Featured Post

Bear with me: Sun Bear @ParkTheatre

Image
If The Light House is an uplifting tale of survival, Sarah Richardson’s Sun Bear gives a contrasting take on this. Sarah plays Katy. We’re introduced to Katy as she runs through a list of pet office peeves with her endlessly perky coworkers, particularly about coworkers stealing her pens. It’s a hilarious opening monologue that would have you wishing you had her as a coworker to help relieve you from the boredom of petty office politics.  But something is not quite right in the perfect petty office, where people work together well. And that is her. And despite her protesting that she is fine, the pet peeves and the outbursts are becoming more frequent. As the piece progresses, maybe the problem lies in a past relationship, where Katy had to be home by a particular hour, not stay out late with office colleagues and not be drunk enough not to answer his calls. Perhaps the perky office colleagues are trying to help, and perhaps Katy is trying to reach out for help. It has simple staging

Meanwhile in SW13: Dress Rehearsal @OSOArtsBarnes


Backstage antics at a pub theatre in Barnes never felt so mild or bemusing in Dress Rehearsal. But while the drama is a little flat the music and production values make up for it. It's on for a short run at the OSO Arts Centre.

Dress Rehearsal follows five performers and their rivalries, failures and ambitions. What happens backstage spills onstage as the drama leads into music and then back into more drama.


Bella (Amanda Wagg) is the faded diva that runs the show. There is a fruity old tenor called Lionel (Tony Baker). And a camp young upstart Kit, played by Luke Farrugia who sings opera and can tap dance. But it is Steph (Alexandra Cowell) who has a secret and the one who keeps the troupe together. It turns out that her secret had to do with throwing away a promising opera career over a case of nerves many years ago.


Perhaps Barnes is such a civilised little part of London that it might be immune to the harsh economic realities facing the rest of the city. Pubs are closing left right and centre. Theatre pubs are an even rarer breed. The ones that are surviving have an eclectic programme to keep the punters coming in. Productions are often profit shares and so it makes it difficult to cobble together a living from it. All this seems much more worthy fodder for an evening exploring backstage antics than a case of stage fright...

But even if the acting is suspect and the drama nonsensical, the singing isn't bad. And at times it is funny such as when Wagg, Farrugia and Cowell don some fabulous kimonos and sing Three Little Maids. Music direction is from resident Ritz Hotel pianist Karen Newby. She also plays the role of Phyllis, a Harpo Marx-like character added into the proceedings for reasons I didn't quite understand.

If there are any little opera companies struggling to fill out their season, they could take inspiration from the piece. It just needs to be funny, or have engaging characters.

The OSO Arts Centre in Barnes is a new community run space. It is carved out of a new development of smart looking flats and shops. The shops include restaurants, dental surgeries and beauty treatment rooms. If you're not a local it isn't the easiest of places to find at night. After wandering around trying to find the entrance, it was tempting to give up the search and go for a teeth whitening and wax. It is at the rear of the development (facing the duck pond).

Anyway here's hoping they can find a niche for programming. It would make a nice home for a small opera troupe. And it has the nicest seats of any fringe venue...

Dress Rehearsal runs at the OSO Arts Centre in Barnes until 20 February.

⭐︎⭐︎⭐︎

Photos: production photos by Scott Rylander

Popular posts from this blog

Opera and full frontal nudity: Rigoletto

Image
David McVicar's oddly modern production of Rigoletto is back at the Royal Opera House . This modern and minimalist dark production has evolved over the years. It is better lit now but there is still an orgy and full frontal nudity within the first thirty minutes. This enables anyone not in the stalls an excellent view of a flaccid penis and a nicely shaved bush. But as time goes it seems more and more superfluous to the main focus of this tragedy of a court jester who seeks revenge. Here is hoping that the production continues to evolve... Conductor John Eliot Gardiner keeps the music well paced. Dimitri Platanias in the title role sounded great and received a rapturous applause for his interpretation of the role. You get a sense more of the doting father rather than the court jester or cursed man here. Vittorio Grigolo plays the Duke and sounds too lovely to be the cad the role calls for, but it is hard not to like when he is on stage anyway. And it is easier to understan
Read more...

Fantasies: Afterglow @Swkplay

Image
Nowadays no self-respecting gay play can be staged without full frontal nudity of some kind. It feels like the default response for the modern gay play now that gay rights are no longer an issue .   Afterglow, currently playing at Southwark Playhouse , serves it up in spades. From the beginning, three men are in a bed, naked. There’s what appears to be a very brief exhalation of ecstasy, before the obligatory rush to the shower. But the gratuitous nudity and excellent performances can’t conceal this is a pretty conventional and predictable story about a fantasy couple.  The three men in the simultaneous orgasm at the start of the piece are Josh, Alex and Darius. Josh and Alex seem to live in a New York world where they can afford a rooftop apartment in Manhattan while holding jobs as a theatre director and a grad student in chemistry. As writer S. Asher Gelman based it on his own experiences, perhaps gay plays with full frontal nudity are the way to achieve financial security
Read more...

Play ball: Damn Yankees @LandorTheatre

Image
Damn Yankees at the Landor Theatre is one hell of a fun, sexy show. A great cast of dancers and singers give this show about a man who sells his soul to get on his beloved baseball team (and give them a chance of winning) new legs and balls. It also helps to up the ante with the sexiness with some healthy doses of cleavage and legs (and that's just the men). The musical is a retelling of the Faust story set in the 1950s when the New York Yankees dominated the game.
Read more...