Wednesday, December 4

Tag: Dominic Carter

1984 – Hackney Town Hall
London

1984 – Hackney Town Hall

George Orwell’s 1984 comes alive in this site-specific theatre production under the solid eye of Irish director, Jack Reardon. This immersive experience skilfully blends audience participation with the confined setting of Hackney Town Hall’s council chamber and atrium to underscore the novel’s themes of oppression and loss of individuality. The adaptation adeptly condenses the first half of Orwell’s novel, focusing on world-building and intrigue through an induction led by high-ranking Party officer O’Brien (Dominic Carter). A Big Brother rally, complete with patriotic singing, anti-sex league flyering, and party agents probing, welcomes the audience into the dystopian world where every word and movement are monitored under the ever-present eye of Big Brother. The initial slow burn a...
Boys From The Blackstuff – Liverpool’s Royal Court
North West

Boys From The Blackstuff – Liverpool’s Royal Court

A standing ovation was a given, and Alan Bleasedale here to enjoy it, but I've never seen individual scenes applauded before. It's an astounding piece about the bitter struggle between employers, employees (Dole Office sniffers) and unemployed; men, once so proud of their skills, engulfed by the darkness of poverty and despair. A grand scale tragi-comedy, filled with microcosms: the second half seems like a series of vignettes, monologues and dialogues: fraught scenes between husband and wife, father and son, etc. On the one hand: farce, Freda (Helen Carter) in her hallway, caught between Malloy (Dominic Carter) at the back door, Angie at the front, the phone constantly ringing. Then Yosser, seeking to discover the meaning of life from the churches at each end of hope Street. Th set is ...