, dictatorship, ruling our society. He imagined us with no rights to free speech, and a punishing regime ruled by terror. Within Theatre Company, (with Sophie Vallee in the directing chair), have taken Nick Hern’s script adapting the novel for theatre, and wrapped a message inside of it – that this is happening in places around the world today, places that they know…their homes! Unable to perform in their home countries of Russia and Belarus, they are performing 1984 in the UK. And, 40 years on did Orwell predict the future correctly? ‘1984’ wa...

Confessions of a Butterfly: An Evening with Janusz Korczak – Greenside at George Street

3Aug

By Caroline WorswickNo Comments

Scotland

Confessions of a Butterfly: An Evening with Janusz Korczak – Greenside at George Street

There have been many plays written about the Holocaust, but these plays are essential in educating generations who can no longer discuss this subject with survivors who are the primary source of information and education. Like the character in the play, playwright, and performer Jonathan Salt works with children, and specialises in educating people about the Holocaust and Genocide. Photo:Ciaran Cunningham Salt takes on the role of Janusz Korczak, a Polish Jew living in Warsaw who was a writer, educator, and doctor. The play is based upon Korczak’s diaries entitled ‘The Ghetto Diaries,’ and is set in May 1942 when Warsaw was under siege by Hitler’s army, when the Jews were being gradually segregated. Korczak opened two orphanages, one managed by himself, and the play...

A Montage of Monet – Greenside, George Street (Mint Studio)

3Aug

By Caroline WorswickNo Comments

Scotland

A Montage of Monet – Greenside, George Street (Mint Studio)

Thinking of Claude Monet, the famous French impressionist painter, I think of lilies, beautiful gardens, and weeping willows. I will not pretend to be an art connoisseur, but Monet’s paintings elicit a feeling of tranquillity. Written by playwright Joan Greening, whose background lies in teaching Art History, with past plays including ‘The Rape of Artemisia Gentileschi’, ‘Rossetti’s Women’ and ‘At Home With The Bronte’s’ available to watch on Scenesaver - https://www.joangreening.com/#/at-home-with-the-brontes/. Greening’s collaboration with Stephen Smith (a remarkable character actor), brings Monet the man to life. Beginning towards the end of Monet’s life when cataracts cause his eyesight to deteriorate, he tells the tale of his life, painting, his romantic loves, and his ...

1Jun

By Caroline WorswickNo Comments

London

May 35th – Southwark Playhouse Elephant

4th June 1989 – This is the date to remember! But, if you live in China or Hong Kong, this date causes their government to have amnesia, and the Chinese government enforces countrywide amnesia on its people. There is no longer a 4th June 1989 in the Chinese calendar, not one that can be discussed anyway. To disguise discussion, this date is now May 35th, and both the date, and the lives of the victims of the Tiananmen Square massacre have been erased from history. In a country where the government uses dehumanisation as a means of controlling its people, this play attempts to overturn this, by bringing together interviews from some of the victim’s families and allows them to speak in one voice. The play centres around a student, Ah Dai who was a hard-working b...

13Apr

By Caroline WorswickNo Comments

London

Player Kings – Noel Coward Theatre

If it were not for the promotion of this show, the title would hide the fact that the play came from Shakespeare’s quill. Incorporating both Henry IV Part One and Two, this adaptation faces the challenge of giving the audience a decent slice of the two plays, without losing the essence that makes each play special. It is a brave actor that takes on such a dialogue heavy role as Falstaff, with almost four hours of performance, but Sir Ian McKellen is a brave knight, and despite his eighty-four years, and his acknowledgement that this is a role that he has previously avoided, he is victorious in his joust with words. Adapted and directed by Robert Icke, there is a fresh breeze blowing through this history play. Gone is the chainmail, replaced with khaki fatigues and red berets...