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Fringe 2010 Reviews (16)
Evening With Dementia
By Trevor T Smith
The Space Radisson.
*****
Trevor T Smith's one man piece about living with the constant problems of dementia is a bittersweet pondering on the nature of what it means to be alive when you don't understand the world around you. The nameless old man sits and tells the audience his secrets on how to avoid the true extent of his confusion being discovered, how he has fooled his social workers and his irritation at being constantly asked questions.
From the outset this subtly played piece manages to harness and show all of the pain and distress inherent to the plight of dementia sufferers. Smith's old man, both genial and lovable breaches the fine line between being winkingly clever and exasperatingly confused. The heartbreaking constant repetitions of the same sentences hammer home the constant reminder of the problems welling in his head.
The most affecting parts of the play are the moments where the man talks to the strangers who visit him, and the audience is left to fill in the painful holes in their comprehension. With some tales of his youth and a heart-rending account of the death of his mother, this stands as one of the most essential pieces of theatre which has come out of the Fringe.
Graeme Strachan
Private Peaceful
By Michael Morpurgo, adapted by Simon Reade
Beacon Theatre Group
Augustines.
**
Using Simon Reade's adaptation of the Great War novel, Private Peaceful, the young cast work hard to bring the tragic tale of class division and the unfairness of war to life. Their achievement is fair but despite their best efforts the performance never breathes life into the pedestrian and somewhat cliched events.
The young cast do very well with their individual lines and parts, although the overenthusiastic death scenes and the constant re-iteration of 'Oranges and Lemons' tied up with the inexplicably shell shocked Big Joe (who never makes it to the front) both serve simply to drag out the lack of flow in the narrative. The scenes clumsily fall one after the other, never managing to sweep along the audience with them.
It's a shame then that this never quite lives up to the potential, but a smaller, more intimate staging might have helped a story that otherwise seems to get bogged down in a huge cast and an over-reliance on filling the stage.
Graeme Strachan
Howling
Freshblood
The Vault.
**
Wolves don't growl. I entered into The Howling with that single thought on my mind. If the wolves in this production were to growl then the whole thing was a failure in my mind. In this bizarre story, what have to be the three most inept hunters in all of North America, struggle against the harsh winter cold and lack of food. At the same time a pack of wolves are in the same area and each of the hunters has to struggle with their own prejudices and personal histories, whilst dealing with the presence of these 'Devils'.
The Wolves themselves are played by a group of masked actors, who alternate between loping and crawling around the stage and spending great swathes of the play sleeping huddled in a corner. Rounding out the cast is the innocuous presence of a curious bird cum spirit of the forest, who puppeteers several of the wolves' quarries.
Despite having a decent idea and a capable cast behind it, the play simply doesn't make sense. The human characters are so vaguely drawn that it's impossible to really care what happens to them. The few fragments of depth they are given are all repeated ad nauseum, and their actions simply defy all rational logic for their circumstances. Equally the wolves are drawn as curious benevolent creatures just trying to make their own way, despite their murdering a child in the early scenes of the story, a point which the hunters seem more than happy to overlook.
It's not that there aren't the nuggets of good ideas here, the continually changing folk story the hunters tell each other throughout is one of the most interesting factors at play, but ultimately the whole comes across as a muddled mess. The wolves didn't growl, sadly they didn't have any teeth either.
Graeme Strachan
Soho Storeys
By Tim Norton with music by Ned Bennett
Pleasance Grand.
****
This accomplished jazz musical by the Pleasance’s Youth Theatre is an absolute gem. Set in a six- storey tenement in London’s Soho it tells the story of immigrant life in the 1950s. The large talented company brilliantly capture the spirit of the era with polished performances, sparkling choreography, beautiful, glamorous period costumes and an effervescent musical score played by a great sounding jazz band.
The highly inventive multi levelled set that the cast wheeled around with great precision created the various flats. In the attic there was the family from Jamaica including Tyrone, who sings in the jazz club in the basement where we have glimpses of life both backstage and front of house. All manner of cultures are represented in this multicultural community; the Greek barber, the French sisters running a patisserie and the two Russian Jewish tailors.
In a series of witty, comic and dramatic vignettes we learn about their lives, their tensions, their quarrels, their relationships and their love affairs but there is not enough time to explore these sub-plots in depth which was a pity. The exuberant cast sing and act with both conviction and panache and the ending chase and fight was a tour de force. This was youth theatre at its best
Robin Strapp
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