Posts

Showing posts with the label Manuel Bau

Featured Post

He had it coming: Burnt Up Love @finborough

Image
Out of the darkness and shadows, three characters emerge. Lit only with candlelight or flashlights, a gripping tale by writer and performer Ché Walker about crime, punishment, love, and loss emerges. The fast pace conveys a sense of urgency to make up for lost time, lost opportunities, and what might have been. It’s currently playing at the Finborough Theatre .  We first meet Mac (Ché Walker) in prison, serving time for a crime he committed. With only a photo of his young daughter, Scratch, to keep him company, he looks for her upon release. But Scratch (Joanne Marie Mason) isn’t the teacher, lawyer or dancer Mac imagined while incarcerated over the years she might be. Instead, Scratch is in and out of trouble, on the edge, angry and violent. A chance encounter one night with JayJayJay (Alice Walker) forms a loving bond and gives her a moment of stability. But Scratch’s demons and restlessness mean trouble does not seem far away. Scratch's random act of thoughtless violence against

Just giving and taking away: Charity Case @draytonarmsSW5

Image
I've often wondered if when someone dies after undertaking some impossible feat for a charity (like running the London Marathon), the charity exclaims, "Yes! We're going to make payroll!" Well, going by Charity Case, Jeff Page's look at the sector, they might do. Nobody dies in this brief look at the charity sector, but it's a hard graft constantly looking for money to survive while providing an essential service outsourced by the government. It's currently playing at Drayton Arms Theatre for this week.  The focus here is on a fictitious charity called Number 93. Funds are down, and expenses are up. The race is on to find some emergency funding. But is it an expensive overhead with high paying charity executives draining the money, or is it impossible demands by the government to deliver essential services for vulnerable children and adults?  Ahead of a deadline to confirm funds as a going concern, there are meetings with ministers, rock stars, cold-calli

Digging in: Checkpoint Chana @Finborough

Image
What do you do when you're a successful poet accused of semitism? How do you avoid the social media storm and the calls for an apology? These are the thoughts that come in Checkpoint Chana by Jeff Page. It's having its premiere at the Finborough Theatre following a reading at Finborough's Vibrant 2017 festival. It starts with Bev (Geraldine Somerville) complaining to her assistant Tasmin (Ulrika Krishnamurti). She has to write an apology  after one of her poems sets off a social media firestorm. It’s been labelled anti-Semitic after every other recent poem of hers has been ignored. The indignity of a respected poet needing to do this is compounded by problems in her personal life and pressure from her university. But she eventually relents to making an apology, and having a sympathetic interview scheduled. She’ll even do a talk at a North London arts centre.  Somerville is convincing as a person caught up in the drama that’s part of their own creation. But often the work s