Gonzalo Sentana, Author at North West End UK

24Mar

By Gonzalo SentanaNo Comments

London

Killing the Cat – Riverside Studios

Can music and speech give fundamental answers to the questions that seem impossible to answer? Can we address the whys and what for of our existence through sound and bodies? Killing the Cat, the new musical with book and lyrics by Warner Brown and music by Joshua Schmidt, undertakes a very ambitious task, both dealing with very complex and interesting topics, while trying to develop a new and unique language in musical theatre. While the play does not reach those goals, it is undoubtedly a refined clockwork, performed with exquisite harmony. When going into the hall, the audience is met by a beautiful white set, designed by Lee Newby, where lights and colours designed by Jamie Platt will combine during the play, joining the music to display the different stages through which the cha...

Nothing Happens (Twice) – Jacksons Lane Theatre

12Mar

By Gonzalo SentanaNo Comments

London

Nothing Happens (Twice) – Jacksons Lane Theatre

Two Flamingos dance and invite you to visit Andalusia, and then they do it again, and then again. And their suffering and their meaninglessness becomes apparent as they try to find reasons to keep doing what they are doing. In this piece, that one could argue is a study on Samuel Beckett's Waiting for Godot, the actors Mercè Ribot and Patricia Rodríguez take us in an irreverent trip through stages in the present and towards the present. Playfully delving into the process of trying to act and survive as performing artists in a foreign land, their personal lives become a moving and intense experience amid laughter and music. The audience will see the appearance of several pairs of characters through the play, and the actors will impersonate themselves, and break the fourth wall more th...

The Bodyguard: The Musical – New Wimbledon Theatre

7Mar

By Gonzalo SentanaNo Comments

London

The Bodyguard: The Musical – New Wimbledon Theatre

If you have ever wondered what it would be to be one of those people in the crowd in a concert in a movie, wonder no more: this show's got you covered. On fire and starting with a bang. Under the incredible direction of Thea Sharrock, The Bodyguard the Musical invites us to enjoy more than two hours in this jukebox musical where the audience goes through many of Whitney Houston's music hits, intertwined with the story of the namesake movie in which it's inspired. With a rock-solid main cast, every single one of them performing to their strengths, Sharrock seizes every opportunity available to thrill us. The show has one blow of effect after another. Melody Thornton, in her role as Rachel Marron, pays a great homage to the memory of the late Houston, with impressive versions of the si...

An Absolute Farce of a Murder Mystery – Drayton Arms Theatre

3Mar

By Gonzalo SentanaNo Comments

London

An Absolute Farce of a Murder Mystery – Drayton Arms Theatre

Seeing a play taking on a very well-known genre and trying to reference it, turning it into something different, is an entertaining and educational experience, though things can turn out less interesting than expected, if the intentions are better than the implementation. This show, written by Peter Rae, and directed by Helen Bang, both doubling as actors, is an attempt at making fun of the genre of the Murder Mystery trope. While the intentions are clear from the beginning, the actual running of the show is a hot mess of overly saturated references and misplaced punchlines. The show starts with "Manning – The Butler", portrayed by Christian Ballantyne, who is cleaning some props on stage, and makes the first attempt at getting the audience to laugh, when spitting a candleholder whil...

1Mar

By Gonzalo SentanaNo Comments

London

BriTANick – Soho Theatre

They tell you to laugh and you laugh. They tell you how much to laugh, and you listen. But when you try to stop laughing, that seems impossible. Welcome to BriTANick. The comedy duo of Nick Kocher and Brian McElhaney, under the direction of Alex Edelman and produced by Zach Zucker and Allegra Rosenberg, brings a thrilling series of short comedy sketches with a non-stopping rhythm and precision that will keep you on the edge of your seat. Starting with a very short slapstick sketch of an annoying spirit that decides to haunt an innocent reader, the audience will be quickly introduced into this clockwork machinery were the two actors play a version of themselves playing characters through eight sketches and some intermezzos. The deceptively simple mechanism of addressing the audience a...

24Feb

By Gonzalo SentanaNo Comments

London

The Winter’s Tale – Shakespeare’s Globe

Imagine that you go to see a play, and someone tells you everything that is going to happen next, but it is so amazing that it's hard to believe. That's when one knows the experience one is about to go through is unique. Marking the opening of the Globe's Folio 400th celebrations, The Winter's Tale, directed by Sean Holmes, takes us to a trip between the intimate and oppressive setting of Sicilia, staged in the Sam Wanamaker Playhouse, and the open-air colorful and mostly vivid lands of Bohemia, staged in the Globe Theatre. The original five acts of the play are then organized in three acts, and the audience is led from the first hall to the second and then back inside again. As it is customary in the Sam Wanamaker Playhouse, the empty stage greets us with the warm light of many cand...

19Feb

By Gonzalo SentanaNo Comments

London

The Masks of Aphra Behn – The Space

Seeing passionate performances is always a beautiful experience, and performers who love their work are always an enjoyable company. Even more so if they are former spies. The Masks of Aphra Behn, written and performed by Claire Louise Amias and directed by Pradeep Jey, is being brought back to The Space in the context of a fundraiser to build a statue in Canterbury commemorating Aphra Behn. This interesting piece is a well told story about the adventures of the historic figure as a spy. The play begins with one mask, the only physical mask we will see during the performance. The other metaphorical masks will come in and out in a succession of interesting intrigues and political affairs. The actor and writer Clare Louise Amias strongly connects from the very beginning with the audien...

17Feb

By Gonzalo SentanaNo Comments

London

Love Rash – Pleasance Theatre

First impressions can deceive. When the stage lights up, we see the least believable face possible, with a weird rictus in the face, and an even weirder voice filling the space, then the fear of having to endure a whole show like that becomes strong. Oh, my, how first impressions can deceive. Weirdness was just the tip of the iceberg (…or should I say fatberg?). From writer/performer Natasha Sutton Williams, this one-woman show of comedy at the Pleasance Theatre is an exhilarating and alienating incursion into human beings' desires and lust for connection. The first character (and the last) to appear is Gary Strange, a curious and thoughtful individual who screams offering for help from the sewers to the people who he records with his cassette recorder. He introduces us to the other cha...

13Feb

By Gonzalo SentanaNo Comments

London

Cirque Berserk! – Riverside Studios

Imagine you could fly. Imagine that the air is your house, and that floating above the ground is where you thrive and show your true self, shining and gliding without any efforts. And then, you will understand what it feels to see Cirque Berserk! Celebrating its tenth anniversary with a series of performances in Riverside Studios, this amazing theatre-circus spectacular combines contemporary circus-style artistry with a very traditional circus feeling in some of its acts. Inside of the stage, from the very beginning of the performance there is a huge cage in the shape of a ball, creating anticipation for what is presented as the main event, although every single moment of this show is charged with as much adrenaline and astonishing acrobatics. Starting with a group of acrobats jumpin...

13Feb

By Gonzalo SentanaNo Comments

London

She – Tara Theatre

Come into the life of two or 14 characters, from birth to death, and live, laugh, sing and cry with them. We challenge you not to. That could be in the doorstep of Tara Theatre when "SHE" is on. "SHE", written by Anthony Clark, is a play comprised by seven short plays. Though largely unconnected, the stories remain attached one to the other through the work of the two young actors on an almost unchanging space, that becomes resignified through the words and actions of the characters in each piece. The interestingly simple design of the space, in charge of Jessica Curtis, domestic but ambiguous, makes us believe that all those spaces could actually look like that, precarious and almost decadent, yet endearing and warm. Loosely inspired by the Seven Ages speech in Shakespeare's As You ...