Gypsy Queen
Assembly Front Room.
11 August 2017
4 Stars
There are many closets that people hide and live in, but bare knuckle fighting and boxing must be among the toughest worlds to negotiate your homosexuality in. Developed in part as a response to homophobic comments by Tyson Fury, this play examines the relationship between Gorgeous George, bare knuckle fighter, and gay boxer Dane Sampson.
Despite Dane being openly gay, this is not totally an accepting world, and the play explores attitudes and love very successfully. Hope Theatre company have created a highly involving piece and director Adam Zane kept the action fluid and engaging. As George Rob Ward portrays toughness and vulnerability in equal measure, and he is matched perfectly by Ryan Clayton's seemingly more confident Dane. They portray every other member of the story, and here are many delights, George's C bomb dropping mother a particular highlight!
Some added physicality could have taken us even further into this world, and I found the ending a little forced, it feels that it hasn't been earned. However, it is excellent to see performers perfectly comfortable with their bodies and subject matter, and this show I would recommend for your must see list.
Read more reviews and editorial in our Edinburgh Festival section.
Paul is a playwright, director, actor, academic, (he has a PhD from the University of East Anglia), teacher and theatre reviewer! His plays include Living with Luke, (UK tour 2016), Play Something, (Edinburgh Festival Fringe/Drayton Arms Theatre, London 2018), , (2019), and now The Miner’s Crow, which won the inaugural Artist’s Pick of the Fringe Award at the first ever Colchester Fringe Festival 2021. In lockdown 2020 he created the audio series Isolation Alan, available on Youtube, and performed online in the Voice Box Festival. He is the founder member of Stage Write, a Colchester based theatre company, and his acting roles include Rupert in How We Love by Annette Brook, first performed at the Vaults Festival 2020 and revived at the Arcola and at Theatre Peckham in 2021. Follow: @stagewrite_
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