Eve De Leon Allen’s Cinderella in the party scene in the Stephen Joseph Theatre’s Cinderella. All pictures: Tony Bartholomew
ON the surface, and certainly from a cursory glance at the press release, this could be a conventional telling of Cinderella’s tale.
Except that this is the Brothers Grimm tale as re-spun by Nick Lane, with music and lyrics by Simon Slater, direction by Gemma Fairlie and stage & costume design by Helen Coyston. Namely the Scarborough team that thinks outside the box to deliver a Yorkshire winter show like no other.
This Cinderella is not pantomime, although slapstick, song-and-dance routines and colourful characters abound, complemented by a gorgeous transformation scene and a singalong Reach for The Stars (a panto staple country-wide).
Life in the fast Lane is inventive, inspired and ingenious, rooted in storytelling, physical comedy, multi role-playing, teamwork and individual flair in Fairlie’s fabulous, free-spirited cast.
Whitbelia’s regal family: David Fallon’s Flarf, with his beloved horse Malcolm, Lucy Keirl’s Delia and Roger Parkins’ Dean
Step forward, and never take a backward step, Eve De Leon Allen (Cinderella/Usher); David Fallon (Charming, Ratface, Flarf, Mouse); Lucy Keirl (Mandy, Delia, Herald); Roger Parkins (Delightful, Dad, Blob, Pumpkin, Dean) and Sarah Pearman (Chief Fairy, Mum, Filania, Frog).
Expect the unexpected with a Nick Lane story and he will still surprise you, while also reprising the hits from past SJT shows: the importance to the tale of Scarborough, its people, culture and seagulls; the digs at nearby places (Whitby’s goths and “inferior fish-and-chip shops”); the silliness yet the poignancy.
Prince Charming has made way for Charming, and there’s a character called Delightful too. The young prince, Flarf, is more interested in spending his days with his horse Malcolm (trained at DisMountview Academy, the programme biog states), rather than bride-finding parties.
Sister act: Roger Parkins’ Blob, left, and David Fallon’s Ratface
Cinderella’s stepsisters are outré fashionistas Ratface and Blob; the outstanding Keirl’s tooth fairy-in-training, 23780, wants to be known as Mandy.
De Leon Allen’s resourceful yet put-upon Cinderella is fixated on maps, and the love she seeks is not that of a “handsome Prince” but the embrace of her missing Mum, still alive she believes but lost to her in a storm when sailing to the magical Land Beyond Beyond, far, far away from Lane’s Scarbodoria and neighbouring Whitbelia.
Lane’s script has headed there too, far beyond routine panto, and anything but lost in such fresh storytelling, where he combines the golden olden with the modern, reinvigorating characters too, whether Cinderella, the prince or the Pumpkin (played by the chameleon Parkins, whose forgetful king is a gem too).
Eve De Leon Allen’s Cinderella andf Lucy Keirl’s Mandy
Fairlie’s cast have such fun with Lane’s flights of imagination, his extravagant, bold, lovable characters (yes, even the stepmother and self-deluded daughter double act); his fearless pushing of boundaries; his love of a joke; the need for mannequins or quick costume changes to keep up with the number of characters required for a scene.
Not least his radical retuning of Cinderella herself to today’s (feminist) sensibilities, delivered with a lightness of touch that is more impactful. She has always wanted to be an explorer, and in turn Lane explores new possibilities for her character.
Add Slater’s witty songs, a nod to The Wizard Of Oz, a notable decrease in Lane’s propensity to bottom-burp gags, and Cinderella is a breath of Scarbodoria fresh air to rival the North and South Bay.
“The most important thing is to be good,” concludes Fairy 23780, sorry, Mandy. A good point on which to finish a very good show. Box office: 01723 370541 or sjt.uk.com
Roger Parkins’ larger-than-life Pumpkin in Cinderella
Did you know?
NEXT year’s SJT “Chrtistmas Spectacular” will be Beauty And The Beast from December 1 to 30. Tickets are on sale already.
The Gunpowder Plotters: Jamie Zubarai’s Kit Wright, left, David Reed’s Guy Fawkes, Robin Simpson’s Robert Catesby, Greg Haiste’s Thomas Percy and Andrew Pollard’s Thomas Winter. Picture: Sam Taylor
Guy Fawkes, Rumours and Rebels season, York Theatre Royal, until Saturday, 7.30pm nightly plus 2pm, Thursday and 2.30pm, Saturday. Box office: 01904 623568 or yorktheatreroyal.co.uk
FOR all the teeth-breaking toffee apples, pumpkin soup, fizzing fireworks and sausages – two forms of bangers, if you will – we take Guy Fawkes very seriously in York, more so than that scoundrel Dick Turpin. Born in this city, Christened at St Michael le Belfrey, no effigy burns on Bonfire Night at his old school, St Peter’s (likewise in Scotton, where Fawkes lived in his teenage years).
Yet just as he was mocked for his affected moniker Guido Fawkes, he is ridiculed for the ultimate incompetence of the Gunpowder Plot that ended with the treasonous traitor’s execution in January 1606, along with the hanging, drawing and quartering of his fellow conspirators. Cue comedic stereotyping of Popish knave Fawkes down the centuries.
Like the bungling incompetents in Guy Ritchie’s 1998 crime thriller Lock, Stock And Two Smoking Barrels, Fawkes’s story lends itself to black comedy, but like Vinnie Jones’s notorious line, “it’s been personal” for York-born writer and actor David Reed.
He first wrote a radio drama of Guy Fawkes for The Penny Dreadfuls, his troupe of purveyors of historical comedy spoofs, aired in 2009 on BBC Radio 4. Director Gemma Fairlie thought it should transfer to the stage, and rather later than first planned, it now forms Reed’s first stage play, billed as “an explosive new comedy”, one that takes the form of interlocking sketches more than a play in full flow, on Carla Goodman’s revolve set (to signify revolution).
Reed and Fairlie decided it should seek to weave together the two faces of theatre – comedy and tragedy – by combining high farce in the manner of Blackadder, Upstart Crow and Monty Python with the pathos of the futility-of-war finale to Blackadder Goes Forth, forever entrenched in the memory, like the poems of Owen and Sassoon. Thirty-six barrels of gunpowder? Seriously serious. One barrel of home brew among them. Comedy! The play seeks a more even balance, but ultimately to the detriment of both, never becoming a tragicomedy.
Lace in brief, witty bursts of metatheatre, referencing Shakespeare’s King Lear, the audience’s changing standards of theatre attire and a nod to Covid naysayers, dismissing the Plague as “a hoax”. Apply Horrible Histories’ flair for debunking history. Toss in a sword fight with The Three Musketeers panache. Crumbs, so much to play with, to squeeze in, so many elements to rub against each other, like sticks to start a fire. More of which later.
A pre-show chat with York actress Florence Poskitt, of musical comedy duo Fladam, and her father revealed he had once written a comedic musical version of Guy Fawkes. So many possibilities, and yes, this Guy Fawkes has music, of the incidental variety in the Jacobean style, by composer and sound designer Eamonn O’Dwyer.
Comic aside: Cassie Vallance’s Martha Percy in her farthingale that requires her to enter sideways. Picture: Sam Taylor
The way it plays out, Reed’s Fawkes treacherous trigger man is the grave one, driven by the detremination to return Roman Catholicism to the throne by blowing up Westminster, haunted by seeing the pregnant Catholic martyr Margaret Clitherow compressed to death in York, struggling with post-traumatic stress disorder from years of fighting in Spain, and now hell-bent on death and destruction back home.
Whereas Rowan Atkinson’s Edmund Blackadder is a cynic, full of putdowns, Reed’s Fawkes is already too damaged to be a clown with a frown. Darkness to the light around him, let others do the historical mockery; he is a man on a mission, and Reed wants us to better understand his motives, to tell his side of the story, to highlight his tragic flaws, rather than merely decry him as a pantomime villain, just as the Richard III Society seeks to paint a fuller picture of another derided son of York, Richard III, to counter the slings and arrows of Shakespeare’s play.
Fawkes is the northern late arriviste to a bunch of southern-softie amateurs: revolutionary fops who gather regularly at their local to discuss and plot James I’s overthrow, keener on the snacks and the gossip than getting the job done under stressed-out, coffee bean-chewing ringleader Robert Catesby (a delightfully nuanced, dyspeptic comedic turn from Robin Simpson, continuing his run of superb autumn performances after a trio of roles in Harrogate Theatre’s H2 Rep season).
Broader comedy is to be mined in Greg Haiste’s blustering, preening Thomas Percy, aping Rik Mayall’s Lord Flashheart with chutzpah; Northern Broadsides favourite Andrew Pollard’s more melancholic, thwarted idealistThomas Winter (of discontent), donning a bear’s costume as a forlorn distraction, and Jamie Zubairi’s camp Kit Wright, still in thrall to Fawkes from York schooldays.
Guy Fawkes is two clashing plays within one, matched by the theatricality of Goodman’s costumes, with the gap being bridged by Cassie Vallance’s Martha Percy, Fawkes’s rekindled love from yore, who begins as a riff on Blackadder’s Queenie, but grows to match Fawkes’s political zeal. Their showdown is Reed’s best scene, one that shows the alternative direction that this play could have taken from the start, potentially far more combustible, more dramatic too, for being more troubled, like Fawkes himself.
Ironically, both in Reed’s script and Fairlie’s direction, the comedy is the play’s stronger suit, but as the plot thickens, the gunpowder never catches fire. Or rather, when it briefly does, symbolically it is stamped out.
Maybe the truth is Guy Fawkes could never be a tragic hero, such were his intentions, but when Reed’s Fawkes says at the close “God, I’m weird”, no-one laughs. In an out-and-out comedy, you would, but the line belongs in a wholly darker drama.
Gemma Fairlie directing a rehearsal for York Theatre Royal’s stage premiere of David Reed’s Guy Fawkes
DIRECTOR Gemma Fairlie is directing two productions this season, all while pregnant with a Christmas delivery on the way.
A driving force behind bringing York writer-performer David Reed’s play Guy Fawkes to the stage ever since Reed’s sketch comedy company The Penny Dreadfuls’ radio play more than a decade ago, Gemma is overseeing rehearsals at the Central Methodist Church, St Saviourgate, for the stage world premiere at York Theatre Royal from October 28 to November 12.
Next, this director of Shakespeare’s Rose Theatre’s Henry V at the Castle car park in York in Summer 2019 will return to the Stephen Joseph Theatre Christmas show in Scarborough. After Jack And The Beanstalk last winter, she will be at the helm of Nick Lane’s Cinderella from December 2 to 31.
Here she discusses Guy Fawkes, Reed’s explosive comedy about York’s traitorous trigger man with its devilishly dangerous mix of Blackadder and Upstart Crow.
How did you become involved with the Guy Fawkes project, Gemma?
“The Penny Dreadfuls wrote the radio play about Guy Fawkes in 2009, which I heard and thought would work brilliantly as a theatre piece. So, in 2010, I approached the guys and we started to have conversations.
“It always takes time to get everybody in the room and start to figure out how it might work, but I knew David [writer David Reed] was excited about making it theatrical and exploring the journey of the characters in a different medium.”
What intrigued you about the play?
“Guy Fawkes gets caught. Everyone knows that. But how can you shift an audience’s perception about a story they think they know? Are there moments where we hope he doesn’t get caught? Are there moments when we are on his side and want to blow up Parliament?
“It’s like Hamlet or King Lear. Everyone knows they die but you want the audience to have that moment where they don’t want that to happen, where they want a different ending. Can we have Guy as a hero and an anti-hero? And can a story that is so clearly a tragedy about a man that fails actually work as a comedy that makes us question that failure?”
When did York Theatre Royal first come on board?
“That was around ten years ago when we brought the play to York with the idea of the theatre being a co-producer or partner. I came to a programme meeting at the Theatre Royal and pitched the idea. They were really excited.
“Of course, it absolutely is a York-originated story although it’s set in London, and that’s a vital part of it. The North-South divide, particularly what that meant in the 1600s and how that relates to the characters and their experiences, is vital to the story.
“Then Covid happened and the planned York production was postponed, but what’s great is that this is absolutely the right time to put it on. What put Parliament back between 1604 and 1605 was the plague. What kept stymying them was this awful medical emergency and in the same way Covid has shifted our perspectives and our timescale over the last three years. It feels very prescient in that way.
“I think there’s disappointment and frustration with our current political system and a great deal of tribalism happening. It’s obviously very different to the persecution of Protestants and the Catholics, and what was happening politically in Guy Fawkes’ time, but there is a parallel in terms of the underlying tension and fear, with nobody knowing if they’re safe or quite knowing what’s going to happen next, what the next government will bring. Now is the perfect time to be doing this play.”
David’s play is billed as a comedy but the Gunpowder Plot – an attempt to blow up Parliament in 1605 – was a serious matter. Discuss…
“What we’re brilliant at in the UK is satire. This comes from a long tradition going back to pamphlets about the Whigs and political cartoons in general all the way through Monty Python, The Fast Show, even Spitting Image, which has recently had a renaissance.
“We love to skewer our political leaders; we love to question and cause trouble with humour. That’s absolutely what the arts should be doing: questioning our society and our values and what we hold dear as humans. Otherwise, what’s the point?
“For us, as a team, it’s about finding the right tone for the play – between comedy and the ultimate tragedy. So, sometimes there’s slapstick and it’s very silly but there’s an underlying truth and passion to this story and a real darkness to Guy’s fervour.”
What should Theatre Royal audiences expect?
“We want people to discover the story of Guy Fawkes afresh. It’s really important people come in knowing it’s a comedy, so that doesn’t freak them out, but I think of it a bit like Blackadder Goes Forth. The end of the last series where they have to go over the top is a really heart-breaking moment.
“You have a bunch of clowns and they’ve been ridiculous; you’ve laughed at them a lot but you’ve also invested in them and grown to love them. That’s so important. The moment at the end where you think they’re all going to die, that’s incredibly moving, and that’s what comedy can do.
“If you laugh at someone, you start to care about them and really invest in their journey. We want our audience to laugh, laugh, laugh and then hopefully cry at the end.”
You held the casting auditions in Yorkshire. How important was that?
“It was absolutely essential we represented York in the show and we have that authentic voice. We wanted to put York actors in front of York audiences and celebrate local talent. Also, having the right mix of people in the room that (a) an audience would love and (b) who would have comedy bones was key.
“You have to know very clearly who they are as characters and they’ve also got to work together as a team. We’re very lucky to have found a wonderfully talented bunch and it’s a total joy for David (Reed) and I to see it come to life, and see what the cast bring to it [including Reed in the title role].”
Did you ever think you might not direct Guy Fawkes because of your pregnancy?
“Absolutely not! I was always aiming to direct it, whether it was with a babe in arms or the day before being induced in hospital. Guy Fawkes has been my baby for so long, so what’s really lovely for me is to see this theatre baby come to life while my son grows in utero.
“It’s kind of crazy to know they are both finally going to be out there in the world as both babies have taken me quite a long time to bring to life. Plus, laughter is really good for you in pregnancy and I’m getting lots of that in the rehearsal room!”
Next up?
“Directing Cinderella at the Stephen Joseph Theatre this Christmas. I’m very lucky I get to have this time in the rehearsal room at two incredible theatres, doing the thing I absolutely love, before I meet my son.”
What sort of theatre work are you attracted to?
“I do a lot of Shakespeare, new work, and I come from a physical theatre background so I do movement and choreography within that, and occasionally a bit of circus as well. The pieces that I’m drawn to tend to have an epic edge to them, and they always have to have heart. Generally, they will have moments of big physicality and lots of comedy.
“When I go to Scarborough, I’ll be directing and choreographing five actors playing the whole story of Cinderella, playing multi-roles and singing their hearts out. I love that I go from Guy Fawkes with a stage revolve, pyrotechnics and sword fights to Scarborough, to work in the round with lots of Strictly Come Dancing moves and glitter. That’s the real joy of being a freelance director.”
Guy Fawkes runs at York Theatre Royal from October 28 to November 12, 7.30pm, except October 30 and November 6; 2pm, November 3 and 10; 2.30pm, November 5 and 12. Box office: 01904 623568 or yorktheatreroyal.co.uk.
Cinderella, Stephen Joseph Theatre, Scarborough, December 2 to 31. Box office: 01723 370541 or sjt.uk.com.
Alicia Mckenzie, left, Loris Scarpa, Jacob Butler, Sheri Lineham and Jessica Dennis in Jack And The Beanstalk at the Stephen Joseph Theatre, Scarborough. Picture: Tony Bartholomew
AFTER the all-too-familiar scenario of Covid in the cast scuppering performances up to Christmas Eve, Jack And The Beanstalk is back up and running for its last week of shows at the Stephen Joseph Theatre, Scarborough.
What’s more, for those unable to head to the East Coast, Nick Lane’s stage adaptation can be enjoyed at home in a film capture of the Christmas show via the SJT website until midnight on Monday, January 31.
From the SJT team that delivered The Snow Queen, Treasure Island, Alice In Wonderland, A (Scarborough) Christmas Carol and Pinocchio comes Lane’s typically imaginative take on the beanstalk-climbing story by Benjamin Tabart and others, directed by Gemma Fairlie, with music and lyrics by Simon Slater and a set design by Helen Coyston.
Lane has taken hold of the traditional fairytale, re-envisioning it as a scary rumour going round town of a meaner than mean giant building a castle above the coastal clouds of Scarborough.
Sheri Lineham’s cool and savvy Jill. Picture: Tony Bartholomew
In Lane’s version, Jack had started the rumour by accident, but given that he seems to know more about this monster than anyone else, he is the obvious choice to head up that weird beanstalk he grew in the garden to destroy the beast. No problem, thinks Jack. Go up the most unpopular child in school; come down a hero. After all, it is only a rumour. Isn’t it?
“My thinking is that in an era when kids, even at the age of eight and nine, some have phones, some are on social media, everyone has to grow up so quickly, but Jack is still growing up, still a boy, still using his imagination, left behind by his peer group, as he still lives in his head,” says Nick.
“When he talks about a giant in the sky, no-one believes him. The cool kid at school just thinks he’s a nerd, so the story is that whole zero-to-hero thing.”
Lane has made a significant change in the balance of the story. “It’s quite male, the original story, so I thought, ‘how would you integrate changes relevant for now?’,” he says.
Playwright Nick Lane
“It’s become much more a tale of Jack and Jill, who’s more cool and savvier than Jack in one way, but in other ways is naïve, so they help each other, in the tradition of the buddy-buddy story.”
Two further elements are prominent in Lane’s sixth winter show for the SJT. Firstly, “Jack And The Beanstalk is just a fairytale, not a traditional Christmas show, so I have tried to ‘Christmas it up’,” he says.
Secondly, he likes to emphasise the Scarborough setting of his SJT shows. “I think that came from when I worked at Hull Truck, pushing that sense of place, when people have a long association with a building and a place,” says Nick.
“You recognise that theatre not only challenges people, but it also celebrates its community, and Scarborough is a great community. Here, it first came from A (Scarborough) Christmas, researching what people like to do at Christmas in Scarborough. It’s worth doing that so that a show feels ‘of us’.”
Polly Lister in Nick Lane’s one-woman version of The Snow Queen at the SJT in 2020
Adapting to changing Covid restrictions in 2020, Lane had to re-write The Snow Queen as a solo show for Polly Lister, having first written a script for a cast of five. “I’d done solo shows before, so when the decision came from on high, I was able to re-do it, and Paul [SJT artistic director Paul Robinson] was very understanding that the script would come in a little late,” says the experienced South Yorkshire playwright.
“I’d previously written A Christmas Carol as a solo show for myself and Royal Flush, a one-man play about Thomas Crapper [the South Yorkshire-born businessman, plumber and inventor of such water closet innovations as the floating ballcock and U-bend].”
Robinson directed The Snow Queen but this time he handed the reins to Gemma Fairlie, who shaped the winter play with her cast of Jacob Butler, Jessica Dennis, Sheri Lineham, Alicia Mckenzie and Loris Scarpa. “He chose Gemma after working with her before and seeing her other work, and if Paul says she’s good, then I trust him implicitly,” says Nick.
“I was given the option of contributing to rehearsals, but having directed as well as written plays, I think it’s fairer to hand it over.”
Alicia Mckenzie’s funky chicken in Jack And The Beanstalk. Picture: Tony Bartholomew
As with the rest of the audience, Lane was in for a surprise when seeing how designer Helen Coyston would create the beanstalk for a theatre in the round. “You’re thinking, ‘it can’t go in the middle of the stage, rising up into the lighting rig, blocking everyone’s view, but it’s sure to be a typically beautifully design by Helen’,” says Nick, who had only a “very brief chat” with her.
Coyston’s multi-layered stage design does incorporate a giant footprint, but as for the beanstalk…you must watch the show!
Jack And The Beanstalk runs at Stephen Joseph Theatre, Scarborough, until December 31. Box office: 01723 370541 or at sjt.uk.com.Tickets for the film cost £12 each or £15 for a group at sjt.uk.com/event/1294/sjt_at_home_jack.
Copyright of The Press, York
From zero to hero: Jacob Butler’s Jack in Jack And The Beanstalk. Picture: Tony Bartholomew
COMING UP FROM NICK LANE’S PEN IN 2022
Sherlock Holmes And The Valley Of Fear, for Blackeyed Theatre, touring from September.
A revival of The Goal at The Courtyard, Hereford, marking the 50th anniversary of Ronnie Radford’s famous FA Cup goal for Hereford United against Newcastle United in the February 5 mud at Edgar Street.
Also for The Courtyard, Hereford: a play charting the history and changing landscape of a farming family from the 1950s onwards. “In 2018, when I wrote The Goal, I thought, ‘I know four things about Hereford: cider; home of the SAS; beef farming and that Ronnie Radford goal’,” he says.
Next winter’s play in The Round at the SJT, Scarborough; title to be announced in early February.
