Chrystal E. Williams in the title role in Opera North’s Carmen. Picture: Tristram Kenton
OPERA North was riding high coming into this new Edward Dick production.
Buoyant through lockdown with multiple streamed events via its own digital platform ON Demand, its backstage efforts were centred on a huge Music Works development.
The outcome of this is the new Howard Opera Centre, named after its principal benefactor Dr Keith Howard, who contributed some 60 per cent of the £18.5 million cost. It will house management and rehearsal studios for the company itself, while providing educational spaces for youngsters to explore their potential.
Within months, a new bar and restaurant with public access will open next to the Howard Assembly Room (now freed exclusively for smaller-scale events), the result of imaginative enclosure of a former Victorian street.
Camila Titinger as Micaëla and Erin Caves as Don Joséin Opera North’s Carmen. Picture: Tristram Kenton
Sadly, all this excitement did not generate a Carmen to do it justice. It is a besetting sin of Carmen producers that they feel the need to re-interpret Bizet, not to say Mérimée, in tune with modern attitudes.
This runs a serious risk of dumbing down, even presumption: this show’s Carmen, Chrystal E. Williams, was quoted in the programme as declaring that “it would be easy just to do a conventional Carmen”, as if convention were a dirty word – or easy.
It is hard to portray an incorrigible man-eater as a saint, albeit one who is the figment of solely male imaginations. Indeed, after Opera North’s last attempt at the work, Daniel Kramer’s brutalist affair ten years ago, no-one would have been surprised if the company had played this one straight down the middle.
Instead, what we have is a good night out, but with little relevance to the original. Time and place are not identified in Colin Richmond’s sets, but we can tell that this is a border town. Since the smugglers are dealing in drugs, we have every reason to assume that we are on the United States-Mexico border.
Phillip Rhodes as Escamillo with members of the Chorus of Opera North. Picture: Tristram Kenton
The action opens in a bordello masquerading as a night-club, whose clientele is mainly in uniform, doubtless drawn by the illuminated ‘GIRLS’ on scaffolding dominating the scenario. Not exactly an advertisement for women’s lib, especially given female staff sashaying around in flimsy underwear, to the designs of Laura Hopkins.
If these girls are smoking anything, it is coke, not cigarettes. Still, it has to be said, the ladies of the chorus bravely put their best foot forward; if they feel uncomfortable, it certainly does not show.
Immediately noticeable is the sparkling form of the orchestra, with Garry Walker at the helm for the first time as music director, a year later than planned. Theirs is much the most positive contribution to the evening.
Walker keeps rhythms consistently crisp but is equally alive to atmosphere: nerve-jangling chromatics in the card scene, for example, and velvet horns in Micaela’s song a little later. His tenure is off to a cracking start.
Nando Messias as Lillas Pastia: “Makes several androgynous incursions during the second half”. Picture: Tristram Kenton
Neither of the principal pair is vocally quick out of the blocks and he has to gentle them into the fray. Williams is lowered on a swing onto the night-club stage, to be embroiled at once in a fan-dance: it is an eye-catching entrance, in keeping with her charm.
When the stage swivels and we see the ‘real’ Carmen – at her make-up table, wig removed, cuddling what we assume is her daughter – her mezzo, although still light, begins to bite. But it is not until Act 3 that we hear what might have been: genuine passion.
The same applies to Don José. Erin Caves only joined the cast five days ahead of curtain-up, Covid having effectively removed two previous candidates. His safely surly opening is understandable, but does little to convince of his interest in Carmen or offer any reason for her pursuit of him.
If there is any electricity at their first encounter, it is low-voltage, like Caves’ tenor. It is only when his bile is up, much later, that he finds real resonance. His eventual throttling of Carmen prolongs her agony unjustifiably.
Erin Caves as Don José and Chrystal E. Williams as Carmen. Picture: Tristram Kenton
Phillip Rhodes’ Escamillo arrives on an electrically-powered bucking bronco, a cowboy not a toreador; there is no hint of the bull-ring. The swagger of his ‘Toreador’ song certainly raises the vocal temperature but thereafter gradually dissipates, lessening the likelihood that he would offer José any real threat. So when José chases him across the scaffolding that now stands in for a mountain fortress, we are entitled to wonder what all the fuss is about.
Camila Titinger gives an engaging Micaela, whose aria is a touch short on warmth; she is mistakenly encouraged to make much of her pregnancy. Amy Freston’s Frasquita and Helen Évora’s Mercedes are tirelessly flighty, raising everyone’s spirits, while the spivvy smugglers of Dean Robinson and Stuart Laing bring an element of light relief. Matthew Stiff is a firm if stolid Zuniga.
With the Lillas Pastia of Nando Messias making several androgynous incursions during the second half, there is no end to the mixed messages of this ill-focused production. Thank heaven we have five children who know exactly what they have to do, working with a chorus that does its level best to sound persuasive. But the saving grace is the orchestra – focused on unvarnished Bizet.
Martin Dreyer
Further performances onOctober 26 and 28, then on tour until November 19, returning to Leeds in February 2022.
Hannah Victoria’s Princess and the pea in Tutti Frutti’s The Princess And The Pea
The Princess And The Pea, Tutti Frutti, York Theatre Royal Studio, 6pm this evening, then on tour. Box office: 01904 623568 or at yorktheatreroyal.co.uk.
SINCE Covid’s cloak turned theatres dark, York Theatre Royal’s dormant Studio could have been added to York playwright Mike Kenny’s Museum of Forgotten Things.
Thankfully, after being used for storage and rehearsals, the Studio has been re-awakened for performances anew, albeit with a capacity reduced from 100 to 71. Out goes seating to the sides; in comes a head-on stage configuration.
A masked-up CharlesHutchPress took up a front-row seat at a morning performance full of excited Badger Hill Primary School children. How lovely to be part of such an occasion full of happy, enchanted faces.
This show is a revival of Leeds children’s theatre company Tutti Frutti’s colour-suffused, playful staging of Mike Kenny’s updated adaptation of Hans Christian Andersen’s story, set in a place where what you see is not what it seems: the aforementioned Museum of Forgotten Things.
Sophia Hatfield in The Princess And The Pea at York Theatre Royal Studio
In his trademark way of bringing fresh perspectives to familiar stories, he refracts Andersen’s tale of The Princess And The Pea through the status of princesses today, against a backdrop that has moved on again even from the 2014 premiere, in our world of celebrity royals, social-media influencers, selfies and preening Love Island and Kardashian saturation coverage.
“Princesses seem to be back with us as a cultural phenomenon,” Kenny writes in his programme note. “The assumption is generally that a ‘real’ princess is very sensitive and high maintenance. If you read Andersen’s original, you can’t quite tell if he’s supporting or actually taking the mickey out of this attitude”.
Kenny creates a framework where three narrator-curators at the museum, a mother, son and their trainee, delve into the mystery of how a little green pea ended up there in a magical hour of storytelling, songs and silliness.
Bossy-boots Mother (Sophia Hatfield) becomes Queen; layabout Son (Mckenzie Alexander) transforms into the Prince and eager Trainee (Hannah Victoria) will emerge as the Princess of the title.
The “other” princesses in The Princess And The Pea, as sent up by Hannah Victoria, Sophia Hatfield and Mckenzie Alexander
All three raid the museum drawers to play “every type of princess you could imagine” in a send-up of 21st century reality TV types (and maybe even York hen parties) as the spoilt, work-shy, silver-spoon-in-his-mouth Prince is instructed by the Queen to conduct his search for the “real Princess” he should marry.
Kenny’s play follows the Prince’s passage from birth, his privileged, demand-everything, spend-spend-spend progress to this point being denoted by numbered props, whether in a suitcase lining, on an umbrella or inside a hat that also turns into a cake-mixing bowl.
Devotees of Peter Greenaway’s cult 1988 film Drowning By Numbers will recall a similar numerical conceit reaping dividends.
Anyway, back to the storyline. Kenny notes how Andersen reveals nothing about the Princess, beyond her taking the “pea test” to prove she is a real princess, and he duly gives her a story about “what it means to be ‘real’”, rather than a Disney-glossy princess.
On song: a musical number for Sophia Hatfield, Hannah Victoria and Mckenzie Alexander
Rather than pretty dresses, tantrums and tiaras, Victoria’s Princess has worked in a kitchen, is blown in by the winds and is left standing in the rain until the wastrel Prince – with all staff laid off – has to answer the door himself.
Kenny, very much the people’s playwright, revels in keeping it real, not royal, with delightful mischief in his storytelling as he mirrors Andersen and the Shrek films in his irreverence towards royalty.
He has fun at the expense of Alexander’s callow Prince for being devoid of social graces and practical know-how, but tellingly he rewards him for toughening up when needs must, and likewise he sends up the Queen’s blinkered, old-school ways and haughty airs for being out of date.
Further pleasures come from Kenny raiding the cupboard of familiar fairytale characters and now forgotten things, from Goldilocks’s porridge spoon to Cinderella’s glittering glass slippers.
Playwright Mike Kenny: “Revels in keeping it real, not royal”
Harris’s cast of actor-musicians thrives on Kenny’s fast-moving sense of fun and games, constant scene and character changes and cheeky humour, allied to his storytelling prowess.
Alexander, a natural for the silly-billy daft lad in pantomime, instantly bonds with the audience with his wide-eyed playing and he loves the chance to be a princess too; Victoria makes for a grounded, streetwise Princess and Hatfield is both fun yet more serious as the older hand in the company.
They team up joyfully for Christella Litras’s compositions too, singing characterfully as well as contributing violin, accordion, saxophone and more to complement Litras’s keyboards.
So much to enjoy here, topped off by Catherine Chapman’s designs, where the stage colours of blue and green, pink and orange, yellow and gold are matched by the actors’ attire. Look out for such clever details as cupboard drawers turning into suitcases – as well as the numbers popping up on myriad objects.
At the finale, the curators change the museum name from Forgotten to Remembered Things. Your reviewer loved this show in 2014; happy to report, it is now even better than first remembered.
That clinches it: Emma Scott’s Macbeth leaps into the arms of Nell Frampton’s The Lady in rehearsal for York Shakespeare Project’s Macbeth. Picture: John Saunders
THE curse of Macbeth combined with Lockdown 1’s imposition to put a stop to York Shakespeare Project’s Scottish Play just one week before its March 2020 opening.
Rising like the ghost of Banquo, but sure to be better received, Leo Doulton’s resurrected production will run at Theatre@41, Monkgate, from tomorrow’s open dress rehearsal (26/10/2021) to Saturday as the 37th play in the York charity’s mission to perform all Shakespeare’s known plays in a 20-year span.
Doulton will be casting Emma Scott’s Macbeth into a dystopian future, using a cyberpunk staging to bring to life this dark tale of ambition, murder and supernatural forces.
“It would be impossible to present Macbeth in the same way as when we started work on it before the pandemic,” he says. “We’ve moved from a world where we fear quite specific things to one where we fear more pervasive, invisible ones, such as the pandemic and the climate crisis.”
Here, on the eve of something wicked this way coming, director Leo Doulton answers CharlesHutchPress’s questions.
Macbeth director Leo Doulton
You had to put your production on hold only a week from opening night in March 2020. How have you gone about building up it up again? Did you start from scratch? Pick up where you left off?
“The image I’m using with the cast and crew is imagining that our 2020 production was a floating city, where light and dark were clearly divided. That city has now crashed, and we’re building something new in the rubble. Some of the rubble can be reused, other bits repurposed into something else, and other parts are from other places entirely.
“More practically, the answer is ‘a bit of both’. I always wanted to make sure that as many of the original cast as were able could re-join us, so that led to a degree of continuity.
“Some of the core ideas, like cyberpunk as a genre of systems beyond mortal understanding, remained useful. But any production has to speak to its audience, and is made by people, all of whom have been changed by the past years.
“Once we knew the show was definitely coming back, I sat down and re-read the play from a blank script, noting which themes, motifs and ideas stood out to me in our new times: uncertainty and innocence, corruption as a constant presence and so on. From that, and discussions with the whole team, came the latest evolution of the show.”
How many cast members and roles have you had to change?
“Five cast members out of 13 and one member of the production team, plus three members of the original cast shifting to new parts. It was especially sad to lose Amanda Dales as The Lady; she was just about to deliver a wonderful performance.
“However, I’m very pleased to have so many new people entering the cast. There’s a unique bond among those of us who entered the pandemic together, but that could easily lead to stagnation were it not for having new thoughts and approaches joining the room, without preconceptions based on the previous iteration of this production.”
Tony Froud’s Ross, with Emma Scott’s Macbeth, left, and Elizabeth Elsworth’s Duncan, rehearsing a scene for Leo Doulton’s Macbeth production. Picture: John Saunders
Death and the fear of death is everywhere in Macbeth, as indeed it has been around us all since March 2020 in these pandemic times. How has that had an impact on how you present Macbeth and those who will be watching it?
“Most obviously, the pandemic means that our audience and actors will be socially distanced and we’ll be asking people to wear masks to keep one another safe.
“You know, I’m not sure Macbeth is an especially death-heavy play, certainly not more so than any of Shakespeare’s other tragedies.
“While I’m confident that someone will treat us all to a Covid-Macbeth, to my mind the play is more concerned with the art of being human while alive and mortal: how to act, what legacy we’ll have, and how to understand a world far larger than us. Its deaths are from violence and the supernatural, not disease.
“In many ways, that is the main change caused by the pandemic. Before it, this was a production where we made a world of clearly defined good and evil; where evil was a known thing you could point at.
“Now, we have spent a long time in a world of lingering menace; where something as innocuous as a doorknob might be a deathly threat. People have been isolated. Uncertainty about what will happen next, or who might be infectious, has infiltrated daily life. Everybody has been affected.
“I’m sure that played into a reading where the Macbeths no longer open a door that taints them alone – the whole world is touched by what comes through, and few remain entirely unchanged. The uncertainty of the play’s inhabitants is more important now: none of them, except perhaps the Witches, knows what’s going on. We’ve reshaped the play to draw out those ideas.”
Why are you setting Macbeth in a dystopian cyberpunk future?
“Because I am a colossal nerd!
“More seriously: you’ll be familiar with period productions, productions in modern dress and really abstract conceptual productions.
“Period productions allow the play to sit in the world it’s written for, but demand the audience do advance reading to see beyond Ye Olde Worlde Thingy. Modern dress gives a cultural language that the audience understand but struggle every time someone mentions a sword or castle. Conceptual productions are great at pulling out the ideas of the play, but often lose some of the dramatic effect.
Clive Lyons as Banquo in York Shakespeare Project’s Macbeth. Picture: John Saunders
“An imagined future gives us the best of all three: a world built using a cultural language the audience understand, while also supporting the play’s world and bringing out its ideas.
“In this case, cyberpunk is a genre that features individuals in a system far beyond them, in an ever-changing world of illusory realities that is corrupted in many ways. It’s perfect for Macbeth– and because we’d built a new world just for this production, it meant that it was very easy to rebuild that world for 2021 in ways that wouldn’t have been possible with other approaches to the play.
“Cyberpunk is an exciting genre for Macbeth, allowing us to explore Shakespeare’s ideas of lurking corruption, a disintegrating reality and the search for some moral certainty.”
How will that be reflected in Charley Ipsen’s set and costume design?
“Ooh, you’re in for a treat. Once you’ve entered the space, you’ll feel the play’s world surrounding you and creeping in. But I’m not going to spoil it, other than to say that Charley’s made something really rather special: they’ve outdone themselves, especially on a tight budget.”
If one play were going to stop York Shakespeare Project in its tracks, it would always be the Scottish Play. Lo and behold, only two productions from the finish line, the curse of Macbeth meets the curse of Covid! Discuss…
“If I had a quid for every time I’ve heard that joke since March 2020.
“I can’t say I’m superstitious in that way. Though our dramaturge, Dr Kelsey Ridge, did share an interesting theory about why the superstition arose: Macbeth is a play that will almost always bring an audience, which means that it’s often one of the last plays a company will do to try and balance the books before going bankrupt.
“Not sure if it’s true, but it’s a good theory.”
Vaulting ambition: Emma Scott in rehearsal for her lead role as Macbeth in York Shakespeare Project’s Macbeth. Picture: John Saunders
Macbeth is back in the headlines for the James McArdle-Saoirse Ronan coupling in Yael Farber’s staging of The Tragedy Of Macbeth at the Almeida, London. What will the coupling of Emma Scott (she/her) as Macbeth and Nell Frampton (they/them) as The Lady bring to your production?
“I haven’t seen that production, having been in York, but having heard that it runs at three and a half hours, apparently our actors at the very least speak faster! (Our Macbeth lasts for only one hour and 40 minutes with no interval.)
“There are as many ways of playing The Lady and Macbeth as there are actors.
“Spoilers ahead: I think the magic Nell and Emma bring is the tenderness of the initial relationship, followed by its unravelling as both are racked with the poison they invite into the world.
“They’re both young, and in many ways that’s helped give their Macbeths’ relationship interesting flavours of hopefulness, enthusiasm and almost innocence at the start of the play. It’s heart-breaking to see that fall apart.
“Nell was playing Malcolm in 2020, and they’ve certainly shown their range as an actor, creating a Lady with a delicious mix of urgency, love, and craving to become something more.
“Emma’s Macbeth has been cooking since late 2019. There’s power and monstrosity, but underpinning it all an almost boundless humanity, caught up in society, temptation, the need for security, the want of a legacy, and of course the great question: do our actions matter in any moral sense? She’s created something very special.
“The relationship Nell and Emma have crafted between The Lady and Macbeth is remarkably done: one striding ever onwards into corruption, the other trying to step back from something she cannot escape. It’s been great fun rehearsing with them, especially since both are, in their own ways, scholars of early modern European literature and interested in cyberpunk and related genres.”
When did you first see a production of Macbeth and what do you recall of it?
“I remember watching about five minutes of the Ian McKellen/Judi Dench production at school, though beyond it being rather dark I remember very little. It’s now one of my favourite productions.
Nell Frampton as The Lady in the York Shakespeare Project rehearsal room. Picture: John Saunders
“Like many people, Shakespeare at school was treated more as a matter of translation than as a source of drama and joy.
“It was years later, when I was just starting to discover why people love Shakespeare, that I first saw a full production of Macbeth: a very intense one at the Young Vic, which managed to compress the whole thing into an hour of action, fear and dread.
What makes Macbeth a great play to stage and, equally, a great part to play?
“For the play: I could answer this for hours; this is one of my favourite plays! How compact the play is, the beautiful lines, the range of ways to approach it for each different team, the vastness and intimacy of its ideas about humanity and the world, the way it presents the Macbeths’ ever-worsening bargains and compromises.
“I’d argue that many plays can be great in the right hands, but Macbeth’s range of ideas and vivid archetypal roles makes the task far easier.
“As a role, Macbeth gives the actor a lot of opportunities to make it their own. With several iconic monologues and 30 per cent of the lines, the actor can build a world around their interpretation and always find something new.
“Those monologues are iconic for a reason: Macbeth’s reflections on the right way to live, what we leave behind, and his shifting views on his own moral state give the actor plenty to play with. You start playing someone who is virtuous and worthy and step by step leaves that behind.
What makes Macbeth a difficult play to stage and, equally, a difficult part to play?
“Mostly, people constantly bringing up those who have gone before! It can be very distracting, though I’ve got rather good at ignoring what others have done to try and read it as though I didn’t know its long tradition, and it was a new play.
York Shakespeare Project’s poster for Leo Doulton’s cyberpunk Macbeth
“It’s pleasingly intricate. Even after an extra two years working on it, I haven’t reached the bottom of what it can do, while still being amazed at how clear it all is.
“As a role, it offers the chance to make a genuine masterpiece. But that requires excellence across the board, both in mechanical things like vocal, physical and text-preparation techniques, and in the deeper artistic matters of finding and nurturing an interpretation, working with the rest of the team, and bringing that to life. I do think Emma has risen astoundingly to the challenge.”
How have you found the experience of working on your second YSP production after your 2019 debut?
“Fantastic. I was very pleased to direct Anthony And Cleopatrain 2019, becoming part of a larger mission. Coming back for Macbeth in 2020 was a delight; coming back after a year of lockdowns has been a joy. Working with people who love Shakespeare so much, with such a strong sense of purpose, and a real range of approaches and ideas, is always a pleasure.”
Is there anything else you would like to add?
“The whole team have done amazing work. Even if you’re not normally a Shakespeare person, this is a great play to try: it’s pacy, dives from love to fear to action to the supernatural, and, at the end of the day, only costs £5 if you come on the right day, and we’ll be doing what we can to make it as safe as possible. Hopefully, we’ll see you there!”
York Shakespeare Project in Macbeth, Theatre@41, Monkgate, York, October 26 to 30, 7.30pm and 2.30pm Saturday matinee. SOLD OUT. Box office for returns only: tickets.41monkgate.co.uk.
James Gladdon’s Robert and Ingvild Lakou’s Romy in The Offing. Picture: Tony Bartholomew
The Offing, Stephen Joseph Theatre/Live Theatre, Newcastle, at Stephen Joseph Theatre, Scarborough, until October 30. Box office: 01723 370541 or at sjt.uk.com
BOOK club favourite The Offing, Hebden Bridge writer Benjamin Myers’s life-affirming account of a journey of discovery from Durham to the North Yorkshire coast, finally makes it to Scarborough after all.
A word of caution, however. Janice Okoh’s adaptation, with additional material by Stephen Joseph Theatre artistic director Paul Robinson, deviates from the book in its structure and tone.
In the words of The Crack’s Book of the Month recommendation, quoted on the paperback sleeve: “If The Offing was a play, it would be a classic two-hander, but any theatrical version would be missing Ben Myers’ bucolic prose, which he imbues with all the evocative rhythms of the passing seasons. This is what folk music would look like if it came in the written form.”
Well, Robinson’s premiere gives us the folk music in the compositions of hauntingly voiced singer Ana Silvera, recorded with Rob Harbron, Lau fiddler Aidan O’Rourke and Jasper Høiby. Lyrical, poetic, poignant, the score and sound design score highly.
The false note, alas, is struck by the disruptive decision to forego a two-hander’s ebb and flow in favour of a jarring three-hander and a ghost story to boot, rather than the gradual revelation of the sub-plot’s mystery.
It would be wrong to say the impact rivals the late Banquo’s arrival at Macbeth’s dinner table, but the subtlety and nuance of Myers’ book is dissipated, and the SJT autumn brochure’s billing of a “sensitive” adaptation might well raise eyebrows, particularly at the sight of a desperate hand suddenly reaching through the shed wall after the sound of scratching. This is not a Stephen King story and it is out of place.
For those not familiar with Myers’s best-seller, The Offing is a coming-of-age story, wherein miner’s son Robert Appleyard (James Gladdon) has left his County Durham pit community on a trek with an open mind and no termination date, working casual labour shifts en route to Scarborough.
Already, at 16, he has the wish to escape life down the pit; he has the wit, but not the tools. This is post-war, still-on-rations Britain: grey, anti-German and narrow (resonating with Brexit Britain).
We pick up his story just up the Yorkshire moorland coast at Robin Hood’s Bay. Narrator Robert is 90, tapping away at a typewriter, 74 years on from when he first chanced upon the bohemian Dulcie Piper (Cate Hamer).
Removing his jacket, and those 74 years, he encounters her out walking her German Shepherd dog, Butler (or ‘Butters’, for short, “although it’s not shorter”, he notes, in the kind of observation that will mark him out for his future career).
Ingvild Lakou’s Romy and Cate Hamer’s Dulcie in The Offing. Picture: Tony Bartholomew
Initially, the focus is on their story, the one that leads to a lifelong friendship. Gladdon’s callow, diffident but keen lad needs awakening; Homer’s libertine Dulcie – haughty yet naughty, once well connected and rebellious, still opinionated, waspishly witty and impassioned but now disconnected, shut down, austere and alone – needs reawakening.
As she feeds his body on epicurean food and wine – “you have butter!” he says, eyes lighting up – and his mind with great art and the literature of Keats, John Clare and the sex texts of DH Lawrence, the culture-clash chasms of the book begin to bubble away. Albeit with surprising softness by comparison with David Wood’s adaptation of Michelle Magorian’s wartime friendship tale Goodnight Mister Tom, but an elephant has taken up residence in the corner too.
Or, rather, two elephants. The first is omnipresent: Helen Goddard’s clunky set sits squarely at odds both with The Round’s configuration and with nature, the outdoors, the flowers and fruits, God’s Own Country Yorkshire, that should be as nurturing as the food and the literature.
Goddard plays instead to the memory-play interpretation of Okoh and Robinson by constructing a heavyweight house interior and the shed where Robert beds down, an interior that has been stripped down to bare wood and faded, dusty pictures, furniture and items. The warmth is stripped away too.
Not only mice are scratching away in the corner. So too is elephant number two: what to do with the secondary story of Dulcie’s long-gone lover, German poet Romy. She could be a mysterious, haunting presence through her poetry, or even Silvera’s music, but this version of The Offing turns from a coming-of-age story to a coming-off-page story, instead having Ingvild Lakou’s Romy as an almost equal third player.
You would expect that in a film adaptation, but one of theatre’s great gifts, shared with books, is the deployment of imagination, a gift to let fly that is rejected here, and so The Offing becomes more prosaic than poetic, and so too does Romy, who fails to match the magnificence or mystery of Dulcie’s descriptions.
Writer and director seem unsure what to do with her when she is present, and Romy becomes a dead weight, stultifying what made the book so cherished.
Through no fault of the playing of Hamer, Gladdon and Lakou – always accurate to the script – The Offing and its characters feel weakened by transfer from page to stage, the relationships less impactful, the humour and colours muted, the overplayed ghost story failing to replace tension with (unnecessary) suspense.
Sadly, this misreading only makes you want to read the book instead.
The Offing will head back north for a November 3 to 27 run at Live Theatre, Newcastle. Box office: 0191 232 1232 or at live.org.uk.
Blue Light Theatre Company cast members in dance rehearsals for Once Upon A Time
ONCE upon a time, the Blue Light Theatre Company expected to do a pantomime only once.
Instead, the York company is to stage its eighth panto next January. “Not bad, considering the first one was supposed to be a one-off,” says writer Perri-Ann Barley, who is joined in the production team by director Craig Barley and additional scriptwriter Steven Clark.
“We’ve worked out that since we began fundraising in 2012, we’ve managed to raise more than £25,000 for charity, which we’re very proud of. This year, we’ll continue to support the York branch of the MND (Motor Neurone Disease) Association and York Against Cancer.
As the name would indicate, the Blue Light Theatre Company is no ordinary theatrical enterprise, especially when set against the backdrop of the pandemic. “Most of our cast either work for Yorkshire Ambulance Service or the NHS, so this show has already given us many challenges since I first wrote it in early 2020,” says Perri.
“It has been, and continues to be, a very busy and trying time, and obtaining shift swaps to attend rehearsals hasn’t been easy. Our choreographer, Devon Wells, is expecting a baby, due any time now, which is exciting, but this meant we’ve had to set all the dance routines in a short space of time.
“That’s certainly tested the cast but Devon has managed to keep going with as much energy as always. That baby will definitely come out dancing! We’re letting her have a rest now but she’ll be back in time for the show.”
Blue Light Theatre Company’s poster for next January’s pantomime, Once Upon A Time
The company has elected Julie Shrimpton as dance captain to keep things going while Devon is away. “Despite all the challenges, we are all loving being back together, performing and generally having fun, which is what panto is all about, and I hope that comes across in our performance in January,” says Perri.
“We’ve missed theatre so much in what’s been an awful time, but we’re delighted to be finally back rehearsing and it’s going really well. We can’t wait to welcome back our regular supporters and hopefully some new audience members too.”
Blue Lights’s fun-filled, fast-paced, time-travelling adventure, Once Upon A Time, will be performed at Acomb Working Men’s Club on January 21 and 26 to 28 at 7.30pm, plus a January 22 matinee at 1pm.
How will the plot unfold, Perri, in this “completely original and brand-new story”? “The Fairy Godmother has lost her magic powers,” she says. “She enlists the help of a local inventor, and his new time machine, to go back in time in the hope of preventing the villainous Phillipe Fogg from stealing them, but will they succeed?
“This panto is a chance to witness the journeys of our weird and wonderful characters throughout time; sing and dance along to a vast array of music from different eras, and watch out for surprises, twists and turns along the way.”
Tickets will go on sale from Monday (25/10/202) at £10, concessions £8, children £5, at bluelight-theatre.co.uk, on 07933 329654 or from cast members. A fund-raising raffle with prizes will be held at each performance.
Pantomime director Craig Barley, right, taking part in a dance rehearsal for Blue Light Theatre Company’s pantomime
Gemma Curry, in her washer woman garb and with her favourite puppet, the Hare, for The Hare In The Moon
HAVE you ever wondered why, when the Moon is full, the shadow of a Hare is cast across its face?
If so, discover more when Hoglets Theatre’s Gemma Curry presents The Hare In The Moon at the Storytelling Circle, an enchanting wooded theatre space in the Museum Gardens, York, on Sunday.
“When a stranger wanders into the woods, all the animals try to help them, but Hare has no gift to give. How far will she go to make another happy?” asks York performer-writer Gemma, the Hoglets founder, as she hosts 30-minute performances at 11.30am, 1pm and 2.30pm.
Hoglets Theatre will take Sunday’s audiences on a magical journey for all the family, exploring the true meaning of kindness through a combination of interactive storytelling, puppetry and live music in an original play by Gemma based on an old folk tale .
“Please note, this is an outdoor event in a natural setting, so my advice is to dress for all weathers, and feel free to bring picnic blankets and cushions to make yourself comfortable,” she says. “The show is suitable for children aged three to 11 and all children must be accompanied by an adult.”
Should you be unfamiliar with the Storytelling Circle, Gemma says: “I didn’t know about that space until my children ran into it one day! It feels very private but it’s open, so it can be a nice, safe experience for our Sunday performances.”
The Hare In The Moon is “brand new-ish”. “I first did it as a Zoom show in March 2021, working with a London company called Onceupona Children’s Theatre, who run a children’s theatre festival, but when that couldn’t go ahead, they got in touch with companies to ask if they’d like to do shows on Zoom,” she says.
“I ended up doing one last March, then one for Christmas, then Easter, and so The Hare And The Moon was done for that one. It’s now going from being performed and recorded at the end of our bed, under the covers, at home to being staged in this beautiful outdoor space.”
The text remains the same. “We used a lot of projection and shadow puppetry on Zoom to show the animals, and this time, in the Storytelling Circle, it will be more physical with me as the storyteller, basing myself on an old Greek storyteller, Clotho,” says Gemma.
“She was the Greek goddess of omens and the patron saint of washer women apparently, so I’ll be dressed as a washer woman with a beautiful costume by Julia Smith, who designed the costumes for Playhouse Creatures, my first Hedgepig Theatre show in 2012.”
Gemma will take the washer-woman imagery further. “I’ll come on stage with all these different cleaning products that will became different animals at various points in the show,” she says.
Curry in a hurry! Gemma Curry, performer, writer and founder of Hoglets Theatre, on the move
“The lovely thing with children is that you can say ‘this is an otter’ and they will suspend disbelief immediately. They can also be your warmest or harshest critic and they’ll tell you what they think there and then!
“That’s the thing I missed when we couldn’t perform to live audiences: that immediacy of reaction that theatre needs, which is both fantastic and yet terrifying as they won’t even wait for a break to say ‘this is rubbish!’.
“I love the way that children will take things as a given, but also question things at the same time. It keeps you on your toes.
“Children have a depth of knowledge nowadays that I didn’t have as a child, and they know when they’re being patronised, so you treat them as you would an adult audience. It’s great to have them there to bounce the show off.”
The story in Gemma’s performance is drawn from an old Buddhist parable that believes the Moon has been watching the world since time began, accumulating stories to tell.
“I’d never thought, ‘there’s a hare in the moon’ until I came across the story when I was doing a Zoom project for York Explore library, but if you look really, really closely – it doesn’t have to be the full moon, but bigger than a crescent moon – you can see the outline of a hare, even if the Moon is waxing or waning,” she says.
“The story is so lovely, and at the time I was writing the script, it was just so appropriate because it’s about the importance of being kind to each other, and how we work best when we work together even when we’re apart, like we’ve had to be during the lockdowns, which is a lovely message to children. It was my favourite story that I did for Zoom and it has my favourite puppet too!”
The chance to perform in the Museum Gardens emerged from another Gemma project. “I got in touch with York Museums Trust, who I’d been working for with Lara Pattison [York teacher, actor and home-schooling science communicator] for their family-friendly scripts, getting the chance to walk around the Castle Museum on our own!
“So, I asked if I could use the Storytelling Circle to do three shows in one day, and the trust was brilliant to me, saying ‘Yes’.”
Looking ahead, coming next from Hoglets Theatre will be a 19-date Christmas tour of Yorkshire libraries, presenting The Snow Bear, based on the Norwegian folk tale East Of The Sun And West Of The Noon. Look out for Explore York shows at York Explore library, Acomb, Tang Hall and Clifton, as well as visits to Scarborough, Northallerton and Rotherham, with more details to follow.
Hoglets Theatre in The Hare In The Moon, Storytelling Circle, Museum Gardens, York, Sunday, 11.30am, 1pm and 3pm. Box office: eventbrite.co.uk/e/the-hare-in-the-moon-tickets-175292954947.
Copyright of The Press, York
The poster for Hoglets Theatre’s The Hare In The Moon
Gunpowder Guy in Horrible Histories’ Barmy Britain
CAN you beat battling Boudicca? What if a Viking moved in next door? Would you lose your heart or head to horrible Henry VIII?
Can evil Elizabeth entertain England? Will Parliament survive Gunpowder Guy? Dare you stand and deliver to dastardly Dick Turpin?
Can you escape the clutches of Burke and Hare? Why not move to the groove with Party-Queen Victoria?
Questions, questions, so many questions to answer, and here to answer them are the Horrible Histories team in their alternative history lesson, Barmy Britain, on tour at the Grand Opera House, York, until Sunday.
These purveyors of the West End’s longest-running children’s show are bringing British history to life in a humorously horrible and eye-popping show trip to the past with Horrible Histories’ trademark 3D effects.
Watch out for their Bogglevision array of illusions, as skulls hover, dams burst and missiles fly into the audience – and be sure to duck. Fast!
Party Queen Victoria in Horrible Histories’ Barmy Britain
Presented by the Birmingham Stage Company over 15 years, the Horrible Histories Live on Stage shows are written by Neal Foster and Horrible Histories author Terry Deary.
Deary has written 200 books, translated into 40 languages. Since 1983, his 50 Horrible Histories titles have sold more than 25 million copies worldwide from China to Brazil.
Horrible Histories’ Barmy Britain is directed by Foster and designed by Jackie Trousdale, with lighting by Jason Taylor, sound by Nick Sagar, music by Matthew Scott and choreography by Kenn Oldfield.
“We all want to meet people from history. The trouble is, everyone is dead. It’s time to prepare yourselves for Horrible Histories,” says Foster. “Our wonderful Barmy Britain journey through the gruesome, scary and unbelievable moments in British history is perfect entertainment for anyone aged from 5 to 105!”
Performances are at 10.30am and 7pm today; 3pm and 7pm, Saturday; 11am and 3pm, Sunday. Box office: atgtickets.com/york.
Ben Moor and Joanna Neary: Mini-season of stand-up theatre and comedy at Theatre@41
MOOR, Moor, Moor and much more, more, more besides are on Charles Hutchinson’s list for the week ahead.
Surrealist stand-up theatre of the week, Ben Moor and Joanna Neary mini-season, Theatre@41, Monkgate, York, today until Saturday
BEN Moor and Joanna Neary combine to deliver five offbeat comedy shows in three days in their Theatre@41 debut.
Moor contemplates performance, friendship and regret in his lecture about lectures, Pronoun Trouble, tonight at 8pm. Tomorrow, at 7.30pm, Neary’s multi-character sketch show with songs and impersonations, Wife On Earth, is followed by Moor’s Who Here’s Lost?, his dream-like tale of a road trip of the soul taken by two outsiders.
Saturday opens at 3pm with Joanna’s debut children’s puppet show, Stinky McFish And The World’s Worst Wish, and concludes at 7pm with the two-hander BookTalkBookTalkBook, a “silly author event parody show”. Box office: tickets.41monkgate.co.uk.
Gunpowder Guy in Horrible Histories’ Barmy Britain. Picture: Frazer Ashford
Alternative history lesson of the week: Horrible Histories’ Barmy Britain, Grand Opera House, York, today at 1.30pm, 7pm; tomorrow, 10.30am and 7pm; Saturday, 3pm, 7pm; Sunday, 11am, 3pm
WHAT if a Viking moved in next door? Would you lose your heart or head to horrible Henry VIII? Can evil Elizabeth entertain England? Will Parliament survive Gunpowder Guy? Dare you stand and deliver to dastardly Dick Turpin?
Questions, questions, so many questions to answer, and here to answer them are the Horrible Histories team in Barmy Britain, a humorously horrible and eye-popping show trip to the past with Bogglevision 3D effects. Box office: atgtickets.com/york
Hannah Victoria in Tutti Frutti’s The Princess And The Pea at York Theatre Royal Studio
Reopening of the week: York Theatre Royal Studio for Tutti Frutti’s The Princess And The Pea, today to Tuesday; no show on Sunday
YORK Theatre Royal Studio reopens today with a capacity reduced from 100 to 71 and no longer any seating to the sides.
First up, Leeds children’s theatre company Tutti Frutti revive York playwright Mike Kenny’s adaptation of Hans Christian Andersen’s story, set in a place where what you see is not what it seems: the Museum of Forgotten Things.
Three musical curators delve into the mystery of how a little green pea ended up there in an hour of humour, songs and a romp through every type of princess you could imagine. Box office and show times: 01904 623568 or at yorktheatreroyal.co.uk.
Artist Anita Bowerman and Yorkshire Shepherdess Amanda Owen at Dove Tree Art Gallery and Studio
Open Studios of the week: Anita Bowerman, Dove Tree Art Gallery and Studio, Back Granville Road, Harrogate, Saturday and Sunday, 10am to 5pm
HARROGATE paper-cut, watercolour and stainless steel artist Anita Bowerman opens her doors for refreshments and a browse around her new paintings of Yorkshire and Yorkshire Shepherdess Amanda Owen, prints and mugs.
“It’s a perfect chance for inspiration before the Christmas present-buying rush starts,” says Anita, who has been busy illustrating a new charity Christmas card for the Yorkshire Air Ambulance featuring the Yorkshire Shepherdess.
Rachel Croft: York singer-songwriter performing at Drawsome! day of activities at Spark:York as part of York Design Week on Saturday
York Design Week gig of the week: Drawsome!, Mollie Coddled Talk More Pavilion, Spark:York, Saturday, from 3pm
AS part of Drawsome’s day of workshops and an Indy Makers Market to complement MarkoLooks’ print swap exhibition of illustrators and printmakers, York’s Young Thugs Records are curating a free line-up of live music.
Taking part will be The Hazy Janes, Kell Chambers and Rachel Croft, singer, songwriter and illustrator to boot.
Breabach: First touring band to play Selby Town Hall in “far too long”. Picture: Paul Jennings
Welcome back of the week: Breabach, Selby Town Hall, Saturday, 8pm
GLASGOW folk luminaries Breabach will be the first touring band to play Selby Town Hall for almost 20 months this weekend.
“Leading lights of the Scottish roots music scene and five-time Scots Trad Music Award winners, they’re a really phenomenally talented band,” says Chris Jones, Selby Town Council’s arts officer. “It’s an absolute thrill to have professional music back in the venue. It’s been far too long!” Box office: 01757 708449, at selbytownhall.co.uk or on the door from 7.30pm.
Levelling up in York: Jazz funksters Level 42 in the groove at York Barbican on Sunday night
Eighties’ celebration of the week: Level 42, York Barbican, Sunday, doors 7pm
ISLE of Wight jazz funksters Level 42 revive those rubbery bass favourites Lessons In Love, The Sun Goes Down (Living It Up), Something About You, Running In The Family et al at York Barbican.
Here are the facts: Mark King’s band released 14 studio, seven live and six compilation albums, sold out Wembley Arena for 21 nights and chalked up 30 million album sales worldwide.
This From Eternity To Here tour gig has been rearranged from October 2020; original tickets remain valid. Box office for “limited availability”: yorkbarbican.co.uk.
Writes of passage: Musician and now author Richard Thompson
Guitarist of the week: Richard Thompson, York Barbican, Monday, doors 7pm
RICHARD Thompson plays York Barbican on the back of releasing Beeswing, his April autobiography subtitled Losing My Way And Finding My Voice 1967-1975.
An intimate memoir of musical exploration, personal history and social revelation, it charts his co-founding of folk-rock pioneers Fairport Convention, survival of a car crash, formation of a duo with wife Linda and discovery of Sufism.
Move on from the back pages, here comes Richard Thompson OBE, aged 72, songwriter, singer and one of Rolling Stone magazine’s Top 20 Guitarists of All Time. Katherine Priddy supports. Box office: yorkbarbican.co.uk.
That clinches it: Emma Scott’s Macbeth leaps into the arms of Nell Frampton’s The Lady in rehearsals for York Shakespeare Project’s Macbeth. Picture: John Saunders
Something wicked this way comes…at last: York Shakespeare Project in Macbeth, Theatre@41, Monkgate, York, October 26 to 30, 7.30pm and 2.30pm Saturday matinee
THE curse of Macbeth combined with Lockdown 1’s imposition to put a stop to York Shakespeare Project’s Scottish Play one week before its March 2020 opening.
Rising like the ghost of Banquo, but sure to be better received, Leo Doulton’s resurrected production will run as the 37th play in the York charity’s mission to perform all Shakespeare’s known plays over 20 years.
Doulton casts Emma Scott’s Macbeth into a dystopian future, using a cyberpunk staging to bring to life this dark tale of ambition, murder and supernatural forces. Box office: tickets.41monkgate.co.uk.
Ballet Black dancers Marie Astrid Mence, left, Isabela Coracy, Cira Robinson, Sayaka Ichikawa, Jose Alves, Ebony Thomas and Alexander Fadyiro in Mthuthuzeli’s The Waiting Game
Dance show of the week: Cassa Pancho’s Ballet Black, York Theatre Royal, Tuesday, 7.30pm
ARTISTIC director Cassa Pancho’s Ballet Black return to York with a double bill full of lyrical contrasts and beautiful movement.
Will Tuckett blends classical ballet, poetry and music to explore ideas of home and belonging in Then Or Now; fellow Olivier Award-winning choreographer Mthuthuzeli November contemplates the purpose of life in The Waiting Game. Box office: 01904 623568 or at yorktheatreroyal.co.uk.
From Limpsey Gate Lane, August, by Sue Slack
Exhibition of the week: Fylingdales Group of Artists, Blossom Street Gallery, Blossom Street, York, until November 30
TWELVE Fylingdales Group members are contributing 31 works to this exhibition of Yorkshire works, mainly of paintings in oils, acrylics, gouache and limonite.
Two pieces by Paul Blackwell are in pastel; Angie McCall has incorporated collage in her mixed-media work and printmaker Michael Atkin features too.
Also participating are David Allen, fellow Royal Society of Marine Artist member and past president David Howell, Kane Cunningham, John Freeman, Linda Lupton, Don Micklethwaite, Bruce Mulcahy, Sue Slack and Ann Thornhill.
Double act: Niall Ransome’s Dr Watson and Jake Ferretti’s Sherlock Holmes shake up The Hound Of The Baskervilles
MYSTERY and murk have abounded in York Theatre Royal’s hit and mist Haunted Season.
That mist descends once more, over a desolate Dartmoor of spectral trees and a grand house, looming in the distance, where the lights seem to twitch nervously. Except, this time, the foggy haze is emanating from Sir Charles Baskerville’s newly lit cigar in the country air, his face matching the contentment of a bygone Hamlet advert.
A bewhiskered, elegantly dressed Serena Manteghi has entered David Woodhead’s nocturnal set in the first guise of a hatful of such roles – putting the ‘Man’ into Manteghi as it were – on a fright-night when she will be playing men only.
Just as we are appreciating her miming – with immaculate timing to the sound-effect accompaniment of the opening and closing of gates and striking of a match – suddenly a ghastly howl quickens the heart.
Taking on 20 roles? Bring it on, say Niall Ransome, Jake Ferretti and Serena Manteghi
A look of terror, a futile attempt to escape, and Sir Charles and his cigar have snuffed it.
So far, so scary, albeit in the exaggerated manner of a silent film, in a startling start where the titular hound is but a sound. Spooky, melodramatic, beyond immediate explanation: this is the perfect Conan Doyle recipe for the arrival of Holmes and Watson.
On bound Jake Ferretti’s superior Sherlock and Niall Ransome’s hearty doctor, promptly shattering theatre’s fourth wall as they demand applause for Serena’s miming, then introduce themselves and how the show will work.
Here comes the “howlarious” version of The Hound Of The Baskervilles penned in 2007 for comedy clowns Peepolykus by John Nicholson and Steven Canny and now, 150 productions down the line, picked up by Bolton Octagon Theatre artistic director Lotte Wakeham and the Original Theatre Company.
In the frame: Jake Ferretti, Niall Ransome and Serena Manteghi in The Hound Of The Baskervilles
It still carries its original health warning for “anyone suffering from a heart condition, a nervous disorder, low self-esteem or a general inability to tell fact from fiction”. In truth, the cast and indeed the characters are most at risk. The audience, by comparison, needs only sit back, laugh loudly and burst regularly into applause.
The facts are that Ferretti, Ransome and Manteghi must play 20 characters between them, multifarious accents et al. Isn’t the heir, Sir Henry Baskerville, supposed to be Canadian, Serena is asked. “Yes, but I can’t do that accent,” she replies.
In the original, the cast of three were all men and Holmes suddenly turned Spanish in the handsome form of Javier Marzan. Such is the strength yet flexibility of Canny and Nicholson’s format that we now have the added pleasure of watching Serena Manteghi as she deepens her voice, mirrors male movements and tropes, breaks out of character under emotional duress at the first act’s finale, and once more confirms what an outstanding talent this former University of York student is.
This time it is Ferretti’s Costa Rican Miss Stapleton who brings an Hispanic flourish to the production, directed crisply and crunchily for the tour by Tim Jackson.
Funny business: Niall Ransome’s Dr Watson, Serena Manteghi’s Sir Henry Baskerville and Jake Ferretti’s Sherlock Holmes make light of tackling the mystery
Comedy, yes, but send-up or spoof, no. Canny and Nicholson are true to Conan Doyle’s story, re-imagining scenes rather than inventing new ones, but always with the fourth wall in danger of needing new bricks again.
“We wanted to be as faithful as possible to the drama and intrigue of Conan Doyle’s masterpiece, while setting about discovering how to use a company of three actors to tell the story as inventively as we could,” said the writers.
“It became clear very quickly that simple props, rapid costume and scene changes, precision comic timing and a determined commitment to stupidity were going to play a significant part in our version.”
Think of the works of Lip Service’s Maggie Fox and Sue Ryding, Nobby Dimon’s North Country Theatre and Mikron Theatre, or Patrick Barlow’s “touching up” of John Buchan’s The 39 Steps, or Mischief’s The Play That Goes Wrong, as Ferretti, Ransome and Manteghi keep veering off the straight and narrow but somehow still reach their intended destination.
Niall Ransome’s Dr Watson has a blast in The Hound Of The Baskervilles
In this case, this is the art of making a drama out of staff-shortage crisis – how very 2021 – but not needing to make a silk purse out of a sow’s ear because the source material is from the top drawer.
Canny and Nicholson have it right in saying the “determined commitment to stupidity” is crucial too: a characteristic that benefits from Ferretti’s Holmes, in particular, taking everything so seriously, or the pathos in Ransome’s even straighter-faced Watson having a propensity to draw his pistol on anyone and anything, especially woodland animals.
This peaks at the outset of the second act after a Tweet “complaint” from an audience member – it was a letter in the original! – about Holmes’s lack of commitment to solving the crime prompts Ferretti to demand the right to re-enact the entire first half. A breathless snapshot replay ensues.
Someone so bright acting so dumb and supercilious is but one of the delights of seeing the Holmes and Watson partnership being poked out of its comfort zone, a shift as rewarding in its comedic interplay as Morecambe and Wise’s jousting.
The Hound Of The Baskervilles goes barking mad in this amiably daft comedy, at the cost of Woman In Black or Jeremy Dyson and Andy Nyman’s Ghost Stories scares, but that sacrifice of bite is a price well worth paying. Howlarious indeed.
Performances: 7.30pm, plus 2.30pm Saturday matinee. Box office: 01904 623568 or at yorktheatreroyal.co.uk.
Vaulting ambition: Emma Scott in rehearsal for her lead role as Macbeth in York Shakespeare Project’s Macbeth. Picture: John Saunders
THE curse of Macbeth combined with Lockdown 1’s imposition to put a stop to York Shakespeare Project’s Scottish Play just one week before its March 2020 opening.
Rising like the ghost of Banquo, but sure to be better received, Leo Doulton’s resurrected production will run at Theatre@41, Monkgate, from October 26 to 30 as the 37th play in the York charity’s mission to perform all Shakespeare’s known plays in a 20-year span.
Doulton is casting Macbeth into a dystopian cyberpunk future, using a dramatic new staging to bring to life this dark tale of ambition, murder and supernatural forces.
“This production has had an unusually long journey, and I’m grateful to everyone involved for their wonderful creativity and resilience over the years, whether they’re a veteran of the original production or a newcomer,” he says.
Nell Frampton as The Lady in the York Shakespeare Project rehearsal room. Picture: John Saunders
“It would be impossible to present Macbeth in the same way as when we started work on it before the pandemic. We’ve moved from a world where we fear quite specific things to one where we fear more pervasive, invisible ones, such as the pandemic and the climate crisis.
“Cyberpunk is an exciting genre for Macbeth, allowing us to explore Shakespeare’s ideas of lurking corruption, a disintegrating reality, and the search for some moral certainty. It is a magnificent play, and I look forward to sharing this production at long last.”
YSP secretary Tony Froud says: “We were all disappointed not to see Macbeth take place last year, when we were so close to the finish line, especially after the hard work of Leo and the cast and crew.
“During lockdowns and restrictions on performance, we’ve done our best to stay engaged with our community with online play readings and two successful outdoor productions of Sit Down Sonnets, but we’ve always been planning to return to this play and the resumption of our 20-year mission.
Tony Froud’s Ross, with Emma Scott’s Macbeth, left, and Elizabeth Elsworth’s Duncan, rehearsing a scene for Leo Doulton’s Macbeth production. Picture: John Saunders
“We’re really pleased that Leo and so many of the cast have been able to return, and we can’t wait to share this production with a wider audience.”
York Shakespeare Project in Macbeth, Theatre@41, Monkgate, York, October 26 to 30, 7.30pm and 2.30pm Saturday matinee. Box office: tickets.41monkgate.co.uk.
Tickets cost £15; £5 for students, means-tested benefit recipients and under-18s. The October 26 performance is an open dress rehearsal with tickets at £5.
YSP’s plot summary
MACBETH receives a prophecy from a trio of witches that one day he will become king. Torn between duty and the chance of greatness, Macbeth and his devoted wife murder King Duncan and take the throne for themselves. Macbeth slowly turns into a tyrant, as corrupt as the strange witches. Meanwhile, the forces of virtue realise what Macbeth has become and a civil war begins.
Clive Lyons as Banquo in York Shakespeare Project’s Macbeth. Picture: John Saunders
Cast
Macbeth: Emma Scott
The Lady: Nell Frampton
Banquo, Siward: Clive Lyons
Fleance, Donalbain, Son, Young Siward: Meredith Stewart
Macduff: Frank Brogan
Duncan, Lady Macduff, Menteith: Elizabeth Elsworth
Malcolm: Rhiannon Griffiths
Lennox: Andrea Mitchell
Ross: Tony Froud
Angus: Sarah-Jane Strong
First Witch, First Murderer, Doctor: Joy Warner
Second Witch, Second Murderer, Gentlewoman: Diana Wyatt
Third Witch, Third Murderer, Caithness, Seyton: Xandra Logan
That clinches it: Emma Scott’s Macbeth and Nell Frampton’s The Lady embrace. Picture: John Saunders
Creative crew
Director: Leo Doulton
Set and costume designer: Charley Ipsen
Lighting designer: Neil Wood
Sound designer: Jim Paterson
Poster design: Charles Keusters
Company back story
YORK Shakespeare Project (YSP) was established in 2001 with a commitment to perform all of Shakespeare’s known plays in York over 20 years.
Debut production Richard III took place in 2002, since when YSP has staged 35 productions, covering 36 of Shakespeare’s plays. Despite the pandemic-enforced delays, YSP still plans to complete the project in 2022.
For more information, go to: yorkshakespeareproject.org.
Macbeth director Leo Doulton
Coming up at CharlesHutchPress: Director Leo Doulton discusses his dystopian, cyberpunk Macbeth.
