YORK artist Matthew Miller will launch his quilt exhibition, Cloth & Colour, at an 11.30am to 1.30pm preview on Saturday at York Theatre Royal.
This inaugural Pop-Up Project mounted by Lotte Inch Gallery will run at the St Leonard’s Place theatre until Tuesday, November 30.
“In the first of our ‘Beyond The Gallery Walls’projects, Lotte Inch Gallery is delighted to be working with the extremely talented, multi-media artist Matthew Miller to bring an impressive and colourful installation to the Theatre Royal foyer this November,” says Lotte.
Multi-media artist Matthew Miller
“Matthew is based in London but hails from York and I’m thrilled that he’s returning to his roots for this milestone gallery project.”
After an uncertain and stop-start 2020 under the Covid cloud, gallery owner Lotte took the difficult decision to close her Bootham premises in June this summer. “However, in my commitment to the city’s art scene, I always intended to keep working on creative projects and I’m excited to be curating this pop-up exhibition at the Theatre Royal.”
Matthew Miller’s new installation is a series of textile pieces inspired by the work of the quilters of Gee’s Bend, Alabama. “Using only waste material from their worn-out garments and sheets, the women of Gee’s Bend made vibrant and raw quilts that rival any Colourists of the 20th century,” says Lotte.
Golden Bird, quilt, by Matthew Miller
“Matthew’s interest in these beautifully crafted textiles drew him to collaborate with his mother, Liza, on his first quilt in 2016 before developing his own process to produce the pieces exhibited in this show.”
Interested in the ecological use of fabric in quilting, Matthew has used end-of-roll and pre-worn fabrics in all of his quilts. “Leaning into the aesthetic of his paintings, he extends his exploration of bright, bold colours and clear form to create a series of vibrant collages in cloth,” says Lotte.
“He has found in quilts a tactile medium that can work just as easily on a table or bed as on a wall. This practical use gives the works an emotional element, allowing people to feel them and touch them as well as just admire them.”
Leaves Runner and Moon Runner, quilts, by Matthew Miller
Matthew’s background in book arts and design, as a graduate from London College of Communication, has seen him host shows in varying media, both in London and his home city of York.
Previously, his medium of choice has been painting. Cloth & Colour will be his first exhibition of quilts, coinciding happily but by chance – in a like father, like son story – with pater Peter Miller’s exhibition of North Yorkshire oil paintings at the Partisan café/restaurant on Micklegate. Miller senior’s From Kilburn To Hawnby landscapes oil paintings share the same closing date, November 30; like father, like son, again.
Matthew Miller’s Cloth & Colour, York Theatre Royal foyer, November 13 to 30, during theatre opening hours; Monday, 1pm to 5pm; Tuesday to Saturday, 9am to 10pm; Sunday, closed.
Lucy McCormick’s “rock star” Cathy in Wise Children’s Wuthering Heights at York Theatre Royal. Picture: Steve Tanner
ASK Wise Children artistic director Emma Rice why she cast performance artist and actor Lucy McCormick as Cathy in her stage adaptation of Wuthering Heights, and she replies: “Lucy is a rock star.”
“Literally and metaphorically! She is pure charisma and has a wildness of spirit that takes my breath away. She is fearless, passionate, seriously sexy and maverick,” says Emma. “She was my Catherine Earnshaw from the moment I saw her perform and I cannot believe my luck that she is creating this role with me. I am in awe.”
Ask Emma why she picked Ash Hunter for Heathcliff, and she enthuses: “Oh, everything! Ash Hunter is everything I want from my Heathcliff. He has a unique intensity that could stop a train in its tracks and a deep understanding of human love, rage and sorrow. He is one of the finest actors I have ever worked with and when he and Lucy start to fizz together, the planets start to spin. I am beyond words.”
From Tuesday (9/11/2021), Lucy and Ash will be at York Theatre Royal, leading Rice’s company in Wise Children’s wild folk musical account of Emily Bronte’s raging Yorkshire moorland tale of love, revenge and redemption in a co-production with the York theatre, the National Theatre and the Bristol Old Vic.
Here Lucy and Ash discuss Emma’s directorial style, returning to the stage, their roles, their passions, their accents.
Emma’s style is so distinctive, how would you describe it?
Lucy: “I would say ‘theatrical’.”
Ash: “I read somewhere that it’s ‘theatre magic’ and I think that a very apt description of her style. She’s got a massive bag of tricks, which she can delve into to create something rare and different to the theatre you see anywhere else.”
Lucy: “Colourful and dramatic but very theatrical and very musical. A bit of everything.”
Ash: “She clearly has a love for the stage and all of its facets; puppetry, song, dance, there’s nothing that doesn’t happen in this production. Vivid.”
How are you feeling about getting stuck into this production, especially after the last two years?
Lucy: “I’ve known about this job during that whole time, which was weird. It got postponed twice during those two years, but it’s good to be back being busy.”
Ash: “Previous to lockdown, the last couple of jobs I’ve had were in TV, so it’s great to be back on stage again. But this has always been a huge production that we’ve been leading up to. So, I think in terms of emotion and preparation it’s been quite a big shift starting Wuthering Heights.”
“When Ash and Lucy start to fizz together, the planets start to spin,” says director of Ash Hunter’s Heathcliff and Lucy McCormick’s Cathy in Wise Children’s Wuthering Heights. Picture: Steve Tanner
Catherine Earnshaw and Heathcliff are a passionate pair, what are you most passionate about?
Ash: “I’m passionate about Lucy.”
Lucy: “I’m passionate about deconstructing patriarchal capitalist systems and I like peanut butter.”
Ash: “And I’m still passionate about Lucy.”
Emily Brontë’s novel has inspired so many versions. How do you best know Wuthering Heights: as the book, a film or TV adaptation or that Kate Bush song?
Ash: “Mine is the Kate Bush song, always and forever, and the Tom Hardy TV series version, which is what I based my Heathcliff on,” [he says with a laugh].
Lucy: “I’ve read the book, back when I was an acting student. I read it because I thought I should read some old classic novels, and now I’m in it!”
What sort of Heathcliff and Cathy will feature in this version of Wuthering Heights?
Lucy: “I’m a bit more intense than Cathy in my actual life.”
Ash: “I think what’s quite clear is that we have some similarities to our characters in real life. I think I’m a lot like him, especially the version that we are doing here. We were saying the version of Heathcliff here isn’t colour-blind casting; he is black, he’s got a Jamaican accent.
“He’s spurned and treated like an outcast, not only because of his poverty or social standing, but also because of his colour, and the anger that’s brewed up within him is a righteous anger.
“Colourful and dramatic but very theatrical and very musical,” says Lucy McCormick, summing up Emma Rice’s stage version of Wuthering Heights. Picture: Steve Tanner
“It’s something that I have felt; I think he is me if I hadn’t found my peace. I actually think that he is less brutal than the Heathcliff in the book and there was a desire to show that people are not entirely bad or entirely good. I think Emma [Rice] hasn’t allowed Heathcliff to become as dark as he could have become, and there are moments where you see him soften.”
Lucy: “Emma wants to leave it on a positive. He’s bad enough.”
Why should this story be told now?
Ash: “For me, its specific to what’s going on in the world and with me and my relationship with my blackness and masculinity. I’m hoping there are people who are going to see this and identify with Heathcliff and his struggles. If you treat someone like a monster, then you create a monster. You wanted a monster, you got one.
“Hopefully, people see that reflection and even out of that can come love and positivity, and if you do face that and deal with your demons, something good can come from it.”
Lucy: “I do think people will always be a***holes; what’s a better way of putting that? It’s like reality TV, these awful people play out their lives and people love to look in on it and their mistakes and hopefully learn from them.
“It’s a classic story of dysfunctional people making mistakes and hopefully an audience can analyse it and see where it went wrong. Because people can be rubbish, and that’s never going to change, unfortunately.”
This is a classic Yorkshire tale; how are your accents coming along?
Ash: “I’m speaking with a Caribbean accent. I love it because of the lyricalness of it. I can’t imagine doing it another way and also where it places him and my voice. It is there to differentiate him from everyone else; you can’t get away from his otherness.
Ash Hunter’s Heathcliff with Katy Owen’s Isabella in Wise Children’s Wuthering Heights. Picture: Steve Tanner
“The choice that when he comes back a gentleman, that he hasn’t changed his accent, he has a more refined, posh, deeper Jamaican accent but he’s not trying to change who he is, he’s owning it. It’s beautiful.”
Lucy: “What was weird for me is that it’s close to my accent but not my accent. I’ve almost found that harder than say an American accent or whatever else I’ve done. It’s just working on that subtle difference. Tweaking my own voice. It’s quite annoying!”
What can the York audiences expect to feel after watching this adaptation of Wuthering Heights?
Ash: “Exhausted! It’s a whole gamut of human emotions! Emma hasn’t left anything out.”
Lucy: “They’re going to laugh, they’re going to cry – and feel celebratory at the end but they will have gone through a journey.”
Ash: “The first half is just a juggernaut. It’s a play in itself! The ending of the first half is just… Watching Catherine and Heathcliff’s descent into mutual madness is just woah! It’s cool.”
Lucy: “There’s a point in the first half that you get to and you just don’t stop! And then we do a second play! The audience seem to feel good about it. Emma wants the audience to feel good at the end.”
Ash: “The first half has a massive tragedy and the second half ends with big drama but in a different way. Emma is careful to give the audience a gift to go away with.”
Wise Children’s Wuthering Heights runs at York Theatre Royal, November 9 to 20. Box office:01904 623568 or at yorktheatreroyal.co.uk.
Lucy McCormick in Wise Children’s tour poster for Wuthering Heights, leaping onto the York Theatre Royal stage from Tuesday. Picture: Hugo Glendinning
Cherie Federico: Aesthetica Short Film Festival director
THE 11th Aesthetica Short Film Festival is running in York this week and online until November 30. No better time for Two Big Egos In A Small Car podcasters Chalmers & Hutch to invite director Cherie Federico for a chat about York’s fiesta of film.
Under discussion too in Episode 63 are: Adele’s algorithms; The Young’uns’ gig theatre in The Ballad Of Johnny Longstaff at York Theatre Royal, and are Public Service Broadcasting’s powers of Bright Magic fading?
“Lucy McCormick is pure charisma and has a wildness of spirit that takes my breath away,” says director Emma Rice of her “rock star” actor playing Cathy. Picture: Steve Tanner
YORK Theatre Royal’s Haunted Season climaxes with Wise Children’s Wuthering Heights, Emma Rice’s long-touted elemental adaptation of Emily Bronte’s gothic Yorkshire revenge tragedy, from Tuesday to November 20.
Company founder and artistic director Rice completes a hattrick of Theatre Royal visits after her stage versions of Angela Carter’s Wise Children in March 2019 and Enid Blyton’s Malory Towers in September that year.
This time, she partners with the National Theatre, Bristol Vic (in the city where Wise Children are based in Spike Island) and the York theatre for a gale-force, folk musical Wuthering Heights, whose tale of love, revenge and redemption is marked by her trademark visual flair, wild humour, puppetry and casting of “rock star” Lucy McCormick as Cathy.
Here Emma answers Charles Hutchinson’s questions as Wuthering Heights seeks to hit new heights.
You call Wuthering Heights a “tragedy”, but reviews have emphasised the “comedy/pastiche”, “the unfaithful storytelling” and the folk musical panache of your interpretation. Have past productions been too serious and Yorkshire-grim?
“I believe that Emily Brontë is an overlooked comic genius. I love comedy and there’s always laughter in my shows, but it wasn’t difficult to bring fun to this adaptation – it’s all there in the text.
“Linton Heathcliff is the most despicably funny character ever written and Lockwood a comedy genius. I hope this production will celebrate Brontë’s sparkling humour as well as her bloody passion.”
Kandaka Moore (Zillah), left, Ash Hunter (Heathcliff), Nandi Bhebhe (The Moor), Lucy McCormick (Cathy) and Witney White (Frances Earnshaw) in Wise Children’s Wuthering Heights. Picture: Steve Tanner
What were the aspects of the story that you most wanted to bring out for a 2021 audience in its transition from Emily Bronte’s Wuthering Heights to Emma Rice’s Wuthering Heights?
“There are several aspects of the show that cast a new ‘21st century’ light on the book, but one thing that stands out is how I see Catherine. I initially saw her as the traditional tortured romantic heroine, then as a bit of a minx. Now I think she’s unwell.
“I think she’s a prisoner of her time: a deeply independent women who is constrained by the limitations of being a woman in the 1800s and who fights against those restrictions until it literally drives her mad. I’ve enjoyed exploring this way of looking at this iconic character with Lucy [McCormick] in the role.”
What made you cast Lucy McCormick as Cathy?
“Lucy is a rock star. Literally and metaphorically! She is pure charisma and has a wildness of spirit that takes my breath away. She is fearless, passionate, seriously sexy and maverick. She was my Catherine from the moment I saw her perform and I cannot believe my luck that she is creating this role with me. I am in awe.”
What do you recall of first reading Wuthering Heights: where, when; how old were you?
“I have always loved the book, though at different times in my life it has meant different things to me. In my teens it was one of the first ‘exam’ books that really got me; it fired up my reluctant teenage brain and dared me to dream of passion and romance.
“In later readings, I was struck by how little love there actually is in the book: it’s brutal and cruel, and this darker version of the book stuck in my mind.
Ash Hunter as Heathcliff and Lucy McCormick as Cathy. Picture: Steve Tanner
“Then, a few years ago, I was appalled by what I saw at the Calais Jungle and at refugee camps all over the world. I was horrified by the cold negotiations our government was having about how many refugee children we would take in – horrified that this could even be a question a so-called civilised country was asking. Something sparked in my brain. Wasn’t Heathcliff an accompanied child?”
Do you view the book and its writer differently now to when you first read it?
“It blows my mind that this book was written by someone so sheltered. The detail of Cathy’s neurosis and behavioural issues and the depiction of illness is devasting and brilliantly described.
“I wonder if, as a vicar’s daughter, all of life came to the Brontes’ door and that is how Emily knew so much about the human condition. I don’t find the novel unworldly in the slightest. It is brutally honest and frighteningly well observed. It explores, obsession, control, prejudice, jealousy, violence and hope. All themes very much rooted in reality.
“I knew I needed to tell this story and I needed to tell it now. When Heathcliff is found at the Liverpool docks, the way he is treated sparks a series of events that are catastrophic. This is a cautionary tale and a revenge tragedy. Truly a story for our times.”
What does outsider Heathcliff’s story represent in our increasingly intolerant, unwelcoming post-Brexit society?
“For me, Heathcliff, and the way he’s treated by those around him, is the key to the story. On the surface it’s a love story, but deep down I think it’s about kindness and about the danger of not showing compassion to those in need.
“Wuthering Heights is a cautionary tale about what happens when we treat those in need as somehow less than ourselves. This is the driving force of my adaptation: cruelty breeds cruelty. Be careful what you seed.”
“Ash Hunter has a unique intensity that could stop a train in its tracks,” says Emma Rice of her pick to play Heathcliff, right
What made you cast Ash Hunter in the role?
“Oh, everything! Ash Hunter is everything I want from my Heathcliff. He has a unique intensity that could stop a train in its tracks and a deep understanding of human love, rage and sorrow. He is one of the finest actors I have ever worked with and when he and Lucy start to fizz together, the planets start to spin. I am beyond words.”
How important is the physicality of the Yorkshire landscape to your production? How do you represent it on stage?
“Hugely important. In fact, I’ve made The Yorkshire Moor a character in the show, played by the jaw-droppingly talented Nandi Bhebhe and the ensemble. The Moor narrates the story, as well as trying – and often failing – to save the characters from themselves.”
Wuthering Heights features a live band. Why is music so integral to your theatre-making?
“Music is important to every part of my life. I love music and can’t imagine making a show that wasn’t full of it. And it feels essential to theatre. Along with storytelling, making music is one of the oldest forms of communication. It’s how we reach across the divide and connect with other humans.
“Wuthering Heights particularly calls for an epic score: it’s an epic novel and needs to be met with everything it demands and deserves. Ian Ross, my long-time collaborator, has composed the most extraordinary score, raw, ravishing and brimful of passion.”
Is it really “grim up north”? If not, why is that the north’s reputation?!
“Haha! I definitely don’t think it’s grim up north, in fact I love it! My family were big campers in the 1970s and many a wet weekend was spent in Derbyshire and Yorkshire. I remember walking up to Upper Withins – the place that is thought to have inspired Wuthering Heights – and being a little disappointed at how small it was. I was intoxicated by the moors though, and the Brontë Parsonage and the sheer wildness of that world.”
“It is a privilege and a wonder to be making something so important,” says Wuthering Heights director Emma Rice. Picture: Steve Tanner
You are building up a relationship with York Theatre Royal for your Wise Children work. Why is forging links with regional theatres, as well as with the National Theatre, important to you?
“York Theatre Royal is Wise Children’s most steadfast collaborator: we’ve made three original touring shows since we launched the company in 2018, and YTR has co-produced all of them! We love working with them and hope to continue doing so long into the future.
“Wise Children’s mission is about making great work and touring it around the country – because we believe that audiences everywhere should have access to the talent and vision that is all too often only seen in the capital.
“We’re also committed to touring the ‘real thing’: we don’t send out a second cast, or a rejigged set – we tour with the original production and cast, making sure that the show is in its perfect form, whether you see it in York or Inverness.”
If someone has never seen Wuthering Heights, or indeed read it, why should they come to your show?
“Because it’s got everything! An epic story, a staggeringly beautiful set, deliriously wonderful music, and a cast of such searing talent that my heart jumps every night. I truly feel this is some of the most thrilling work I have ever made, and I am loving watching audiences respond to it.
“Inspired and emboldened by lockdown, we were determined to bring everything we could to this show – and you can feel the energy in every song, dance, line and action. It is a privilege and a wonder to be making something so important with such an amazingly talented and joyful company.”
Wise Children’s Wuthering Heights runs at York Theatre Royal, November 9 to 20, 7.30pm (except November 14); 2pm matinees, November 11, 13, 18 and 20. Box office: 01904 623568 or at yorktheatreroyal.co.uk.
“I truly feel this is some of the most thrilling work I have ever made,” says Emma Rice as Wuthering Heights blasts its way to York Theatre Royal . Picture: Steve Tanner
Heather Watts as Queen of Night in York Opera’s The Magic Flute: “Fiery coloratura spiced with menacing gesture”. Picture: Benjamin Lindley
The Magic Flute, York Opera, at York Theatre Royal, tonight and Friday, 7.15pm; Saturday, 4pm. Box office: 01904 623568 or at yorktheatreroyal.co.uk
AFTER 20 frustrating months, York Opera is back where it belongs – on the Theatre Royal stage. We may all rejoice.
Running an opera company is backbreaking work at the best of times. Covid has been making it a whole heap harder. Mozart’s last opera would not necessarily be an automatic choice after so long a lay-off and is certainly not an easy option. But the company has dug deep and delivers the goods in a splendid revival of John Soper’s traditional production, first seen in 2009.
In the distribution of laurels, there are many individuals to compliment. But one entity stands out. Derek Chivers’s 20-piece band, using an excellent orchestral reduction by Kenneth Roberts, takes the score by storm.
Hamish Brown’s Prince Tamino and Alexandra Mather’s Pamina. Picture: Benjamin Lindley
On opening night they began untidily, to be sure, but halfway through the overture there was no stopping them, inspired by a woodwind quartet of the highest calibre whose colourings and accuracy are a marvel throughout. Claire Jowett, a stalwart of so many groups, offers untiring leadership of the strings. One member, James Sanderson, slips in and out of the pit as player of the magic bells when not singing First Priest, a unique double act.
The singers clearly relish such a strong foundation. Foremost among them is Heather Watts, who returns to deliver another impeccable Queen of Night, fiery coloratura spiced with menacing gesture, a thrilling performance by any standards. David Valsamidis makes a witty, amiable Papageno, whose superb diction is allied to a warm baritone. Unlike some, he never forgets his audience.
Alexandra Mather is a fetching Pamina, whose emotions are conveyed not only by her clear soprano but also by complementary facial expressions, a valuable asset. Her Tamino is Hamish Brown, who takes the role that illness denied him last time round. His tendency to jerky movement undermines his princeliness, but his accurate if pinched tenor covers the ground well.
Monostatos might suit his personality better. That role goes to Ian Thomson-Smith, last time’s Papageno. He sings it musically but without quite the venom this nasty character demands. The Sarastro of Mark Simmonds is clad much like an orthodox priest; his bass is a little underpowered at the bottom of the range, but otherwise firm and decisive.
David Valsamidis: “Makes a witty, amiable Papageno” in his York Opera debut. Picture: Benjamin Lindley
Lesser roles are covered with distinction, reaffirming the company’s strength in depth. Clive Goodhead is an authoritative Speaker, doubling as an Armed Man (here described as Guardian of Fire), while Elizabeth Vile is a vivid Papagena.
I was much taken by the three Genies, Victoria Beale, Hannah Just and Maggie Smales – standing in for the usual ‘Boys’ – blending superbly like their rich white brocades, breeches and tricorns. Equally impressive are the spear-carrying Three Ladies, Annabel van Griethuysen, Rebecca Smith and Maggie Soper, a determined trio.
The chorus seems to have acquired some new blood and sounds fresh and committed. They are also very disciplined, moving with intent but keeping still when merely onlookers, which is easier said than done. I had forgotten how rich Maggie Soper’s costumes are, distinctive and a feast for the eye. A word, too, for Eric Lund’s nicely varied lighting.
John Soper’s own masonic-style permanent set fits the bill well: two panels of stars and planets divided by gold triangles and circle, with a chessboard platform in front. If it were a little closer to front-stage, some of the solo voices would resonate better than they do from further back. His production is now even more slick than before and more clearly organised; he merely needs to get some of the spoken dialogue better projected. But this is a cheering evening in so many ways and deserves widespread support.
Review byMartin Dreyer
Maggie Soper’s costumes in York Opera’s The Magic Flute: “Distinctive and a feast for the eye”. Picture: Benjamin Lindley
The Young’uns in The Ballad Of Johnny Longstaff. Picture: Pamela Raith
The Young’uns in The Ballad Of Johnny Longstaff, York Theatre Royal, 7.30pm tonight; 2.30pm, 7.30pm tomorrow. Box office: 01904 623568 or at yorktheatreroyal.co.uk
AT 17, the under-age Sean Cooney, David Eagle and Michael Hughes were drawn to the sound of singing in the back room of The Sun Inn in Stockton-on-Tees. They burst into song, harmony singers so natural that The Young’uns were born there and then.
Music had bypassed them at school, but they wondered why sea shanties, folk songs of real stories and home truths, had never been taught there.
In the 1930s, Johnny Longstaff left school at 14, suffered burns in an industrial injury in his first job at a smelting factory, and left Stockton at 15 in search of work. Told he was too young to join the Hunger March to London, he nevertheless followed its path, half a mile back, until he was discovered and allowed to take part, and then stayed in London.
By 17, he had already taken on Oswald Mosley’s Fascists – and the police – in the Battle of Cable Street and was on his way to the Pyrenees, against the rules, to train as part of the British Battalion of the International Brigade to join the Republican cause in the Spanish Civil War.
What the two paths share is a refusal to take No for an answer, to react to rejection, to find a way to make connections. The Young’uns have gone on to win a BBC Radio 2 Folk Awards three times; Johnny Longstaff’s story of working-class-hero political activism is the stuff of six hours of Imperial War Museum recordings, a Young’uns album and now a piece of gig theatre that burns with the same north-eastern fire that lit up Sting’s Tyneside shipbuilding musical The Last Ship.
There are four voices to this performance, first directed by Lorne Campbell in his days as artistic director at Northern Stage, Newcastle, as he brought a theatrical symmetry to Cooney’s songs while retaining the trio’s immediacy as always moving, sometimes humorous, storytellers in song.
The impassioned harmony singing, as beautiful as it is stirring and lyrical, is interwoven with their own storytelling and that fourth voice: extracts from those 1986 recordings in Longstaff’s Middlesbrough home that inspired Cooney’s songs.
Jack Rutter: Deputising for Michael Hughes at The Young’uns’ York Theatre Royal performances
What a potent combination it becomes: the songs make powerful statements on their own right, as with the political songwriting of Billy Bragg, Elvis Costello or Christie Moore, all the more so for the instinctive harmonies (imagine The Proclaimers with an extra voice), and then, even more resonant are the recollections of Johnny Longstaff, who has the last word, in song as his 1986 recording of The Valley Of Jarama takes over from The Young’uns live rendition.
In the absence of Michael Hughes, indisposed as he is now a full-time teacher on half-term leave, Huddersfield traditional singer Jack Rutter steps in to suffuse the harmonies, whether a cappella or augmented by keyboards, guitar or Eagle’s urgent accordion.
Campbell told The Young’uns, “don’t worry, you won’t have to act”, but nevertheless there is superb movement direction to this performance; much humour, especially from Eagle, and an awareness of how to tell the story to maximum effect, particularly from Cooney.
In an earlier life, The Ballad Of Johnny Longstaff was performed with a backdrop of Johnny Longstaff, but Campbell called on Teesside animator Scott Turnbull to add his imagery to the already potent brew, and as Campbell promised, it takes the show to a heightened level by accompanying the songs and stories with a combination of beauty, industrial grit and even cartoon humour.
Towards the finale, Johnny Longstaff’s recordings have him talking with such conviction and humanity about the importance of the Spanish Republicans taking on General Franco, almost 50 years after he was there, going days without food, being served a family cat as his supper, living off oranges and being the endangered messenger at the front.
He met Churchill on his return at Westminster, who wondered if he would bring such dedication and zeal to fighting Nazism. At first, however, he was not allowed to serve in the Second World War, having gone against the Government’s neutral position by going to Spain. Once more, he would not take No for an answer.
Oh, for the honesty, the desire to make a difference, the guts and the quest for betterment for all to surge through today’s politicians. Post-war, Johnny settled for the quieter life as a civil servant, Labour voting to the last, but still full of that drive in his recordings. Thanks to his son, Duncan Longstaff, passing on a photograph and a list of Johnny’s achievements to The Young’Uns, his story is being championed loud and proud in song.
Three performances to go in York: make sure to be there; no excuses. Amid all the ghost talk of Halloween this week, and this show’s inclusion in the Theatre Royal’s Haunted Season, Johnny Longstaff is anything but a ghostly presence; his voice so full of life and belief as it reverberates down the years.
Aesthetica Short Film Festival: York’s trendiest fest returns
YORK’S annual short film festival keeps growing longer as Charles Hutchinson surveys a week ahead of multiple choices.
Festival of the week and beyond: Aesthetica Short Film Festival, York, from Tuesday
THE 11th edition of the Aesthetica Short Film Festival runs in York from November 2 to 7 and online from November 2 to 30 in a new hybrid format that combines in-person events and the virtual platform.
ASFF 2021 offers six carefully curated film programmes, such as animation, drama, family friendly and dance, along with industry sessions and marketplace, masterclasses, guest screenings, the VR Lab, social events and an awards ceremony in this showcase for a new wave of cinematic talent. Full details can be found at asff.co.uk.
They Cud be so good for you: Leeds band pop over to York tonight
Heritage gig of the week: Mr H presents Cud, plus Percy, The Crescent, York, tonight, 7.30pm
HERE’S the history bit: Leeds art students form band in 1985, create cult indie-pop and funk sensation, tour with the Pixies and record sessions with John Peel.
Emerging from the same art/design cauldron that produced fellow Leeds legends Soft Cell, Scritti Politti and The Mekons, Cud were the pre-Britpop answer to sad-eyed shoegaze, reckons promoter Tim Hornsby. Here come Carl Puttnam and co with the still infectious indie rock of Rich And Strange and Purple Love Balloon. Box office: thecrescentyork.com.
David Baddiel: Taking on the trolls
Comedy gig of the week: David Baddiel, Trolls: Not The Dolls, Grand Opera House, York, Monday, 7.30pm
IN his follow-up to My Family: Not The Sitcom and Euro 2020 return to number one with Three Lions, comedian David Baddiel turns his quizzical gaze to trolls: “the terrible people who spend all day insulting and abusing strangers for no other reason than to fill the huge gaps in their souls”.
Baddiel tells stories of the dark, dreadful and absurd cyber-paths that interacting with trolls has led him down. Box office: 0844 871 7615 or at atgtickets.com/York.
Shobna Gulati’s Ray and Layton Williams’s Jamie New in Everybody’s Talking About Jamie at Leeds Grand Theatre
Musical of the week: Everybody’s Talking About Jamie, Leeds Grand Theatre, Tuesday to Saturday.
EVERYBODY’S talking about Everybody’s Talking About Jamie, but stop talking and start rushing to the box office as tickets are hotter than a climate-changed world amid COP26 fever.
Jamie New, 16, lives on a Sheffield council estate, where he doesn’t fit it in and is terrified of the future, but he will be a sensation in this award-winning musical, “specially updated for the times we live in”.
Layton Williams reprises his West End role, starring alongside Shane Richie and Shobna Gulati. Box office: 0844 848 2700 or at leedsheritagetheatres.com.
Heather Watts’s Queen of the Night and Alexandra Mather’s Pamina in York Opera’s The Magic Flute. Picture: John Saunders
Nights at the opera: York Opera in The Magic Flute, York Theatre Royal, Tuesday, Wednesday, Friday, 7.15pm; Saturday (6/11/2021), 4pm
YORK Opera returns to York Theatre Royal after a pandemic-enforced two-year gap with Mozart’s The Magic Flute, sung in English to orchestral accompaniment.
The story follows Prince Tamino (Hamish Brown) on his quest to rescue Pamina (Alexandra Mather) from the grasp of her mother, the evil Queen of the Night (Heather Watts), and return with her to the world of light presided over by Sarastro (Mark Simmonds), the High Priest of Isis and Osiris.
David Valsamidis makes his York Opera debut as Papageno, the Queen of the Night’s bird catcher; John Soper is the stage director; Derek Chivers, the musical director. Box office: 01904 623568 or at yorktheatreroyal.co.uk.
Feat of Peake: Tim Peake discusses the life of a British astronaut at York Barbican
In space, no-one can hear you scream, but at York Barbican they can hear you talk: Tim Peake, My Journey To Space, Tuesday, 7.30pm
IN December 2015, Tim Peake became the first British astronaut to visit the International Space Station to conduct a spacewalk while orbiting Earth.
Back on terra firma, he is on his first British tour, sharing his passion for aviation, exploration and adventure as he brings unprecedented access, photographs and fresh footage to his guide to life in space, from European Space Agency astronaut training to launch, spacewalk to re-entry.
Peake will be revealing the secrets, the science and the everyday wonders of how and why humans journey into space. Box office: yorkbarbican.co.uk.
The Battersea Poltergeist: From podcast to night terrors at the Grand Opera House, York
Fright night of the week: The Battersea Poltergeist – Live, Grand Opera House, York, Tuesday, 7.30pm
FROM a BBC Radio 4 series, The Battersea Poltergeist became a multi-million, genre-busting download phenomenon, mixing documentary and drama to tell the terrifying true story of the 1956 haunting of the Hitchings family at 63 Wycliffe Road, London, at the hands of a poltergeist they nicknamed Donald.
Now, The Battersea Poltergeist goes live as writer, playwright and journalist Danny Robins, the show’s creator, and his podcast guest experts delve deeper into this paranormal cold case, bringing the investigation to life on stage, sharing exclusive footage of Shirley Hitchings and other witnesses and revealing chilling new evidence. Box office: 0844 871 7615 or at atgtickets.com/York.
Off into the sunset: Clannad bid farewell on rearranged 2021 tour
Long goodbye of the week: Clannad: In A Lifetime, The Farewell Tour, York Barbican, Wednesday, 8pm
CLANNAD were booked to play York Barbican on March 10, but you-know-what intervened, delaying Moya Brennan and co’s Farewell Tour to the autumn.
The tour takes its name from the career-spanning March 2020 anthology In A Lifetime, drawn from 16 studio albums since 1970 that fuse elements of traditional Irish music with more contemporary folk, new age and rock. Box office: yorkbarbican.co.uk.
Duncan Honeybourne: Lockdown piano soundbites at Late Music concert
York Late Music at the double:Duncan Honeybourne, 1pm to 2pm; Elysian Singers, 7.30pm to 9.30pm, St Saviourgate Unitarian Chapel, York, November 6
IN the afternoon, Duncan Honeybourne presents pieces from his collection Contemporary Piano Soundbites: Composers In Lockdown 2020, after commissioning more than 30 piano miniatures from distinguished senior figures and emerging composers alike. Works by John Casken, John McLeod, David Power, David Lancaster, Sadie Harrison and Adam Gorb feature.
For the evening concert, Elysian Singers director Sam Laughton has devised a programme of choral music where a contemporary work is paired with an earlier piece based on words from the same poet or source, such as Cheryl Frances-Hoad and Rachmaninov’s settings of All-Night Vigil. Box office: latemusic.org.
Too late! Beth Hart’s York Barbican gig on Sunday has sold out
Recommended but sold out already
FEMALE Gothic, tonight and tomorrow, and Nightwalkers storytellers Jan Blake and TUUP, Saturday, both at York Theatre Royal Studio; York band The Howl & The Hum, Leeds Brudenell Social Club, Saturday and Sunday; American singer-songwriter Beth Hart, York Barbican, Sunday.
The Young’uns Michael Hughes, David Eagle and Sean Cooney performing The Ballad Of Johnny Longstaff. Picture: Pamela Raith
MAY 2015. Teesside folk trio The Young’uns have just concluded a gig in Somerset when up comes Duncan Longstaff with two pieces of paper.
On one is a black-and-white picture of a man. “This is my dad,” he says. On the other is a list of achievements that reads like a litany of defining moments of early 20th century working-class struggle. “This is what he did,” he explains.
Duncan hoped the Stockton-on-Tees vocal, accordion, guitar and keyboard group might write a song about his father. One song? They duly wrote 17, whereupon a show about Johnny Longstaff was born.
From tonight to Saturday, The Young’uns – Sean Cooney, David Eagle and Michael Hughes – perform a theatrical version of The Ballad Of Johnny Longstaff at York Theatre Royal, the show now featuring songs from the original album alongside new material and animation.
Young’un Sean Cooney recalls the May 2015 night that spawned their musical celebration of northern working-class activism. “It was really special. Duncan Longstaff, who was in his late-60s/early 70s, had heard us on the radio and knew we were from the north-east, from Stockton-on-Tees, Johnny’s hometown.
“He had this lovely photograph of his dad, this scruffy-looking lad, and as he was aware we wrote songs about real people, with a north-east flavour, he thought we might get one song out of it.
“But it turned out there were six hours of recordings of Johnny at the Imperial War Museum, and once we’d made time to listen to them properly, we realised we had something really special that could never be just one song.”
The resulting show, the true story of The Ballad Of Johnny Longstaff, is billed as a “timely, touching and often hilarious musical adventure, following the footsteps of a working-class hero who chose not to look the other way when the world needed his help”.
The Young’uns singing an a cappella number in The Ballad Of Johnny Longstaff. Picture: Pamela Raith
Johnny’s journey took him at 15 from poverty and unemployment in Stockton, through the Hunger Marches of the 1930s, the mass trespass movement and the Battle of Cable Street, to fighting fascism in the Spanish Civil War.
That journey is recorded not only on tape but also in writing. “Duncan kept bombarding us with stuff: Johnny had written his memoirs, but they’d never been published, and suddenly there were these 600 pages, left at my front door,” recalls Sean.
“Then he lent us Johnny’s books, with corrections that he’d written down the side when he didn’t agree with the accounts of what had gone on.
“With all these resources, we thought we’d love to use Johnny’s voice from the recordings and tell his story through song.”
The Young’uns drew inspiration from the ground-breaking BBC Radio Ballads documentaries produced by folk musician Ewan MacColl and Charles Parker in the late 1950s for the BBC Home Service. “They pretty much put working-class voices on the radio, with Peggy Seeger and Ewan MacColl writing songs to go with those voices,” says Sean.
“For our show, the songs and story are very much interwoven with Johnny’s voice. You’ll hear Johnny talking and then we’ll break into song, and there’s a special sequence at the finale, with our voices, Johnny’s voice, a little bit of narration…and then Johnny singing.
“At the end of those six hours of recordings at the Imperial War Museum, you hear him breaking into song. He’s singing The Valley Of Jarama [also known as El Valle del Jarama], and for those people who know about the Spanish Civil War, that was the song that was always being sung.”
The Young’uns first envisaged The Ballad Of Johnny Longstaff as a radio series, “but then came the touring opportunity to put together something new for the road, with a promoter arranging dates for us for March 2018,” recalls Sean.
“We thought, ‘yes, let’s take it on the road’, but as we sat in the pub at Sheffield railway station [Sean lives in Sheffield] in May 2017, I was thinking, ‘we’ve only done three months’ work on it so far, we’ve only got ten months to go’, and we still didn’t know if we’d just do the songs, with us introducing them, or whether we’d use Johnny’s voice.
The Young’uns incorporate Scott Turnbull’s animation in their theatrical performances of The Ballad Of Johnny Longstaff. Picture: Pamela Raith
“That’s when we came up with the idea of doing the show as ‘gig theatre’ with a backdrop image of Johnny behind us. It felt exciting and trepidatious at the same time, but the reaction we got was so great that what was originally going to be a side project, diverging from our main work, became much more than that.”
The album recording ensued and then came a show in Toronto where “we became really pally with the team there, and they said, ‘Have you heard of Lorne Campbell at Northern Stage’, as they’d worked with Lorne on Sting’s shipbuilding musical, The Last Ship, so they had a connection with him,” says Sean.
The Young’uns met up with artistic director Campbell in September 2019. “We knew we had a show that was so personal and special to us, and we wondered, ‘what would they want to do with Johnny, with us?’, but Lorne was great, saying he just wanted to heighten it, to bring it to bigger audiences,” says Sean.
“The key, he said, was to ‘make you as comfortable as you can be, and no, you won’t have to act’. Because the backbone of the show is Johnny’s voice and the songs, we’d never thought about the visuals, but Loren brought in an animator, Scott Turnbull, from Teesside, and now these beautiful images are built into the songs and there’s a lot of movement in the show too.”
From tonight, Johnny’s voice and Sean’s songs will unite and resonate anew. “We never strive to make links with today, but it’s clearly obvious,” says Sean. “He was fighting for the future in the 1930s, and the biggest parallel now is the fight to deal with climate change.”
Like The Young’uns, Johnny was a young’un when he started out on his adventures. “He was 15 when he walked from Stockton to London; 17 when he crossed the Pyrenees, but though they’re now seen as huge politically charged events, when Johnny lived through them, he didn’t grab that significance,” says Sean.
“He went on the Hunger March to look for work, and when he was told he was too young at 15, he followed them in secret until he was discovered, and they then said he could join.
“He went on the Cable Street march because he’d met a Jewish refugee. He didn’t understand Fascism’s doctrines; he just wanted to make human connections.”
At 17, The Young’uns made their under-age way into singing in the back of The Sun Inn pub in Stockton for the first time. “We stood up and sang unaccompanied, and it just felt natural,” Sean says. “As we were 40 years younger than anyone else there, we got called ‘The Young’uns’, and unfortunately the name stuck, but we realised we had a voice and it connected with people.
The Young’uns with an image of Johnny Longstaff behind them. Picture: Pamela Raith
“It felt welcoming, it felt ordinary, because as a kid I couldn’t access music at school, where it felt like it was for someone else, for other people, as I couldn’t play an instrument.
“But once we discovered that world of folk music, where everyone is encouraged – big voice, little voice, in tune, out of tune – this group of people who met in the back room of a pub, sharing songs and stories – wondered why we had never been taught this at school.
“Learning sea shanties that everyone could sing, we found the audience singing along with us, and from that moment, we wanted to keep doing it.”
Twenty-one years down the line, with three BBC Radio 2 Folk Awards to their name, The Young’uns are not so young’uns at 36, but their return to the stage after the pandemic lockdowns has had the same exhilarating impact on them. “For so many people in our world, it’s been incredibly emotional to get back out there,” says Sean.
Even more so, when spreading The Ballad Of Johnny Longstaff. “In many ways there’s potential for people, when they see a show poster or hear a story of Johnny, to pigeonhole it in our divided land, but we want to stress the humanity in that story and in what other people did in the 1930s.
“Johnny became a member of the Labour Party, but in the Spanish Civil War, people came from different backgrounds to fight Fascism, from public schools too.
“When people hear Johnny’s voice, there’s great respect for that voice and what he’s saying. It’s a different kind of story, that’s not well known, but…”
…thanks to Duncan Longstaff’s two pieces of paper, The Ballad Of Johnny Longstaff is now being sung loud and proud.
The Young’uns in The Ballad Of Johnny Longstaff, York Theatre Royal, tonight to Saturday, 7.30pm plus 2.30pm, Saturday. Box office: 01904 623568 or at yorktheatreroyal.co.uk.Further Yorkshire concerts by The Young’uns: Square Chapel Arts Centre, Halifax, December 11, 7.30pm; The Greystones, Sheffield, December 12, 3pm and 8pm; The Coliseum Centre, Whitby, December 17, 7.30pm. Box office: Halifax, squarechapel.co.uk; Sheffield, ents24.com/sheffield-events; Whitby, eventbrite.co.uk/e/the-younguns.
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.
Setting the record straight: Adrian Lukis as George Wickham 30 years after Pride And Prejudice in Being Mr Wickham
REVIEW: Adrian Lukis in Being Mr Wickham, Original Theatre Company, Haunted Season, York Theatre Royal, today at 2.30pm and 7.30pm. Box office: 01904 623568 or at yorktheatreroyal.co.uk
TWO years ago, 25 years on from filming the BBC adaptation of Pride And Prejudice, actor Adrian Lukis started thinking about still being Mr Wickham, having “defended his dubious reputation” for so long.
What would have become of Jane Austen’s Georgian rogue George, or “What happens to a rake when he can’t rake anymore,” as Lukis asked himself?
Harper Lee revisited the characters of To Kill A Mockingbird in Go Set A Watchman; Danny Boyle’s 2017 film T2: Trainspotting picked up the story of Mark Renton, Sick Boy and co 20 years on; in this instance, the writing falls to Lukis and Georgian storyteller Catherine Curzon.
Refracting Austen’s vilified character through their shared lens for a one-man character study set 30 years down the line of worn time, Lukis’s Wickham is now 60, still charming, with aching knees and wife Lydia waiting in the bedroom, as he tells his side of the story.
Lukis reimagined him living in reduced circumstances, having gambled his way through his £3,000 pay-off from Darcy, no longer reliant on his looks and his wits, having left behind the dissolute London life. Maybe he was residing in Yeovil, or maybe running a small business in Malmesbury, definitely he was looking out of the window for the tittle-tattle of life across the way, so he told Thursday’s audience in the Q&A after the 75-minute performance.
Wouldn’t you rather spend a night out with Mr Wickham than Mr Darcy, speculated Adrian Lukis in his post-show question-and-answer session
Lukis constructed an earlier version of this monologue but found his ageing Wickham too sleazy. Lockdown enabled him and Curzon to create Wickham mark two: a rake raking over the coals and setting the record straight. Actors must always empathise with whoever they play, runs the advice to those playing the villain of the piece, and Lukis warms to that task with relish as he reacquaints himself with “my old friend”.
Yes, Wickham was “a bit of player”, yes he behaved badly, even disgracefully on occasion, but as Lukis said afterwards, but wouldn’t you rather have a night out with gorgeous, affable George than Darcy?
Significantly, Lukis said he treated this Wickham as a new character when writing and playing him, rather than as the Austen rogue he played in Andrew Davies’s adaptation. What emerges is a story of loss, exits; his rueful reflections on Elizabeth Bennet, Darcy and Lord Byron; the blood, the smell, the gore, of the Waterloo battlefield. What has Wickham achieved at 60? He has survived, he says. He has survived, he repeated.
Being Mr Wickham is beautifully detailed, from the elaborate Georgian phrasing of Lukis and Curzon to Libby Watson’s faded drawing room design, to Guy Unsworth’s immaculately composed direction and Lukis’s eloquent, elegant performance.
Life with a scandalous scoundrel is never dull and it certainly still isn’t in Being Mr Wickham, even if the heat has gone out of the day and those knees are aching ever more.
One last story from the Q&A: when first meeting for filming, actress Susannah Harker (Jane Bennet) misheard Lukis, thinking he said he was the wig man and promptly asking him to make adjustments. No, he would be playing Mr Wickham, he corrected her, and he is still being Mr Wickham to charming effect all these years later.
Review by Charles Hutchinson
George Wickham, the survivor, in Adrian Lukis’s characterisation in Being Mr Wickham
