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The
Edinburgh Fringe
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Fringe 2000 Reviews (15)Attic No Limits is a professional company made up of people with a learning disability, which performs physical theatre based on contemporary dance techniques. Attic is about memories. A man goes of to war, treasuring his memories of his family and his girlfriend, locking them away to enjoy when needed. But somehow these memories are lost and when he returns has to accept that all he has is the future. In a way, the plot is unimportant: it is the characters and the mood created in each scene which give the play its impact. There's the mother, hovering in the background all the time, watching intently; there's the solid seemingly unemotional father; there's the younger sister (played with a delightful cheekiness by Helen Smiles), the older sister and the younger brother; there's also the girlfriend and, of course, the man himself, played with great intensity by Paul Norman. This is not the easiest of plays to follow, but it's very rewarding. Freebird Three bikers (Fred, Grouch and Tyg) set off from London to Cornwall on behalf of a mysterious character known as "The Chairman" to negotiate with a man who has grown a field full of cannabis. Fred is the leader, but he isn't any longer entirely happy with the life he is leading. Grouch is continually high on any drug he can lay his hands on; he's got a new girlfriend and he's in love. Tyg loves violence abnd carries an impressive array of knives. The play simply chronicles their trip: their reactions to people they meet - and peoples' reactions to them. Nothing much happens - and they certainly don't do any negotiations over the cannabis field (for one thing, Fred loses the money given to him by the Chairman): they're stopped by the police, they buy food, they go into a couple of pubs, they stop by the roadside - but the whole thing is very funny. The characters are beautifully drawn and realised in the acting by author Jon Ivay (Fred), Antony Bessick (Grouch) and James Puddephatt (Tyg). A play just to sit back and enjoy, which is just what the audience - and I! - did. New Boy I suppose this is best described as a sex comedy, but that conjures up images of, for instance, No Sex Please, We're British, and that would be misleading. Mark is a sixth former who is obsessed with sex, mainly because he's not getting any! He greets the arrival of new boy Barry, who is very good-looking, as an opportunity: if he can become Barry's friend, he is sure that some of Barry's undoubted sexual experience will rub off on him. However Barry turns out to be a virgin, just like him, so Mark plots how Barry can seduce girls from the local girls' school. His ideas work, but Barry eventually gets bored, so Mark suggests an affair with the French teacher, Mrs Mumford. His plotting for that works, too, and Barry starts an affair with her. Meanwhile Louise, Barry's sister, takes Mark's virginity. And so it goes on. The rest of the plot involves the ending of the Mumford affair, the end of the relationship between Mark and Louise, homosexuality and homophobia... New Boy is totally undemanding - and very funny. It's playing to packed houses and no doubt will continue to do so. Of the stage versions of novels which I've seen this Fringe it is by far the most successful. The writing and performances keep the production running at just the right pace and the twists and turns of the plot keep the audience laughing till the very end. Next page - - - Index |
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