Theatre
PREVIEW REVIVAL THE RISE AND FALL OF LITTLE VOICE Dundee Rep, Mon 27 Feb–Sat 19 Mar
It was good news for Helen Darbyshire when she checked in with the voice doctor. Before committing to the part of Little Voice in Jim Cartwright’s play, she wanted to be sure her vocal chords were up to the task. This is a character whose pathological shyness shields an uncanny ability to mimic the great torch singers. It wouldn’t do if Darbyshire’s pipes weren’t up to it. Happily they were – and then some.
‘I knew Helen could sing but I didn’t know to what capacity,’ says director Jemima Levick. ‘The singing coach said, “Oh, yes, she’s got a three-octave range, she’s just never really used it before.” It was news to her as well.’ First seen in 1992 and popularised in the movie
version starring Jane Horrocks, Brenda Blethyn and Michael Caine, The Rise and Fall of Little Voice is a classic Ugly Duckling story of a young person overcoming life’s obstacles – overbearing mother, the mother’s exploitative boyfriend and the crushing
poverty of 1980s Lancashire – and discovering the beautiful swan within. ‘There’s something about an outsider that is
fascinating,’ says Levick, who has also directed those other misfit plays, Beauty and the Beast, Equus and The Elephant Man (for which she won a CATS award for best director). ‘They have a different perspective on the world. You find yourself going, ‘Wouldn’t it be lovely if I could do that?’ because we all think we sing like her in the shower. Little Voice has that extra layer of magic because she can do the thing we secretly wish we could do.’
One reason for selecting this black comedy to open the Dundee season was to cheer up audiences after the feminist rage of A Doll’s House and ahead of the Russian tragedy of Anna Karenina. Levick plans to give the audience a good time, but she knows it will be tempered by an all-too-topical sense of austerity. ‘It’s a brilliant play about poverty and poetry,’ she says. ‘It’s a perfect black comedy. You find yourself laughing but then you think, “These people are living in really hideous times”.’ (Mark Fisher)
PREVIEW REVIVAL PENETRATOR Tramway, Glasgow, Fri 25 & Sat 26 Feb
Since its 1993 Traverse debut, Anthony Neilson’s Penetrator has been held up as one of the Scottish playwright’s best works, its aggressive and unsettling atmosphere making it an early classic of what’s become known as ‘in-yer-face theatre’. It’s a bold work to take on as a first production, but that’s exactly what new group Boxman Theatre will be doing this month at the Tramway.
Boxman was set up by two recent acting graduates from Glasgow’s Langside College, who were first introduced to Neilson’s early play in a course workshop. Scott Ballantyne, one of its founders, says: ‘We wanted something simple for our first performance, something that would get us out there and let people see what we’re about. It’s very well written and we fell in love with it when we first read it, so we always thought we’d revisit it one day.’
In the play, the ordinary lives of
young Max and Alan are disrupted when a childhood friend returns after going AWOL from the army. According to Ballantyne, it’s Neilson’s delicate mix of comedy and tragedy that makes it such a great play, as well as the timeless nature of its characters. ‘These characters do still exist in today’s society,’ he says. ‘I can even relate to the characters among some of my friends. A lot of people have common misconceptions about the theatre but I hope that people who don’t often go to plays might see this as something different, something that might actually change their idea of it.’ (Yasmin Sulaiman)
PREVIEW CLASSIC ADAPTATIONS RICHARD III/THE COMEDY OF ERRORS King’s Theatre, Edinburgh, Tue 22–Sat 26 Feb
In the last year, Edward Hall has been praised for resuscitating the fortunes of London’s Hampstead Theatre, but it was with the innovative, all-male Shakespeare company Propeller that his reputation as a director of note first emerged. The group has received critical acclaim and numerous awards since its first production, Henry V, 13 years ago, but its current touring double bill of Richard III and The Comedy of Errors will feature its first- ever performance in Edinburgh. To date, Propeller’s very physical and musical approach to Shakespeare has provoked
positive reactions around the world. Hall says: ‘There’s such a wonderful exuberance about Shakespeare’s plays, which I think we managed to unleash very early on. Audiences around the world instantly responded to that. We’ve played in Indonesia, the Philippines, Malaysia, Italy, Spain and the response has been very similar, in Asia and Europe.’
This lively atmosphere continues in Richard III, reimagined as a gory Gothic horror, and The Comedy of Errors, set in a cheap package-holiday resort. The two shows have already received rave reviews and Hall hopes to eventually pair Richard III with Rose Rage, Propeller’s award-winning adaptation of the Henry VI trilogy. For now, he’s thriving off the energy of the current tour: ‘There’s so much live music and physical action in both these plays. They’re very different from anything you might expect of Shakespeare and I’d encourage people who think that they don’t like Shakespeare, or anyone who has a child they want to introduce to theatre, to come and see them.’ (Yasmin Sulaiman)
N A L R A H L E U N A M 84 THE LIST 17 Feb–3 Mar 2011