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Fringe 2008 Reviews (95)
Sound and Fury's Cyranose
Gilded Balloon Teviot
***
These three guys from LA are attempting to become the Reduced Rostand
Company. They have taken the French classic Cyrano de Bergerac
and given it the American comedy treatment, with mixed results.
This show has received many plaudits and is at times very funny but
it does not provide a sustained hour of hilarity as their Shakespearean
predecessors have been known to do. Indeed, the lengthy opening, using
cards read by audience members has the feeling of a filler.
Once we move into the real story of love and selflessness, a mixture
of charm and good-natured humour takes over.
A rather masculine Roxanne is admired by three men, a baddie with a
travelling beauty spot, a nasally-challenged wordsmith and a dashing
but brainless soldier. The shallow beauty gets what she deserves.
This kind of comedy relies entirely on the scripting and personalities
of the performers. They are at their best in rhyming songs set to Ponchielli's
La Gioconda (otherwise known as Allan Sherman's Hello Muddah,
Hello Fadduh) and So Long, Farewell from The Sound of
Music.
With more work, this already popular show could be really special,
though it might struggle to emulate the RSC which has franchised across
the world.
Philip Fisher
Vivien
Chimera Theatre Group
The Space on the mile
*****
It's not easy to portray the lives of two of the greatest actors ever
to have walked the stage, but Chimera's choice to show the downfall
of the relationship between Vivien Leigh and Sir Lawrence Olivier, the
so called 'Darlings of the Gods', is a good one, carving out a swathe
from their torrid affair, through to their divorce and her later days
with Jack Merivale.
The beauty of this production is that the cast never attempt to portray
the genius of their charges' stage work, instead giving light to the
more intimate side of their lives and the constantly volatile relationship
between Lady Leigh and Sir Lawrence. One choice which marks this out
is the decision to shift the focus away from the wrenchingly painful
and upsetting outbursts and mood-swings of Leigh and instead direct
the action on the repercussions and after-effects these have on her
friends and loved ones.
In part this may well have been on account of the stellar performance
of Orlando Jones, whose Olivier is so unnervingly strong and accurate
that it's not clear at times if he's acting or merely channeling Larry
from beyond the grave. In fact his performance commanded the attention
so much that even when he was merely sitting in the background, brooding
in pained agitation at each of Vivien's infidelities and manic actions.
The rest of the cast acquit themselves admirably, with Ian Wych's
turns as Peter Finch and Noël Coward both coming across with a
clarity and sympathy which goes a long way to building the genuine affection
the audience all felt as the spiraling descent into the melancholic
inevitability finally wound itself down.
Graeme Strachan
1913 or Nude Descending a
Staircase
Strings Attached
Sweet Grassmarket
*
1913 or Nude Descending a Staircase has many subtitles. These
include The Tragedy of the Russians in Venice and The Murderous
Lover. With so many subtitles one can only wonder as to the choosing
of the unnecessarily long title. This proves to be because the Russian
Countess Maria Tarnowska is supposedly the inspiration for Marcel Duchamp's
painting Nude Descending a Staircase. However we are similarly
informed of many other titles that the painting could have had. Indeed
Strings Attached inform us of so many extraneous details that this is
performance is far more akin to a history lesson than a play.
In a piece excessively loaded by narration Strings Attached even take
the time to repeat these details so as to make sure that any errant
children at the back of the class are still listening. The narrator
tells us Maria's husband is off to Italy to study singing and the character
duly repeats this fact in the scene which had no other purpose to play
out this plot device which we have, in fact, all ready been told. When
the Countess is repeatedly told by her maid on three repetitious encounters
that they do not have twelve roubles the narrator is again helpfully
on hand to repeat this fact to the audience in case we had missed it.
The life of Maria Tarnowski, a woman trapped by circumstance and manipulated
by the men in her life to finally become a drug addict, taking many
lovers and convicted for the murder of one, of them is interesting subject
matter. However with the cast of four women, white painted faces, fake
moustaches and plastic guns, Strings Attached make a veritable meal
out of plausibly interesting material.
Cecily Boys
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