Putting the “barb” into York Barbican: Ed Byrne on Friday night
Ed Byrne, If I’m Honest, York Barbican, December 13
FRIDAY the 13th is unlucky for some”,
and certainly for those who missed out on Ed Byrne’s If I’m Honest show at a
half-full York Barbican. An honest mistake, no doubt, that should be rectified
next time.
Unlike our political parties in the General
Election, 47-year-old Dubliner Byrne has decided honesty is the best policy,
and while comedians are no less likely to exaggerate than politicians seeking
the X factor at the ballot box, they do so with a silver, rather than forked,
tongue.
Byrne headed to York, the lone red rash in deepest
blue North Yorkshire, on the night after the nation had voted. Yet more politics
was not for him, however. “I could talk about Brexit for 20 minutes, but I
choose not to,” he said. Exit Brexit, stage hard right. Good call, Ed, judging
that the party mood needed to be joyful, not political.
He was not one to massage figures, either, instead
drawing attention immediately to the empty seats, making everyone there feel
better for their impeccable judgement. Honesty, straightaway, was the best
policy.
Byrne book-ended the show, providing the short
opening and longer closing chapters, with Henley comedy pup Kieran Boyd let off
his lead in between. While this can break the rhythm of the night, Byrne knows
the importance of giving fledgling acts their wings. Nish Kumar, for example, played
support slots in York several times before graduation to headline status at the
Grand Opera House.
Rather too many comedians do material about their children;
the equivalent of being passed endless pictures of little Johnny or Joanna at an
inescapable party, but when Byrne, fast thinking and even faster talking, is
making the observations, then fair children’s play to him.
In If I’m Honest, he “takes a long hard long hard look at
himself and tries to decide if he has any traits that are
worth passing on to his children”. On
Friday, he did so self-deprecatingly, as he takes on parenthood in his forties
with children named Cosmo and Magnus. And no, they were not named for comic
effect.
Far from it. When he
played Reykjavic, Byrne was greeted with an outpouring of Icelandic
congratulations for choosing one of their own!
Byrne could laugh
at how his young sons already were mirroring him and his mutually sarcastic exchanges
with his wife, theatre publicist Claire Walker.
Byrne’s comedy is
both mentally and physically energetic, even hyper, as well as laced with Irish
storytelling lyricism and much mischief making, and not only children’s received
behaviour was up for his honesty test.
So too were
superdads and superheroes and the way superhero film titles have become so
convoluted, as he yearned for the simplicity of old.
Byrne wore a shiny red
jacket and tapered jeans that would not have looked out of place competing on
Strictly Come Dancing, a show he revealed he had turned down, foregoing the chance
for “Byrne the floor” headlines, much to his family’s disappointment. He could not
trust himself with the dancers, said the Oti fan, honest to the end.
Hello? Play Scarborough as well as York, you say? Why not, says Lionel Richie
LIONEL
Richie will play two North Yorkshire shows within a fortnight next summer after
adding Scarborough Open Air Theatre on June 9 to his York Festival appearance on
June 21.
Tickets go
on sale for his Scarborough return on Wednesday at 9am, Richie having made his
sold-out debut there in June 2018 on his All The Hits, All Night Long tour.
“It was a truly wonderful night on the Yorkshire coast in 2018 and I
cannot wait to return to this beautiful part of the UK again,” says the Alabama
soul singer, songwriter and producer. “It’s going to be another night to
remember, so bring you’re dancing shoes.”
Richie, 70, will play Scarborough as part of his Hello!, Hits tour, performing
songs from his Commodores days to the present day, taking in Three Times
A Lady,
Truly, Dancing On The Ceiling, Say You Say Me, Hello and All
Night Long.
Honoured last year with the Ivor Novello PRS for Music Special International
Award, to go with an Oscar, Golden Globe and four Grammy awards and 100 million
album sales, Richie released his latest album, Live From Las Vegas, in the
summer.
Heading East: Westlife: to play Scarborough in the same week as their York Festival headline show next June
York
Festival can be added to such Richie festival headline sets as Bonnaroo, Outside
Lands and Glastonbury, where he drew more than 200,000 to main stage in 2015.
Cuffe and Taylor are promoting both his Scarborough and York gigs. “Lionel
Richie is an undoubted global superstar and we are delighted to be able to
bring him back here to Scarborough,” says director Peter Taylor.
“His 2018 sold-out show was the stuff of legend. It was a brilliant
night in the presence of one of the most successful and celebrated music
artists of all time.”
As well as Richie, Cuffe and Taylor have booked Irish boy band Westlife
to play both locations, Scarborough OAT on June 17 and York Festival, at York Sports
Club, Clifton Park, Shipton Road, on June 20.
Tickets for Scarborough OAT concerts are on sale at scarboroughopenairtheatre,com, on 01723 818111 or 01723 383636, or in person from the venue, in Burniston Road, or the Discover Yorkshire Tourism Bureau, ScarboroughTown Hall, St Nicholas Street.
For York Festival tickets, go to york-festival.com.
York Early Music Christmas Festival:Yorkshire Bach Choir/Baroque Soloists, Sir Jack Lyons Concert Hall, University of York, December 14
THE York Early Music Christmas Festival finished brightly on Saturday with Handel’s Messiah before a packed house. Tempos were rapid, but that comes with the territory when Peter Seymour is at the helm (he sat at the harpsichord and even fingered it from time to time).
Nothing wrong with speed: it is widely thought to deliver excitement. But audiences, like electorates, are not easily fooled and Messiah is not really about excitement. Although traditionally wheeled out at Yuletide, its true focus is the message of Easter.
Mezzo soprano soloist Helen Charlston. Picture: Matthew Badham
One of Seymour’s soloists, mezzo Helen Charlston, appeared to realise this and took him on. He raced into her aria, He Was Despised – and she managed to slow him down. Thus her unaccompanied voicing of “despised” and “rejected”, with a little sob in the latter word, unexpectedly became the evening’s most telling moment.
The choir of 36 voices was impeccably on the ball, its diction superb and its staccato runs unimpeachably clear. Six tenors were not enough in this company and the bass line lacked its usual authority, but the upper voices – several countertenors included – were exemplary.
York soprano soloist Bethany Seymour. Picture: Jim PoynerJim Poyner
The best of the soloists was the bass Gareth Brynmor John, relaxed and forthright in equal measure and especially stirring in Why Do The Nations. In contrast, Gwilym Bowen’s increasingly effortful tenor verged on the operatic, although perfectly suited to Thou Shalt Break Them. Apart from her smooth I Know That My Redeemer Liveth, Bethany Seymour’s soprano arias were shrieky, with dodgy breath control.
No such problems with the tireless orchestra. Led by the spritely Lucy Russell, the strings laid a consistently stylish foundation. Yet relentless speed is only one of countless ways to treat this work. It would be nice to hear some of them occasionally.
James Swanton: Dickensian storyteller par excellence. PIcture: Jayne Nicoll
AFTER spinning yarns all this week at London’s Charles Dickens Museum, Gothic York actor James Swanton returns home with his Ghost Stories for Christmas.
At the time of going to CharlesHutchPress, only five tickets remain on sale for the entire run.
As last year, Swanton will be performing three Dickens works, one each night, at York Medical Society, Stonegate, from Tuesday to Saturday.
A Christmas Carol on Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday will be complemented by the lesser performed The Chimes on Wednesday and The Haunted Man on Friday, all at 7pm.
Swanton, the
Outstanding Performing Artist winner in the 2018 York Culture Awards, will be
the black-clad gatekeeper for all manner of supernatural terrors after memorising
three hours of wintery material for his “seasonal roulette of three Dickensian
tales”.
Ahead of his Dickens of a week
in York, James answers Charles Hutchinson’s questions.
Why is A Christmas Carol so
amenable to being presented in so many guises each winter in York and
elsewhere, James?
“Could it be that it’s the greatest story ever written? Ebenezer
Scrooge has joined Sherlock Holmes and Count Dracula as Victorian literature’s
most endlessly adapted characters.
“But unlike the master detective and the master vampire, who
constantly crop up in diverse new contexts, Scrooge remains inseparable from
his original story. It’s perfectly structured and passionately written. It
demands to be told, just as we all demand to hear it, year after year. There’s
a great responsibility not to do it badly!”
What form do your three shows
take: a reading or more than that in each one-man show?
“I’m happy to say that these are full-fledged dramatisations
rather than Jackanory-style readings. This has been quite the Labour of
Hercules: 180 minutes of text to memorise to cover the three one-hour readings!
But it’s worth it to ensure these pieces are truly alive. My abridgements are
closely based on Dickens’s own performance scripts, so their faith to their
sources is absolute.”
Will you use a similar
performance style for each tale?
“This is old-fashioned storytelling in a suitably atmospheric
space. I’m hoping to use every physical and vocal trick in my repertoire to
make the audience see Dickens’s pictures as clearly as I do myself.
“The formidable Miriam Margolyes saw me performing one of these
pieces in 2017 at the Charles Dickens Museum. She was very complimentary about
its pictorial vividness – and she’s not easily pleased!”
Give quick synopses of The
Chimes and The Haunted Man…
“Just like A Christmas Carol, these lesser-known works
hinge on disenchanted older men who must encounter the supernatural to change
for the better. The Chimes is the exuberant tale of a lowly ticket-porter who
finds goblins squatting in the bells of his local church.
“Meanwhile, The Haunted Man is a Gothic
chiller about a chemist who hatches a bargain with his ghostly double to remove
all of his sorrowful memories.”
Dickens’s concern over
Ignorance and Want rings out in A Christmas Carol. Rather than being ghosts,
the ills of greed and the need for charity and care for others are as alive as
ever. Discuss.
“You know, the absence of Ignorance and Want might be the only
flaw in The Muppet Christmas Carol (a near-perfect film, as everyone knows).
Dickens spectacularly revives the figure of Ignorance in The Haunted Man, in
which the feral child receives a ferocious human embodiment. Deeply disturbing.
“And The Chimes is so socially angry
that it might as well be called ‘A Brexit Christmas Carol’. It attacks the
untrustworthy press, the still more untrustworthy rich, and a world that
condemns the poor without considering how they came to such grief. These might
be Victorian ghost stories, but they are indisputably stories for our own age.”
We still respond to what
Dickens says in a way that contrasts with so many people turning their back on
religion. Why?
“Dickens might be considered to have
reinvented Christianity for an increasingly secular world. He’s particularly
invested in the idea of redemption, and how it might be realised through the
death of an innocent child.
“Death is ever-present for Christ, even at the Nativity:
think of King Herod’s massacre of the innocents, or the Wise Man who gifts him
with the myrrh that’ll preserve his body after the crucifixion.
“All three of these Dickensian ghost
stories centre on children in mortal peril. Tiny Tim must be resurrected just
as miraculously as Scrooge. Dickens suggests that we can conquer death, but in
ways more practical than waiting for an afterlife.”
James Swanton’s Ghost Stories For Christmas, York Medical Society, Stonegate, York, 7pm nightly; A Christmas Carol, December 17, 19, 21; The Chimes, December 18; The Haunted Man, December 20. Box office: 01904 623568 or at yorktheatreroyal.co.uk
James Swanton with his bust of actor Henry Irving in Irving Undead at York Medical Society in October
REVIEW: James Swanton in Irving Undead, York Medical Society, Stonegate, York, October 10 to 12 2019
IT starts with a dusty recording of Henry Irving drifting across the York Medical Society carpet.
This is the sound of “the strangest actor who ever lived”, and to a modern ear, the voice is indeed strange and deathly as Irving negotiates a speech from Shakespeare’s Richard III.
A door opens to the side of the stage, and what first emerges is a thin, long finger of actor-writer James Swanton, then all his digits curl round the door frame. Enter the gaunt Swanton, as spindly of leg as Irving notoriously was.
James Swanton in his role as Henry Irving, ” the strangest actor who ever lived”
As ever, whether playing Dracula, Dickens’ Bill Sikes, Frankenstein’s Creature, Lucifer or now Irving, Swanton brings an angular physicality to his bravura performance, wherein he seems to consume the character he plays, so wholly does he take on the part.
As we know too from his solo performance of Dickens’ A Christmas Carol last winter, he is a wonderfully eloquent storyteller, his writing full of intelligence, understanding, wit and drama.
Here Swanton’s Irving relates the story of his life and death, not least how Bram Stoker, his business manager for 20 years is said to have immortalised him by writing the horror story Dracula. The pain behind the mask for the “undead” and restless Irving is that Dracula is now better known than theatre’s first knight: a case of being out for the Count.
“I hope to do the old man justice,” said James Swanton, as Henry Irving confronted his demons in Swanton’s one-man show
Obsessive in his art, ill-fated in love, fearful of scandal, Irving specialised in playing mad monarchs, guilt-stricken murderers and the Devil, delivered with a Gothic, macabre air that apparently “petrified 19th Century London”. Swanton delights in playing Irving’s Romeo, a frightening performance from the early master of horror acting met with derogatory reviews that Irving reads out with a glum glower.
Swanton contends that Irving was a deeply subversive figure with a work, work, work ethic, driven by some mightier force. All this comes through in an intense performance, underscored with admiration for his fellow traveller along theatre’s pit-laden path.
“I hope to do the old man justice,” said Swanton in advance. He certainly does that, while adding to his stock as a formidable talent in his own right.
Babe in arms: Raqhael Harte’s Mary with the infant Jesus. Picture: John Saunders
A Nativity for York, York Mystery Plays Supporters Trust, Spurriergate Centre, Spurriergate, York, until Sunday
A NATIVITY for York is a new solo venture for the York Mystery Plays Supporters Trust, an hour-long festive first directed by Philip Parr.
The City Guilds wagons have parked up for the winter; Corpus Christi feast day is but a summer memory, and the mediaeval Mystery Plays have moved indoors for four nights and days of Christmas shows.
Glad tidings of great joy: Sally Maybridge’s Angel Gabriel in A Nativity for York. Picture: John Saunders
Thursday’s audience is sitting at tables, sipping hot drinks, the community
cast placed among them from the start, to emerge one by one into their roles,
with the company’s musicians and singers to the back of the church building.
This positioning is a reminder that the Mystery Plays are of the people, for
the people, by the people; always were, always will be.
This Nativity play is not one for tea-towel headgear, tons of tinsel,
awkward children and extraneous animals in the stable. Instead, Parr’s
production knits together text from eight of the 48 plays in the York cycle,
here presented in a “northern dialect of Middle English origins but modernised”.
Modernised might be stretching it: this is still the street language of the
plays of yore, where “mickle” means “a large amount” or “much”.
Stable relationship: Raqhael Harte’s Mary and Chris Pomfrett’s Joseph with the new-born Jesus. Picture: John Saunders
What is modern is the presence of rucksacks and backpacks, a pram, an
M&S bag, high-street clothes and Raqhael Harte’s Mary in jeans and hooded
winter coat. That said, Las Vegas Elvis would love the cut of two of the Kings’
outfits, regal white for Wilma Edwards and dazzling blue for Stephanie Walker, an
irreverent comment maybe, but their countenance could not be more reverent.
Costume designer Filip Gesse balances past and present, the everyday and
the holy, robes and jackets in equal number, linking the plays’ history with
today. Just as the deeply affecting storytelling has resonance with our need
for a new guiding light, new hope, new beginnings (disconnected, it would seem,
from the Godless political event going on that divisive, decisive day).
Wise move: Stephanie Walker’s King seeks the infant Jesus. Picture: John Saunders
Parr’s Nativity for York juxtaposes the Christmas miracle with the story of an ordinary couple caught up in events beyond their control that will change their lives forever.
“The Nativity is probably a story that much of our audience will know, but we wanted to give it a fresh, new and contemporary perspective,” he says. “Joseph, Mary and their baby are really no different from any other refugees: fleeing their country, persecution and the threat of death.” Thought for the day, indeed.
Bearing her gift: Jenna Drury’s Shepherd with Raqhael Harte’s Mary and Jesus. Picture: John Saunders
Sally Maybridge’s Angel Gabriel looks down from above in radiant white, while cast members move among the full house, sometimes in circular motions as the Kings (completed by Ben Turvill) and the Shepherds (Ged Murray, Michael Maybridge and Jenna Drury) make their journeys to seek out the new-born king, wrapped up in Mary’s arms.
All the while, Chris Pomfrett’s Joseph is protective, concerned, dutiful, specs propped on his head in his few calm, reflective moments, fearful at others.
The weight of responsibility: Chris Pomfrett’s Joseph must take Mary and Jesus to a safe place after learning of Herod’s decree to put all infant males to death. Picture: John Saunders
Parr, artistic director of Parrabola and driving force behind the York International Shakespeare Festival, not only directs with suitable gravitas and awareness of making the fullest spectacle of the church setting, but also has written and arranged the beautiful music. Instrumental or choral, accompanied or a cappella, it sounds wonderful as it rises within these bare walls.
Thursday and tonight’s performances have sold out, but seats are available for shows at 12 noon, 2pm and 6.30pm tomorrow (December 14), and 12 noon and 2pm on Sunday. Rejoice at this news and book now on 01904 623568, at yorktheatreroyal.co.uk or from the Theatre Royal box office in person.
York Early Music Christmas Festival: Fieri Consort, National Centre for Early Music, York, December 11
SORRY to pour cold water on your show, chaps, but this was not the oratorio it was billed to be. Giovanni Girolamo Kapsperger, an Italian with Austrian forebears, described his theatrical piece of 1629, The Shepherds of Bethlehem, as a “dialogo recitativo” – a dialogue in musical speech – a forerunner of oratorio certainly, but not the real McCoy. That was still to come.
Now that’s cleared up, Kapsperger certainly made a hefty stab at dramatising the Christmas story and the five singers and four players of Fieri put up a pretty good case for it. So we had the shepherds and the angels battling for the spotlight, while the librettist – a pope-in-waiting – delivered unctuous praise of the present pope, Urban VIII, via a narrator.
What the work lacked in arias was pleasingly filled in with motets and other madrigal-style commentaries, mainly from an earlier generation of composers. So Hassler hinted at the Annunciation, Michael Praetorius’s rose bloomed again, Marenzio admired the Christ-child and Victoria evoked the mystery of it all.
Fieri bring plenty of meat to the table in this repertory. These are strong, modern voices quite without the preciousness once so treasured by early-music buffs, but smooth at the edges as well, so that their blend is exceptionally polished. Shading was less prevalent here. There was even some splendid coloratura from Hannah Ely and Helen Charlston, courtesy of Carissimi, and the instruments kept up tasty chatter behind it all.
Do the hustle: Emma Osman as sex worker and single mum Carol in Kay Mellor’s Band Of Gold at Leeds Grand Theatre. Picture: Anthony Robling
KAY Mellor had seen at
least 30 actors for the all-important role of hustler Carol in her stage
version of Band Of Gold, then in walked Emma Osman.
“She looked right, she
sounded right…and she turned out to be from Leeds,” recalled the Leeds writer-director
at the question-and-session session that followed Monday night’s performance of
her world premiere at Leeds Grand Theatre. “I couldn’t believe it. It must have
been meant to be.”
Born in Leeds, raised in
Moortown until she was eight, then Selby and York, Emma is being billed as
“newcomer Emma Osman”. Although she has played Carly Reynolds in BBC One’s
Doctors and Beth Ayres in Snatch on screen, this is her “break-out role”,
performing alongside EastEnders’ Laurie Brett, Hollyoaks’ Kieron Richardson,
Emmerdale’s Gaynor Faye, Coronation Street’s Shayne Ward and York actor Andrew
Dunn, from Victoria Wood’s dinnerladies.
“The call came through my
agent, and I met Kay in Leeds, two weeks before my 25th birthday,”
says Emma. “It was confirmed I’d got the role later that evening, and what an
early birthday present that was!”
Emma first caught the eye in York as a regal, mysterious and love-struck Titania in Nightshade Productions’ A Midsummer Night’s Dream on the city-centre streets in July 2012. Two summers later, by now studying at East 15 Acting Acting School, she returned home to play Oda-Mae Brown in Pick Me Up Theatre’s Ghost The Musical: the sassy comic-relief Whoopi Goldberg role in the film version.
Emma Osman in 2014, when she was playing Oda-Mae Brown in Pick Me Up Theatre’s Ghost The Musical in York
Now living in London, Emma
is nevertheless delighted to be back north once more, and Mellor’s story of “life on the lane” in Bradford’s red-light
district in the 1990s has resonance for her.
Written 22 years after the ITV
crime drama’s finale in 1997, the play retains the setting and storyline of the
humorous but heartbreaking original series, wherein a group of women, Carol, Rose,
Anita and Gina, a young mother newly on the game, must battle for survival…and
a killer is on the loose.
“I’ve got a lot of family that
lived in Bradford. My aunt used to work in the job centre, dealing with lots of
sex workers, meeting the women Band Of Gold is based on,” says Emma. “In fact,
the woman who Carol is based on is coming to the show.”
Normally, Emma has a rule
not to watch a show before auditioning for a part. “But because Band Of Gold
was written about real people, I broke that rule and watched all the series before
meeting Kay,” she says.
Life on the lane and in the hustlers’ bar: Emma Osman’s Carol, Laurie Brett’s Anita and Gaynor Faye’s Rose in Kay Mellor’s Band Of Gold. Picture: Anthony Robling
“I’ve also watched a lot of
documentaries on sex-workers, especially the Holbeck one in Leeds. It’s interesting
to see how even though the women have to be tough, they’re also very vulnerable
and they’re just everyday girls in extraordinary circumstances.
“What Band Of Gold does so
well is show it all, the vulnerability, the banter and the problems that have
put them where they are.”
Carol was “the
Cathy Tyson role” in the TV series, but Osman gives it her own stamp, bringing
lip, no-nonsense nous, jagged humour, resilience and a strut to a feisty woman
who can handle a disinfectant bottle as well as she can deal with men’s demands
and the inherent dangers of her work, taking care of herself and daughter Emma.
“There’s a pressure there, but you have to make the role your own,” she says. “I appreciate being given this opportunity to do something so powerful and to play a character who’s so strong and feisty.”
“I’m honoured to be working with Kay Mellor, so I want to make her feel proud,” says Emma Osman
Working
with a writer-director on a premiere has “definitely been different from my
past theatrical experiences, though limited,” says Emma. “This way, if Kay
wants to change a line, she can, if it makes more sense for the plot or
improves the dialogue, so there was a lot more going on in rehearsals. And she’s
been making changes during the run, giving us notes after shows, so we’re still
working on it.”
Emma
adds: “It’s given me such an insight into playing Carol, and it’s such an
honour to be doing this play in Leeds with Kay, especially as I was born here
and lived here until I was eight.”
Playing
Carol is a “dream role”, she says. “I’m a big feminist and I’m into playing
feminists, so this is ‘full-on percussion’ as my first big stage part. I’m
honoured to be working with Kay, so I want to make her feel proud, just as I want
to make the sex workers, or former sex workers, who are coming to see the play
feel that we’re telling their stories truthfully.”
Kay Mellor’s Band Of Gold
runs at Leeds Grand Theatre until Saturday, December 14. Performances: 2.30pm and 7.30pm today; 7.30pm tomorrow;
2.30pm and 7.30pm, Saturday. Tickets update: limited availability on 0844 848
2700 or at leedsgrandtheatre.com.
Giving him the bird: David Leonard’s Evil Diva in Sleeping Beauty at York Theatre Royal. All pictures: Robling Photography
Sleeping Beauty, York Theatre Royal, until January 25 2020. Box office: 01904 623568 or at yorktheatreroyal.co.uk
UNLESS you have been asleep for 100 years, you will know Sleeping
Beauty is the first York Theatre Royal pantomime since Berwick Kaler hung up his
big boots after 40 years as Britain’s longest-serving dame.
Unlike Elvis, however, Kaler has not left the building. Now 73, he is still taking care of business, writing the script; co-directing with Leeds City Varieties rock’n’roll pantomime alumnus Matt Aston; appearing in two film sequences and in doll’s head form for baby Beauty, and providing sporadic voice-overs too. In other words, there is still a Kaler on the loose.
Slice-up: A J Powell’s ever-changing modes transform him into Edward Scissorhands
“You have given me a purpose to life,” he told his adoring
panto public as he waved goodbye through the final curtain on February 2 this
year. “I’m not going anywhere. If this theatre needs me, I’ll be back like
a shot.”
Executive director Tom Bird and co decided they did need him for the
first pantomime of the post-dame, post Damian Cruden directorship era. Britain’s
best villain, David Leonard, perennially bouncy sidekick Martin Barrass, ageless
principal girl Suzy Cooper and chameleon Brummie A J Powell said they needed
him too, to write the script.
And so Berwick was back like a shot, ticket sales have passed the 30,000
mark, but how do you fill the black hole, the tornado wreaking havoc, the
master adlibber, the smasher of theatre’s fourth wall that is the Kaler dame?
All rise: Martin Barrass’s down-to-earth Queen Aradne with Jack Lansbury’s King and newcomer Howie Michaels’ Funky the Flunky in Sleeping Beauty
This is the elephant in the room, a role more usually taken by Barrass
in one of his animal acts. In fact, a better comparison is Banquo’s ghost, haunting
this halfway house of a panto.
Sleeping Beauty retains the Kaler template, from Babbies And Bairns theme
tune opening to Hope You’ll Return Next Year finale to convoluted plot, via
disappointingly unfunny films (one with Berwick and Harry Gration) and a futile
slosh scene.
As there ain’t no-one like Berwick’s dame, the remaining panto gang of four spread out their familiar traits without ever filling the gap. Thankfully, there’s no rest for the wicked, and so David Leonard is still fab-u-lous, with a dash of dame, or more truthfully waspish drag queen, about his Evil Diva, and his character switch with Powell’s ever-so-nice Darth Vader is the show’s one coup de theatre.
Principal girl, cuddly toy: Suzy Cooper’s Princess Beauty
Suzy Cooper’s Princess Beauty goes from St Trinian’s schoolgirl with a cuddly toy to leading song-and-dance routines, searching forlornly for better material, especially in a year when she has excelled as Lady Macbeth in Shakespeare Rose Theatre’s Macbeth at Blenheim Palace.
Without his buddy Berwick to bounce off, Martin Barrass is in no man’s land – or even no mam’s land – as Queen Ariadne, not a dame, nor a queen, one with only one good (Bile Beans) costume and only one innovation, a nod to Eric Morecambe, to go with the old Barrass tropes.
Musical theatre newcomer Howie Michaels’s Funky the Flunky, big voice, big stage presence, fares well, and Jack Lansbury’s King/Tarquin Farquhar, dance captain Danielle Mullan and the ensemble work their panto socks off in frankly difficult circumstances, their reward coming in the stand-out Teenage Dirtbag routine, Grace Harrington’s best choreography..
Beauty and the beastly: Suzy Cooper with vainglorious villain David Leonard
Was it a mere coincidence that new designer Anthony Lamble’s sets lacked
the sparkle of old, just as the comedy lacked the spark, surprise, timing, topicality
and magical mayhem of the peak Kaler years?
Last night felt awkward, uncomfortable, indulgent. Bird and the board
have to ask: “Are the days of this brand of pantomime behind you?”, because the
patented but weary “same old rubbish” won’t suffice next year.
This is no laughing matter, and here are the options. Bring back Dame Berwick full on, working from the inside, not the outside, with all that goes with that; freshen up the panto in a different way, or find a new vehicle to utilise the talents of Leonard, Cooper, Barrass and Powell. Many a theatre has moved on from pantomime, whether Leeds Playhouse, the Stephen Joseph Theatre or Hull Truck, and still found a winter winner. We await the Bird call…
The final curtain: Berwick Kaler saying farewell to 40 years as York Theatre Royal’s pantomime dame on February 2 2019
LAST night was press night for Sleeping Beauty, the first
York Theatre Royal pantomime since Berwick Kaler hung up the dame’s big boots
after 40 years.
Unlike Elvis, however, Kaler has not left the building. Now 73,
he is still taking care of business, writing the script; co-directing with
Leeds City Varieties rock’n’roll alumnus Matt Aston; appearing in two film
sequences and in doll’s head form for baby Beauty, and providing sporadic voiceovers
too.
How was the show? A thing of beauty, or should this panto
format be put to sleep? See Charles Hutchinson’s verdict later today.
In the meantime, let’s remember the Dame Berwick Kaler years
from an Ugly Sister in 1977 to exit stage left, February 2 2019. The total
reads: Jack And The Beanstalk, six pantos; Mother Goose, five; Cinderella,
five; Aladdin, five; Dick Whittington, four; Babes In The Wood, three; Sleeping
Beauty, two; Sinbad The Sailor, two; Humpty Dumpty, one; Beauty And The Beast,
one; Old Mother Milly, one; Dick Turpin, one; Humpty Dumpty, one; York Family
Robinson, one; Robin Hood & His Merry Mam, one, and his last stand, The
Grand Old Dame Of York, one.
Up in lights: Northern Ballet dancer Martha Leebolt in David Nixon’s Cinderella. at Leeds Grand Theatre from December 17. All pictures: Emma Kauldhar
NORTHERN Ballet return home from December 17 for the festive season in Leeds with artistic director David Nixon’s enchanting adaptation of Cinderella at the Grand Theatre.
In the Canadian-born choreographer’s
account of “the world’s most famous rags-to-riches fairy tale”, he combines
dance with magic and circus skills, as seen on tour already at Nottingham Theatre
Royal and Norwich Theatre Royal last month.
Puff the magic! Ashley Dixon as The Magician in Northern Ballet’s Cinderella
In Northern Ballet’s Cinderella,a tragic end to a perfect summer’s day leaves Cinderella with no choice but
to accept a desolate life of servitude. At the mercy of her wicked Stepmother,
Cinderella seeks joy where she can but, after encountering the handsome
carefree Prince skating on a glistening lake of ice, she yearns for another
life.
Despite her sadness,
Cinderella never forgets to be kind and her generosity is repaid when a chance
encounter with a mysterious magician changes her destiny forever.
Touching moment: Javier Torrres as Prince Mikhail and Minju Kang as Cinderella
Cinderella is not
only choreographed and directed by Nixon, but he has designed the opulent
costumes too. The ballet is performed to an original score by Philip Feeney, played
live each performance by Northern Ballet Sinfonia. Duncan Hayler has designed the
transformative sets, complemented by Tim Mitchell’s lighting design.
Nixon says: “This
production of Cinderella, while being immediately recognisable as the famous
fairy tale, offers something different to other traditional ballet adaptations.
Point of order: Minju Kang and Rachael Gillespie in Cinderella
“We have staged our
ballet in the winter wonderland of Imperial Russia, opening up the
possibilities of this colourful world as a new setting for Cinderella to make
her journey. “Audiences will see the dancers skate on a glistening lake of ice,
stilt walkers entertaining in a marketplace and the fateful Ball held in a
Fabergé-inspired ballroom.”
He concludes: “Cinderellais ultimately the story of a young woman who must travel a challenging road
to achieve happiness and our ballet is a joyful adaptation filled with action,
magic and fun.”
You will go to the Ball: Minju Kang’s Cinderella in Northern Ballet’s Cinderella
Northern Ballet’s Cinderella runs at Leeds Grand Theatre, December 17 to January 2 2020, 7pm (not December 24 or 31); 2pm matinees, December 18, 21, 24, 27, 28 and 31, January 2; Sunday shows at 4pm, December 22 and 29; no Sunday evening shows. No performances on Christmas Day, Boxing Day and New Year’s Day. Box office: 0844 848 2700 or at leedsgrandtheatre.com.
Cinderella production credits
Choreography, Direction and Costume
Design: David
Nixon
