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| Sexy action spins like dancer’s
pole |
THE EDUCATION OF A LAPDANCER
Pleasance Theatre by Martina Anzinger
THE Full Monty, it ain’t – but, yes, they do get ‘em
out for the lads’. Only the G-strings spare the blushes of
perhaps 50 per cent of the audience.
This show not only has wall-to-wall sex, but also drugs and rock
‘n’ roll as well as English lessons.
But for all the sexual frolics in bed and around poles, this is
a compelling domestic drama about the state of play in New Labour’s
sceptred isle.
Author John Cooper lifts the veil on this new Jerusalem – from
failing schools to the pandemic of human trafficking for prostitution
orchestrated by the eastern European mafia. In this crucible a complacent
middle-class family’s life unravels under the spell of the
oldest primal urge.
Chris, a frustrated English teacher researching his book at a lap
dance club, ends up giving English lessons to exotic Romanian dancer
Ylenia – in her bed. Back home, his wife Marie, an overworked
doctor, falls for the charms of a mysterious eastern European businessman
who, it turns out, is making big bucks in the pole-dance business.
And then there’s the black musician Billy, whom our Maida Vale
couple’s daughter brings home to share her dream of X-Factor
stardom.
Forbidden desires and bitter reality clash, with disastrous results.
In the end there is murder, separation – and a little bit of
education for the damsel in distress.
Cooper’s daring drama challenges common perceptions about pimps
and prostitutes, and his characters’ moral ambiguity is perfectly
captured by the superb cast in this production by director Harry
Meacher.
In particular, Ben Dudley as Chris struck a chord with the audience
– his classroom battles with recalcitrant black pupil Delroy
being obviously all too familiar.
Rada award-winning Harry Meacher and Kate Steavenson-Payne –
who excelled in Ian McKellen’s screen Richard III – are
convincing as the slick Romanian businessman Sorin and his lap-dancing
protégé Ylenia. The accents were straight out of passport
control at Bucharest airport.
They were ably supported by Lucie Dobbing and Karen Cooper while
Jason Ramsay proved never less than engaging as the young black
wannabe rock star Billy.
The stage direction was as flawless as the pole dance acts, with
scene changes from classroom and lap dance club to family home and
call-girl’s love nest seamlessly realised. Spearmint Rhino,
eat your heart out.
Until November 13
020 7609 1800
Profound and fruity
COMFORT ME WITH APPLES
Hampstead Theatre by Tom Foot
THE original cover of Thomas More’s novel Utopia was illustrated
with an apple tree.
Fruit was a powerful symbol of natural abundance for his alternative
society – ripe for the picking.
In Comfort Me With Apples, the apples are rotten, the ground infertile
and the relationships dead.
Capitalism has taken root in contemporary Somerset and the farmer
is no longer self-sufficient.
Independent cider orchards are disappearing from the rural landscape
faster than you can say ‘Scrumpy Jacks’.
But this subtext, despite being inextricably linked to Nell Leyshon’s
play, barely gets a mention. Her work is far too sophisticated to
descend into a sectarian rant.
What immediately strikes you about the night is the remarkable set.
Half orchard, half house; with a carpet of earth, apples spill out
from beneath the bed. A wood fire smokes out the theatre. When the
scene shifts into the orchard after the interval, the boundaries
blur once more. The characters don’t know where else to be;
they fall asleep beneath a duvet of leaves.
The land is home and the home is land.
Unfortunately, for the matriarch Irene (Anna Calder-Marshall) the
land and her way of life are worth more than the happiness of her
son Roy (Peter Hamilton Dyer). A kind of female King Lear, Irene
has her favourite, but eventually sees the error of her ways and
is redeemed after acknowledging her daughter Brenda (Kate Schlesinger).
But Roy’s late break from his mother’s maternal clutches
ends with tragedy. Irene’s brother Len (Alan Williams) plays
the fool, full of simple truths and foreboding. Amidst all the family
squabbles, he is the one that brings what’s really important
– the future of the farm – to the fore.
With a plain plot and few memorable lines, the play’s power
is in its characters.
The nuances of family life smack of authority, each individual with
their agenda but eventually willing to sacrifice for the collective.
Nell Leyshon, the new writer in residence at the Hampstead Theatre,
sets out to depict rural life before it disappears. She has created
a mysterious world governed by myth and legend that comes recommended.
Until November 12
020 7722 9301
Stoppard’s masterful pity is comparable
to Godot
HEROES
Wyndhams by Illtyd Harrington
THEATRICAL history looks like repeating itself at Wyndhams. Almost
10 years ago, producer David Pugh brought in Art, a first work by
a French playwright. Christopher Hampton translated it, it starred
Albert Finney, Tom Courtney and Ken Scott and it ran for six years.
Heroes is the first play by Gerald Sibleyras, translated by Tom
Stoppard, starring John Hurt, Richard Griffiths and Ken Stott and
produced by David Pugh.
It takes place in 1959 in a retirement home for mentally bruised
and physically battered French officers. They live amidst the tranquillity
of the French countryside. These three gather daily on a secluded
terrace and talk and talk, even sometimes to a stone dog. Occasionally
they look out to a distant row of poplar trees. John Hurt is Gustave,
trim and neat, who snaps into conversation planning their escape
to far away Indo-China – a forlorn hope for he’s a little
barking, as well as being an agoraphobic.
Richard Griffiths, of massive girth, the longest-serving inmate
who has a gammy leg radiates kindness, realisms and harmless mischief.
His imagination and lust is fired when he is accompanied by a group
of school kids on his daily walk.
Phillipe (Ken Stott) has fainting fits, the consequence of the shrapnel
still in his brain and is living again the horrors of war.
We learn very little about their past lives, but in the hands of
such superlative actors and more than 100 minutes of the action,
an intimacy develops. Already it has been compared to Waiting for
Godot.
These are typical old men who have spent around 40 years in these
asylums, being cared for by regimentally minded nuns. The highlights
of their lives are birthdays and funerals, and too often an unspoken
and unrealisable yearning.
In one hilarious scene they rope up using the garden hosepipe as
they plan their escape beyond the mournful and distant poplar trees,
only to be brought back to reality by Henri.
Dylan Thomas wrote: “Old age should rage against the dying
of the light.”
Perhaps these three do not rage, but they realise that life is closing
in. In the last moments, although it is now autumn, they see high
above them a flight of migrating birds heading for the sun. They
flop their arms in communion, touching, sad, but courageous.
Thea Sharrock sensitively directs these three masters of their craft
in an exquisitely designed set by Robert Jones.
Until January 14
0870 950 0925
Tense action on a sultry carriage
THE RETURN
Old Red Lion by Rebecca Omonira-Oyekanmi
THE Birmingham Stage Company’s premiere of Reg Cribbi’s
The Return is intense and informative viewing.
Trev and Steve, two Australians fresh from prison, board a train
to Fremantle – their intention to make the carriage their own
is clear from the outset.
In the darkness of the tiny Old Red Lion, the pair enthralled the
audience, leaving us amused, bewildered and sympathetic to their
every word and every action.
The Return begins as a story of two bored men, Trev and Steve, harassing
a lone woman, Lisa. They show a desire to please and repulse.
But when the train stops at Perth, two more passengers enter and
the play takes an unexpected twist.
A tragedy of social and class divisions, love, homophobia and despair
ensues. The convincing performance from all the actors reinforced
the brilliance of the script.
Every twitch, glance and grimace was compounded by the tensions
and heat of the train.
Will Irvine (Trev) and Alistair Scott-Young as Steve put in charismatic
and thrilling performances, reminding the audience of the potential
depths of human sadness.
The Old Red Lion has made quite a coup with this excellent production
that brings to life the story of ordinary people in an extraordinary
way.
Until November 26
020 7837 7816 |
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Get to work on your tannin
BORDEAUX winemakers – long regarded as the world’s greatest
– are in trouble. Government health campaigns and strict enforcement
of French drink driving laws are causing a dramatic decrease in French
wine consumption.
FULL STORY
It all comes down to cash
AFTER confessing to not being able to swim the other week, I was deluged
with offers of help.
FULL STORY
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