Tag Archives: Frost Magazine

Review: Grimm Tales, Chichester

Posted on by

Grimm Tales – For Young and Old
Adapted by Philip Wilson
Chichester Festival Youth Theatre at the Cass Sculpture Foundation, Goodwood
Until 19 August

Photo credit: Johan Persson

If you go down to the woods today… Just when it seems impossible for Chichester Festival Youth Theatre (CFYT) to achieve any greater heights they come along and smash it of the park. The sculpture park, in this instance.

The Cass Sculpture Foundation is the perfect setting for Grimm Tales. Woodland paths, tree-lined hollows and sheltered clearings provide a series of glorious natural stages. Greeted by a raggle-taggle band of minstrels beckoning us into the woods, the music throughout is evocative, catchy and haunting. All members of the Youth Theatre, these young troubadours are exceptional and add greatly to both the charm and continuity of the production.

Starting with Little Red Riding Hood and followed at different locations by Hansel and Gretel, Hans My Hedgehog, The Goose Girl at the Spring, The Three Snake Leaves, Rapunzel and The Juniper Tree, these yarns are grim indeed. Adultery, murder, child abduction, cannibalism – Mr Disney may have prettied some of them up for the big screen, but in their original form these fairy tales offer no trace of saccharine sparkle or Bibbidi-Bobbidi-Boo. Marvellously dark, but not without humour, Philip Wilson’s adaptations are magical, mysterious and utterly spellbinding.

Under the skilful direction of Dale Rooks the acting is uniformly superb. Remaining totally in character even when leading the audience from location to location, even those in minor roles demonstrate the discipline and focus of seasoned professionals. It would be grossly unfair (and almost impossible) to single out any one performance.

Testament to the excitement and enrichment of the experience, the smiles of the cast at the curtain call are wider than that of Grandma’s wolf. With satellite groups across the county, West Sussex children are so lucky to have CFYT available to them. Especially at a time when funding cuts threaten to hack drama and the arts down to almost nothing in some schools.

Ably supported by members of the Technical Youth Theatre, as darkness fell there wasn’t a star in the sky to outshine this supremely talented company.

Tickets: 01243 781312 www.cft.org.uk
There is no parking at the sculpture park, but a highly efficient system of park-and ride coach transport is in operation from Chichester College.

Review: The House They Grew Up In

Posted on by

The House They Grew Up In
Minerva Theatre, Chichester
Until 5 August
Box Office: 01243 781312 www.cft.org.uk

Photo Credit: Johan Persson

Deborah Bruce’s new play, a co-production with Headlong, manages to be both entertaining and deeply moving. It’s a tale of our time. Middle-aged brother and sister Peppy (Samantha Spiro) and Daniel (Daniel Ryan) live in the house they grew up in amid floor-to-ceiling clutter (Max Jones’s claustrophobic set design is marvelous). Isolating themselves, autistic Daniel spends his days recording a precise log of every passing moment in his diary. Highly strung and obsessed with art history and Cambridge University, Peppy leaves the safety of their nest only for food and, later, to visit Uncle Manny to try to find out why he didn’t make his regular Christmas visit. But the arrival of the little boy next door into their co-dependent lives (superbly played by Rudi Millard on press night) triggers a terrifying change in their reclusive existence, with the police, social workers, neighbours and journalists forcing the much-feared outside world upon them.

Remarkably, what seems certain to be the inevitable conclusion takes a happier turn. Jeremy Herrin’s thoughtful direction and Bruce’s accomplished writing allow Peppy and Daniel to be heard and understood, ultimately earning our compassion and making us feel uncomfortable at failing to feel and extend it sooner.

Beautiful and bitter sweet, the tragedy of the optimistic ending is that in the real world Peppy and Daniel would be the exception rather than the rule.

With superb performances, especially from Spiro and Ryan, this a thought-provoking and fascinating play that deserves a wider audience than its short run in Chichester will generate.

Review: Fabulous Fiddler

Posted on by

Review
Fiddler on the Roof (until 2 September)
Chichester Festival Theatre
Box Office: 01243 781312 www.cft.org.uk


Photo credit: Johan Persson

Heart, humour and world-class performances are just some of the elements that make Daniel Evans’s big summer musical an absolute belter. Add to that terrific musicians, Alistair David’s thrilling choreography and Lez Brotherston’s cleverly conceived set, which makes the very best use of Chichester’s unique stage, and you have a show that has all the hallmarks of a West End transfer.

The story of Tevye, a poor dairyman with five daughters, it is 1905 and in Russia an uneasy sense of impending change is in the air. But on a poor shtetl Tevye is more immediately concerned with finding husbands for the three eldest of his girls. Alas, despite his best efforts to keep with tradition, it seems that they are determined to follow their hearts rather than their heads, or indeed the advice of Matchmaker Yente (gloriously played by Liza Sadovy).

Omid Djalili is superb as Tevye. Radiating warmth sufficient to melt a Moscow frost in January, he convinces absolutely as the ordinary family man who is not without his shortcomings. In his regular exchanges with God (Dajalili’s stand-up career is much in evidence here), and later as he sings the touching Do You Love Me? to his wife, he reveals a touching vulnerability.

Tracy-Ann Oberman as his wife Golde is equally impressive. A feisty lioness who knows her old man better than he knows himself, it is an inspired pairing.

The singing overall is outstanding. From sweet and soaring to joyous and rousing, Tradition, the opening number, is nothing short of an emotional musical wallop to the gut.

A stupendous ensemble effort, this is a revival that feels both fresh and relevant. Delivering the theatrical triple of laughter (the dream scene is as clever as it is riotous), tears, and food for thought, it is the latter of the whole shebang that is the production’s ultimate strength.

A sharp reminder of how political and social unrest continues to throw lives into disarray, the final moments are heartbreakingly poignant.

Review: Sweet Bird of Youth, Chichester Festival Theatre

Posted on by

Sweet Bird of Youth

Chichester Festival Theatre

Until 24 June

Box Office: 01243 781312 www.cft.org.uk

Photo credit: Johan Persson

With the run-up to General Election a veritable carnival of hypocrisy, self-interest, arrogance and rampaging egos, the day after the event itself wasn’t the ideal time to digest more of the same. Alas, in Tennessee Williams’s 1959 play there is little relief from such monstrous conduct.

Fearing derision and rejection after the premiere of her latest film, aging Hollywood movie star Alexandra Del Largo (Marcia Gay Harden) has bolted and is holed up in a hotel in St Cloud on the Gulf Coast of Mexico with Chance Wayne (Brian J. Smith), a gigolo and wannabe actor who skipped the town a few years previously. While the actress hides behind an alias and dulls her demons with alcohol, narcotics and sex, Chance is determined to be reunited with Heavenly, his teenage sweetheart. Unaware that before leaving St Cloud he infected his girl with a STD that necessitated a hysterectomy, he has no idea that Heavenly’s father and brother are resolute: should Chance ever show his face in the neighbourhood again he will pay for his crime.

The first act, almost entirely a two-hander set in a hotel bedroom, offers superb performances from Harden and Smith. Convincing and compelling, on the Festival Theatre’s thrust stage, however, some of the intensity and intimacy is lost.

Elsewhere the performances are strong, especially Richard Cordery as Boss Finley, a bully with double standards and an unshakable belief in the American Dream. Victoria Berwick as Heavenly Finley is also excellent. Vulnerable, compliant but filled with a rage, when she sobs silent, despairing tears, her grief and anger is sorely palpable.

Easy on the eye, Anthony Ward’s set is stunning; clever, evocative and stylish, it is also beautifully complemented by Mark Henderson’s lighting.

The ruthless marching of time is one of the play’s key themes. In Jonathan Kent’s undeniably ‘classy bird’ there remains a niggling sense that the pace needs to be stepped up.

Review: Forty Years on at Chichester Festival Theatre

Posted on by
ARSONatChichesterFestivalTheatre.PhotoJohanPersson_02652

Photos: Johan Persson

Taking up his post as Artistic Director new Head Boy Daniel Evans opens his first Chichester Season with Alan Bennett’s early play, which is set in 1968 at Albion House, a fading public school.

Some fifty local schoolboys join the cast and are outstanding, opening the production with a roof-raising rendition of Praise My Soul the King of Heaven.

The occasion is the end of term show, which also marks the retirement of the elderly headmaster. Under the directorial auspices of his reformist successor, the offering of a history revue includes some sketches that get the old duffer decidedly hot and bothered – to be overtly risqué is definitely tsk-tsk territory.

There are some joyous moments. Danny Lee Wynter’s naughty portrayal of an elderly aristocrat à la Dame Maggie as Downton’s Lady Violet is delicious, while an ace tap-dance solo is worthy of the Strictly! final. A stage invasion of lusty-voiced rugger buggers is also a gas, which for all the headmaster’s puritanical tendencies is deemed perfectly acceptable once it is revealed that the opposition has been roundly trounced.

Alan Cox as incoming headmaster Franklin, Jenny Galloway as Matron and Lucy Briers as Miss Nisbitt give accomplished performances, while the music and singing is superb, thanks to the excellence and exuberance of a terrific ‘school orchestra.’

Some of the historical inspirations do not resonate, leaving these skits teetering on the brink of tedium. But there are plenty of jolly spoofs to compensate, as well as flashes of poignancy bringing a balancing shade.

)inCFT'sproductionofFORTYYEARSON.PhotoJohanPersson_04653You can almost smell overcooked cabbage thanks to Lez Brotherston’s impressive school hall set, which comes complete with an almighty oak organ, rising from and towering over the stage.

At eighty years on himself, and having suffered a heart attack only last year, it is perhaps unsurprising that Richard Wilson is not yet tight on his lines. Reading from a script for the most part, when he struggles to find his place on the page it causes the audience collective anxiety. It’s a shame, but there is still much to enjoy here.

www.cft.org.uk Box office: 01243 781312

Vicky Edwards

Stepping Out: Review

Posted on by

Stepping Out

stepping-out-rehearsal-nicola-stephenson-tracy-ann-oberman_-photo-johan-persson_00571

In rehearsals for Stepping Out

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

At Chichester Festival Theatre until 19 November (Booking: 01243 781312; www.cft.org.uk)

At the Vaudeville Theatre, London, 1 March – 17 June 2017 (Booking: www.nimaxtheatres.com)

Directed by Maria Friedman

Cast: Amanda Holden, Angela Griffin, Tracy-Ann Oberman, Tamzin Outhwaite, Nicola Stephenson, Judith Barker, Rose Keegan, Sandra Marvin, Jessica-Alice Mccluskey, Dominic Rowan, Janet Behan, Emma Hook, Katie Verner and Nick Warnford

A weekly tap dancing class in a community hall is the setting for a story that follows the lives of a group of ladies and a solitary man. Like many adult education classes, all human life is here.

Boasting a cast that includes several popular faces from television, Tracy-Ann Oberman is on superb form as wise-cracking Maxine. Glamorous in a wardrobe of nearly new and knock-off, the more-front-than-Brighton exterior conceals a tender and vulnerable heart. Tamzin Outhwaite as is also touching in her role class teacher Mavis. With her dreams of being a dancer dramatically reconfigured and an unhappy relationship to cope with, teaching is both her salvation and a constant needling reminder that she never quite made it. Amanda Holden as posh but tactless neat freak Vera delivers some of the production’s funniest moments, admitting only towards the end that her perfect life isn’t quite so perfect after all.

Everyone, in fact, has a secret to reveal, but the audience is short changed; what the final outcome is for each of the characters is anyone’s guess. Pace, too, is a frustration. A lethargic beginning gives way to a gentle potter before coming to a rather abrupt and inconclusive ending.

But the dialogue is sharp enough, the performances are (largely) accomplished and the familiar theme of trying to get along with people with whom one has little in common will surely resonate. Touring prior to the West End next year, hopefully the tempo will pick up and settle along the way. Then, no doubt, Stepping Out will be packing ‘em in.

stepping-out_image

 

Old wines in interesting bottles at Winerack

Posted on by
Borgo Magredo - great wine in an attractive flask

Borgo Magredo – great wine in an attractive flask

The big wine retailer Conviviality, which includes Bargain Booze and Wine Rack, is offering a series of wines which are veering towards the unusual.

Their autumn wine tasting, held last week (7 September 2016) had a wide variety of wines from unlikely countries. A Slovenian 2015 Gomilla Sauvignon Blanc (£10.99) was being offered alongside a Chinese2015 Chateau Changyu Moser XV Cabernet Sauvignon (£10.99). The Slovenian wine was light and fruity. The Chinese wine was slightly too dry for my palate, but it is the sort of thing that guests would be keen to try..

There are some really pretty flask-shaped wine bottles from Italy. The 2015 Fruliano Borgo Magedo, Friuli Grave was fruity and slightly floral with notes of grapefruit. It’s a nice wine and – it might sound a bit shallow – but when you are having a dinner party, it’s nice to have something on the table that looks interesting.

It’s worth checking out the South African wines. There are some good chenin blancs and I particularly rated the Julien Schaal Mountain Vineyards Chardonnay (£13.99) – light and slightly fruity with citrus tones. A nice thing to drink with fish, chicken breasts or just by itself.

And there are even wines with celebrity links. The 2016 MT Pinot Noir Rose (£10.99), is made by McGuigan/John Torode. John Torode is the Australian celebrity chef who does Masterchef and looks severe when contestants burn the apple crumble. Pinot noir is more normally used for Burgundy style wines and it is found in rose Champagnes. So this is a slightly unusual wine, but it would go well with prawns or a tuna salad and it is reasonably priced.

Gomila Exclusive sauvignon blanc

An exciting Slovenian cabernet sauvignon

Shelter From The Storm by Ellie Dean

Posted on by

Shelter-from-the-Storm-Ellie_Dean

The latest saga set at Beach View Boarding House in Cliffehaven.

It is 1943 and nineteen-year-old April Wilton has joined the WRENS and is busy servicing ships’ engines in Portsmouth. Here she has found freedom, friendship, and fulfilment.

April meets Daniel, a young American soldier, whose mother is Sioux and father is of African descent, The attraction is immediate, and coming from strict racial segregation in South Carolina, Daniel finds the freedom he has in England overwhelming.

But with war and race both involved, their relationship was never going to be simple.

Rejected by her mother and facing an uncertain future she travels to Cliffehaven. However, she carries a secret, one that could change her life for ever.

Can the warmth and support of Peggy Riley and those at Beach View Boarding House heal the wounds of April’s past and bring her hope amid this time of turmoil?

This is my first encounter with the characters of Beach View Boarding House even though it is Ellie Dean’s eleventh family saga.  However, it didn’t matter  that I hadn’t read any of the others  as I was soon swept into the warm and welcoming arms of Peggy Riley and the members of her hotch-potch household. It quite easily stands alone but it did make me curious to find out the back stories of the other members that now reside at Beach View – which can only be a good thing.

Ellie Dean handles a wide range of characters and makes you warm to each one of them – no mean feat at all. She takes us back to a time when life was difficult enough fighting a war and dealing with rationing, let alone the complications that relationships bring. A heartwarming and uplifting story for lovers of family sagas.

www.ellie-dean.co.uk

www.penguin.co.uk

www.tracybaines.co.uk