REVIEW: What Shadows, Park Theatre ✭✭✭✭
What Shadows is a seriously meaty play, full of challenging ideas, brought to life through a strong cast and Roxana Silbert’s well-paced direction.
What Shadows is a seriously meaty play, full of challenging ideas, brought to life through a strong cast and Roxana Silbert’s well-paced direction.
While Twilight Song lacks the power of My Night With Reg, it is an enjoyable piece of drama that sharply portrays people – both gay and straight – who feel trapped by their circumstances and seek an escape that risks making their misery even worse.
Casting has been announced for Michael Fentiman’s 50th Anniversary production of Joe Orton’s classic dark comedy Loot playing at the Park Theatre from 17 August – 24 September 2017. Joining the previously announced rising British stars Calvin Demba (Evening Standard Emerging Talent Award nominee, The Red Lion, National Theatre) and Sam Frenchum (Private Peaceful, Grantchester) and the award-winning Sinéad Matthews (Mrs Elvsted in Ivo van Hove’s Hedda Gabler, National Theatre), are Christopher Fulford (Winston Churchill in Werner Herzog’s Queen of the Desert, The Crucible, Regent’s Park Open Air Theatre), Ian Redford (The Alchemist, Mad World My Master, Candide, all for the RSC) and Raphael Bar (national tour of Out of Order) with Anah Ruddin. When it premiered five decades ago, Loot shocked and delighted audiences in equal measure and it scooped the Best Play of the Year Award in the 1967 Evening Standard Awards. This production commemorates three 50-year anniversaries: … Read more
Maybe that is because there are no grey areas, making The View From Nowhere’s tone of frustration and anger one that is fully deserved.
Kathy Burke is to direct the World Premiere of Sam Bain’s new comedy drama The Retreat at Park Theatre from 2 November to 2 December 2017. Luke, a former high-flyer from the City, is sitting in a remote stone hut halfway up a mountain in the Scottish Highlands. He is on a meditation retreat, searching for the inner peace that so far has eluded him. The trouble is, not only will his mind not settle, but an uninvited guest arrives – his obnoxious older brother, Tony. Is Tony everything that’s wrong with Luke’s old life, or is he the only one who can really see into his soul? And is Luke’s quest for spirituality a way of transforming himself, or is it just another form of addiction? The Retreat is a sharp new comedy drama about a world where we can never escape ourselves, or find ourselves either. Kathy Burke is a director, actor … Read more
The Park Theatre has announced that Calvin Demba, Sam Fremchum and Sinéad Matthews will lead the cast of the 50th-anniversary production of Joe Orton’s Loot when it opens at the Park Theatre on 17 August 2017. Winning the 1967 Evening Standard Award for Best Play Of the Year in 1967, Loot delighted and shocked audiences in equal measure. The production will star Calvin Demba (Evening Standard Emerging Talent Award nominee, The Red Lion, National), Sam Frenchum (Private Peaceful, Grantchester) and award-winning Sinéad Matthews (Mrs Elvsted in Hedda Gabler at the National Theatre). Further casting is to be announced. Loot is to be directed by Michael Fentiman, designed by Gabriella Slade, lighting design by Elliot Griggs, sound design by Max Pappenheim. Loot will play at the Park Theatre from 17 August – 24 September 2017. BOOK TICKETS FOR LOOT AT PARK THEATRE
Twitstorm Park Theatre 1st June 2017 3 Stars BOOK NOW The great thing about this theatre is that you can never – quite – tell where Artistic Director Jez Bond is taking it. Each new show comes along and brings with it a new departure, and certainly a bold contrast to whatever preceded it. Each production is a risk, and while many pay off, occasionally some do not. Well, that is the privilege of an experimental, new-writing house: it must reserve ‘the right to …’, well, if not exactly ‘fail’, then certainly to be slightly less than completely successful. Never was that more true than with this opus, a contemporary boulevard comedy, by and partly starring Chris England, set – in theory – in the world of Twitter and celebrity culture. In practice, this feels more like an endearingly old-fashioned, light-hearted slab of cheeky but still not too saucy entertainment. … Read more
I’m delighted to say that I’m already booked to go back and have another session with Tick Tick BOOM!, and its fascinating aesthetic conundrums, later in the run. It is the kind of production that rewards such attention.