★★★☆☆
Three Stars

There were some sizzling moments from the actors in this production, but a general lack of polish and a few first-night hiccups let it down.

The small stage was crammed with props surrounding a big double bed, cluttered and tight. The set itself was tatty – the edges of the door frames were deliberately painted to look run down, which perhaps emphasised themes of decay, but the illusion was completely broken by the sellotape caught in the glint of the spotlights; it was an odd mixture of studied and accidental shabbiness.

Some of the acting was excellent. Sustaining a Mississippi drawl for almost three hours is difficult but most of them pulled it off. Ella Waldman as Maggie stood out: at the beginning she spoke very quickly, but she settled into it and, when she flowed, she was captivating as she talked and talked at Brick.

Ed Price as Brick adopted a strange, slow delivery, forcing every word through a sigh. It was odd, like Marlon Brando doing a bad Christopher Walken impression. But he really looked in pain when he hobbled around on his crutch, and there was complete detachment in his face throughout. Big Momma shuffled in her loud taffeta dress turning her nose up in the air, with furrowed brow and pursed lips. Like the vicar, she brings a bit too much farce to the play when she first appears but, as things turn more serious towards the end, her performance improves and, in the big ensemble family scenes, it works very well.

But what is the period? Besides the taffeta, there was a frilly peach number for Mae, while the men wore plain suit trousers and white shirts – even the doctor and the Reverend, with no indication of who their characters were. The props were a mish-mash of old-fashioned looking things, with no coherence.

There were some excellent and absorbing moments of acting, but other areas need attention. It is easy to forgive a couple of first-night hiccups, but there were a few too many – sputtering sound cues, clattering sets, prop failures and, repeatedly, actors tripping up on the same step. But it is a remarkable script, and probably worth it for that.

★★★☆☆
Three Stars

London’s burning in Marchella Ward’s (dir.) latest play at the Keble O’Reilly, bringing Sophocles’ Antigone to the streets of London during the 2011 riots. A wall covered in graffiti with zingers such as “hatred reigns”, some precarious looking scaffolding and fly-tipped furniture fill the stage to create what in fact looks like a genuine enough London back alley – cringing graffiti tags aside.

The task of making a Greek tragedy relevant to such a specific time and place is no mean feat, and Antigone (after Sophocles) should be commended for what is mostly a successful attempt. However, there are moments when the plot grates against its modern backdrop, particularly in one particular scene set on the tube: whilst the sudden and unlikely appearance of characters is all part of the fun of Greek tragedy, when we are encouraged to believe this happening on a tube train, it smacks of incredulity and it’s hard not to raise a cynical eyebrow. All is not lost however, as there are strong performances across the board in the cast, particularly those of Tom Hilton as Creon and Amber Husain as Tiresias, who plays the blind tramp with a control which lets the underlying desperation seep through just enough to make you feel slightly uncomfortable.

Antigone (after Sophocles) is a very smooth production with the Chorus doubling up as stagehands, throwing the set around between each scene whilst remaining in their collective character of a pack of hyena-like youths. This animalistic quality makes the Chorus reminiscent of what our wonderful Justice Secretary Kenneth Clarke called the “feral underclass” and who were blamed for the riots two summers ago, but it is unclear whether this is intentional. Indeed, it is also unclear whether Ward’s Antigone is more interested in the story of the riots or in the journey made by Antigone – a ‘spoilt brat with daddy issues’. Ultimately, this ambiguity may mean Antigone leaves you with a sense of dissatisfaction, failing to deliver on some of the political questions it raises. However, the weaknesses in this area are redeemed by the strong performances and impressive aesthetic of the whole production.

★★★☆☆
Three Stars

A Day in the Death of Joe Egg starts with a bang and goes on with an onslaught of emotional and intellectual attacks from there. The play touches upon human relationships in almost every conceivable way, familial, friendly, romantic, and does so throughout the play, constantly adding nuances to each as the story progresses. Although, at points, the audience does seem to wonder “How much can I find out about a family in one and a half hours?” This is counteracted by the characters’ monologues – and dialogues, in fact – which appeal directly to the audience. They are emphasising the fact that you are intruding in a voyeuristic way however long you stay, so you might as well stay for the ride.

Which would, indeed, be worth your while. The actors are all extremely competent and bring off their characters with a flair and personal style – notably, Brian (Sam Ward) assuming different roles as his character relives his past. The character of Sheila – played very well by Claudia Hill – is the simple woman but ultimate mother figure. Their friends Freddie and Pam and the late appearance of Brian’s mother, Grace, though the characters are not quite fleshed out, are also worth mentioning in that they achieve what they were supposed to. They add to the chaotic atmosphere being constructed by Brian and Sheila’s emotional breakdown, accentuated by Jo’s physical one.  

The impression of a stable family home, slowly revealing all its wear and tear, is quickly established by an impressive set – probably about as furnished as the BT is going to get – and solid lighting which was not imposing but fully complemented the action onstage. One of the audience’s first impressions is that a lot of work has gone into this production.

Though well-done and with a general quickness and fluidity in deliveries and interactions, it is not completely polished, with a few lines too many lines going astray to be written off as first-night nerves. Thankfully, the cast does not let that affect them, and are able to quickly cover and move on without creating any awkwardness. Strangely enough, the play seems to be constantly trying to be awkward then veering off it into the genuinely thought-out. The beginning which calls for slight audience interaction, freezes the audience then serves to break the ice. When Jo was brought on, I prepared to cringe, but it never happened. Disability done by someone fully able onstage can quickly turn into something offensive and her frequent seizures could easily have been either ridiculous or disturbing. This was certainly not the case at all. Lucy Delaney’s performance was finely-tuned  and understated enough to find the balance between realism and aesthetic representation.

All in all, the emotional back-and-forth and the inability to decide which character to identify with is not for everyone. However, if the limits of people, whether physical, intellectual or emotional, portrayed with subtlety and care are of any interest to you, head to the BT.

★★★★☆
Four Stars

Never before have I laughed so much in a play that I’ve cried. Never before have I seen an audience burst into spurts of applause mid-scene. Never before have I seen a man with an afro as big as Dylan Townley’s. This is all explained, since never before have I been to an Imps production. 

The Play’s the Thing is a heavily improvised tragicomedy, following an entirely new plot each night. Townley and Tom Skelton (who also directed the piece) rely wholly on the audience for the main character’s names, the female lead’s dream, the setting of the play, as well as the focus of their metaphors. Tonight, Patrick and Miranda from the second row gave the characters their names, with an old man at the back choosing the setting of Florence. Metaphors about flowers were cleverly dropped in throughout the piece in the most unlikely of places, with Dom O Keefe at one point shouting, “Although as quiet as a daisy, with this sword I’ll stab you like crazy!” 

However, the most attractive aspect of this play was not the ear lobe humour, tangerine jokes or drunken debauchery; it was the fact that the audience who see this play tomorrow evening will probably not understand a single one of those references. The cast have an obviously close relationship and excellent chemistry, allowing them to play off each other with skill and precision, almost always ending in hilarity for the audience. We become absorbed in the play and the actors, with scripted and unscripted scenes merging seamlessly to create fresh and witty comedy. The idea that Sylvia Bishop can come up with a long soliloquy on her death bed seems outrageous, as is Skelton’s brilliant caricature of a monk, attempting to contact God telepathically through lifting his leg and screwing up his face.

But beneath all the silliness and the jokes, the play was fundamentally rooted in Shakespeare. Archaic, Shakespearean English was used throughout The Play’s the Thing – the cast appearing to relish the “thou”s and “hast”s they threw into their sentences. The core of the play merely highlights the intelligence with which it was put together, and the final, death scene emphasises this with the last character left standing bearing a striking resemblance to Ludovico in Othello.

It was funny, it was clever, it mocked English tutors; go and see it.