REVIEWS Archives - Page 280 of 548

16Aug

By Paul AckroydNo Comments

London

The Garden of Words – Park Theatre

This an unusual production to be performed in the United Kingdom being a stage adaptation of the Japanese Anime film of the same name by Makoto Shinkai. It tells the story of seven people, all seeking happiness in relationships but having to confront the realities of life in an urban environment which makes such connections difficult. True to its animation origins it adopts a symbolic rather than realistic staging. It is performed on a largely bare stage with a raised platform at the back and only a few white blocks which the cast efficiently moved around provide the necessary set for the various scenes. At the back of the playing area of was a skeletal tree and a projection surface onto which beautiful images of Japan were played, including from time to time quotations in b...

16Aug

By Greg HolsteadNo Comments

Scotland

Mariza – Festival Theatre

Despite the language barrier there is no doubt at all that this is a heck of a show, and a display of superlative singing power and grace, from the statuesque Portuguese star Mariza returning to the Edinburgh International Festival in style after a ten year hiatus. At times dropping the mic and singing without amplification in the vast hall, shows the immense power of her voice, and her confidence in it. Singing songs in Portuguese, in the Fado (translated as destiny or fate in Portuguese) tradition, a style thought to have originated in Lisbon in the 1820s, often associated with pubs and cafes, and renowned for its expressive and profoundly melancholic character. Launching into Loucura, the first song from her first album all of 24 years ago, she reminisces that at that time the...

16Aug

By Greg HolsteadNo Comments

Scotland

Macbeth – Greenside @ Infirmary Street

Gosh! Where to start on this highly unpleasant Macbeth mash-up. This is my 3rd instalment of my Macbeth marathon of the Fringe and an undoubted low point. Comparison is a wonderful tool! But at least you got one star! That’s for your Macbeth, the undoubted star of this particular show, who shone with hope and ambition in a sea of troubles. Unfortunately, there is no possibility to name-check said star because you didn’t care enough to provide that information! A show which shows no hand of a director, and the barest story and which has actors crossing each other, talking in unintelligible whispers with their back to the audience, and generally running around like headless chickens. A show which shows scant respect for their paying audience or for the craft of acting. Adding to...

16Aug

By Greg HolsteadNo Comments

Scotland

Intimacy – The Space @ Venue 45

This new two women play from writer, Sarah Nelson (Letter to Bodda) for Watershed Productions, sees Chloe in search of answers to female sexuality (or more likely her own), for her Masters thesis, and Nel as her more than willing, and highly experienced, respondent. The two actors come with significant credentials and are both excellent, Chloe is played by Caitlin O'Ryan – Lizzie Wemyss in the international TV hit Outlander. Nel is played by Imogen Greenwood, the writer and producer of award-winning film Natural Causes. In something of a cat and mouse performance it is never quite clear where this is going, or how it will end, until the final climax, where it all comes together with a bit of an aha moment of realisation. The linear Q & A structure is initially limiting and...

16Aug

By Euan HuthNo Comments

Scotland

Hive – Assembly Roxy

Hive is show that feels like it has big things to say. It wants to talk about corporations building monolithic skyscrapers and the consequences of that , how people can be displaced and forced to move out of their homes, the way grief can impact our lives and relationships. Hive tries very hard to communicate these things, but unfortunately it does not communicate them well enough. The setting is an abandoned housing building with Mother Ria (Elin Doyle) being brought in to investigate a “hive” of some description along with her child, Salve (Emily Millwood), after they where expelled from school and there’s no one Salve can stay with while Ria works. The play also features a third character, Craig, the site manager who joins Ria on her journey to the hive while Salve makes their ow...

16Aug

By Damian RiverolNo Comments

North West

Greatest Days – Blackpool Opera House

This evening I'm at the Blackpool Opera House to see the official Take That musical – Greatest Days. The box office colleagues are so pleasant and very helpful at this theatre, going the extra mile to ensure we are happy, even changing our seats to make it more accessible for the person with me. The greeting from front of house and ushers were so welcoming and professional. I couldn’t have asked for more. The Greatest Days began it’s life at The Band the musical but has been revisited and renamed with a new cast, a new set and a new lease of life. With the book written by Tim Firth and lyrics by Take That, we are transported on a journey of love, loss and a heap of nostalgia. Five teenagers follow every move of the ‘Boys,’ the band they share a love for and their journey of winning a...

Crash and Burn – theSpace @ Niddry Street

16Aug

By Christina SchmidtNo Comments

Scotland

Crash and Burn – theSpace @ Niddry Street

Set on a private jet, heading to the climate conference COP26 in Glasgow: Oil Baron James Johnson with his employee and daughter are forced to share the plane with eccentric actor and activist Amodius Vassano and his personal manager. After take-off, they find out that this and other planes have been hijacked by a group of radical environmental activists and they are being held hostage, only to survive if Johnson confesses to his crimes. ‘Crash and Burn’, a new play written by Will Leckie, who also plays Amodius Vassano, aims to be a political comedy that wants to ask the question of how far activism can or should go. Whilst this is a great premise, although an unoriginal idea, the execution of it was rather poor. The play lacks structure, trying to tackle too many topics at once...

16Aug

By Greg HolsteadNo Comments

Scotland

Anna Vanosi Jazz Trio – The Jazz Bar

Escaping the bagpipes, the ticket pushers, the crowds and the traffic, to rest at peace for a quick hour and bathe in a little pool of jazz bliss with the Italian Diva herself, Anna Vanosi is just about perfect. Set below ground in the subterranean bunker that is The Jazz Bar, near the Museum, in Central Edinburgh’s melee, Vanosi ushered us through quite a quick catalogue of songs, mostly above love or lost love in the language of love, Italian. And some in the much less romantic English. Either language was fine with me, Vanosi’s voice was nectar in both. This is Vanosi’s second show at the Fringe this year, at the same venue, having completed a run of shows last week entitled, Late Bloomers Tales, which I also thoroughly enjoyed, but in a different way. The previous show is ...

16Aug

By Roger JacobsNo Comments

Scotland

Cola Boy – The Space @ Symposium Hall

This show kicked off on Monday (13th) with a full house and Thursday & Friday are already sold out. It’s in of those infamously ‘intimate’ Fringe venues so move fast if you want the experience; for that primarily is what this is, rather a fleeting one at that. How many times have you heard the cliché ‘The book’s much better’? Author Ryan Battles did actually live and work in Dubai, his book an enjoyable, adventurous tome pulling few punches about a place he has ‘no desire to ever travel to again.’ However, squeezed into 40 minutes it ends up highlighting just two themes; the death (and ghostly return) of Jimmy’s bezzy mate Andy, and the nerve-shredding trip back to London to traffic 70 grammes of coke back into Dubai. We’re welcomed in from a drenched Hill Square by a groovy ...

Don’t Dress for Dinner – Frinton Summer Theatre

16Aug

By Samantha CollettNo Comments

South East

Don’t Dress for Dinner – Frinton Summer Theatre

In these dark times we desperately need to laugh and laugh you will at ‘Don’t Dress for Dinner’. In fact, I don’t think I’ve ever laughed so much or so hard or felt my laughter was getting in the way of the actor’s next line – which I was eager not to miss on account of the hilarity at stake. The storyline, in brief, goes as follows: a wife is going to visit her mother and her husband is going to take advantage of his wife’s absence by inviting his mistress over for the weekend. His friend who’d been his best man at the wedding then calls and the husband invites him to join, thinking he would make a perfect alibi. As it turns out when the wife discovers the husband’s friend is coming to stay, she cancels her visit to her mother because – as it turns out – she’s having an affair with him...