Clancy Flynn Archives - North West End UK

21Aug

By Ella BeckleyNo Comments

Scotland

Trainspotting Live – Pleasance @ EICC

Trainspotting Live has a reputation to behold, with nine years of sell-out Fringe runs and Irvine Welsh himself saying it’s ‘better than either the book or film’. The show is deserving of every star it has ever received and more. The atmosphere at the EICC is buzzing with expectations, stewards replace tickets with glow sticks and usher audience members towards a darkened space with heavy dance music and flashing lights. From the moment the cast welcome their audience onto their raving set, Trainspotting Live draws you in like a moth to a flame, only to set you ablaze and turn it all to ash. The cast bring their world alive, pulling the audience into every moment of joy, love, loss and fear. It all begins with contagiously high energy, the characters are literally...

Black is the Color of my Voice – Pleasance at EICC

Amazing. Brilliant. Such an expanse of energy. These are some of the comments I heard on leaving the theatre. For myself the rapture began less than one minute in. The hairs, not just on my arms, but on my scalp, stood on end as our protagonist call “Daddy!” Why? I’m not sure. It must have been the emotional intensity. I knew this was going to press buttons and make me bleed. In a good way. Apphia Campbell has a powerful voice: a fitting tribute to Nina Simone, but, more than that, this woman can act. She knows about pace and tension and pathos and immersion. It is a beautiful piece of theatre. Scripted to perfection by Campbell, this is a don't miss piece for lovers of Nina Simone and all theatre goers who admire true commitment and emotional frankness. For me, I knew little of t...

The Sorcerer’s Apprentice – Southwark Playhouse Stream

After the exciting rise of new British musical theatre came to a dreary halt last March it feels immensely hopeful to finally catch a new offering, in the form of Ben Morales Frost and Richard Hough’s “The Sorcerer’s Apprentice”, as our industry slowly comes back to life. Due to have had its premiere at the Southwark Playhouse (an innovative home for new musicals) earlier this year, the production now finds itself shifted online in the form of a three-week stream. Taking inspiration from J. W. Goethe’s 18th century poem, which went on to inspire Dukas’s orchestral piece, a section in Disney’s Fantasia and its subsequent 2010 live action adaptation, “The Sorcerer’s Apprentice” in its new musical form sheds most of these skins until it is mostly unrecognisable aside from its magical danci...