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Articles
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South West Theatre in 2005Dateline: 30th December, 20052005 may well turn out to be one of the best in recent history for theatregoers in the South West who did not have to go very far for first class entertainment. Bath Theatre Royal and Bristol Old Vic between them hosted several handfuls of productions either bound for the West End or born there. The Old Vic, whose joint artistic director, David Farr, quit earlier this year to take up artistic directorship of the Lyric Hammersmith after two years here, staged Farr's production of Marlowe's Tamburlaine the Great, starring Greg Hicks, while the Studio hosted Anne Tipton's pared-down production of Phaedra's Love, by the late Sarah Kane, the latter featuring a most questionable use of socks. Not to be outdone, Bath Theatre Royal hosted the critically-acclaimed revival of Rattigan's Man and Boy, starring David Suchet, en route to London; Tom Stoppard's The Real Thing, starring Tom Conti; Simon Gray's Otherwise Engaged, starring Richard E Grant and Sheridan's The Rival's, starring Stephanie Cole and George Barker, as well as a cracking revival of Shaw's wafer-thin You Never Can Tell, with Edward Fox in top form, the latter part of Peter Hall's third Bath Theatre Festival. Other productions in the Hall Festival which didn't make it to the West End included a first-rate revival of Beckett's Waiting for Godot, a feisty Private Lives and a fleet Much Ado About Nothing. Back at Bristol, the Old Vic transformed itself into the round for an imaginative staging of Homer's The Odyssey, directed by David Farr, starring Robert Bowman as Odysseus. Bowman returned in the autumn to direct a well-received production of Chekhov's The Seagull. The theatre also hosted two productions by Cornish theatre company, Kneehigh. After watching their acclaimed adaptation of Euripides' The Bacchae, which I found amiable but frankly tiresome, I passed on their equally popular take on Tristan and Yseult. Over at the small but perfectly-formed Tobacco Factory, the Shakespeare at the Tobacco Factory delivered a visually gorgeous but, by their high standards, weak production of Pericles, a play only partly written by the Bard. Not for nothing did Johnson, a great admirer of his friend, call it 'moldy' (COR). By contrast, the second offering in the company's sixth season was a beautifully-nuanced adaptation of Chekhov's Three Sisters. Having come across umpteen of these siblings in recent years I thought I would the production would only prompt ennui. I couldn't have been more wrong. Serve me right to underestimate the company and, of course, the great man. When you consider the meagre resources available to director Andrew Hilton, the success of the company which last year staged two of its productions at the Barbican in London following the departure of the RSC, is truly remarkable. Those venturing further afield will have found their effort well-rewarded at The Watermill, Newbury, which hosted a beautiful staging of The Winter's Tale by the all-male Propeller Theatre Company under director Edward Hall. Not even Hall though could salvage the tedious nonny-nonnying of the second half. Other offerings at this most enterprising of theatres which continues to punch well above its weight included an enjoyable production of Lope de Vega's The Gentleman from Olmedo and a critically-acclaimed staging on Sondheim's Mack and Mabel, starring David Soul, which is currently on a regional tour. With all this going on it's little wonder I only made it to Salisbury Playhouse once, a trip that cost me £60 and three points on my driving licence, for the UK premiere of the late and sorely-missed Arthur Miller's Playing for Time. The production, which clocked in at little short of three hours, is an adaptation of a memoir by a former member of a concentration camp orchestra. Sensitively directed by Joanna Read, the production featured some uneven performances but also a beautifully-judged one by Joanna Riding as Fenelon. My own pick of the crop included Waiting for Godot, Three Sisters and the first half of The Winter's Tale. A very happy new year to you all. Pete Wood
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