Theater

“It’s the a-choc-alypse…no, it’s choc-mageddon” What to do when a golden ticket is actually thrust into one’s hand?! A late invitation to a very early preview of new big budget musical Charlie and the Chocolate Factory meant a hurried trip to the newly refurbished Theatre Royal Drury Lane to see what has to be one of the most highly anticipated productions of the year with Sam Mendes directing, Peter Darling choreographing and Douglas Hodge taking on the role of Willy Wonka. Given the huge success of fellow Roald Dahl adaptation Matilda, the stakes on this multi-million production are substantial and a month long preview period is testament to how much the team want to test the show before opening night. Where Charlie might suffer, unlike Matilda, is in the enduring memory of the iconic film version from 1971. When Hodge appears at the door of his factory, you can sense the sigh of relief as he looks ‘right’, as in definitely inspired by Gene Wilder’s take on the character; when the doors open on the Chocolate room, there’s a slight sense of disappointment which is perhaps inevitable as the logistics of creating a chocolate waterfall and river come up hard against what appears to be a giant curly-wurly (hopefully there’s more to be done here). So consequently much of my emotional reaction to the show actually came from preconceived notions – tears came in anticipation of Charlie unwrapping the all-important chocolate bar rather than because of it, the goosebumps at the climactic elevator ride came from the sneaky use of Bricusse and Newley’s ever lovely Pure Imagination (the only song to make it from the film) as the lift itself wasn’t ready to be used and apparently the cause of earlier previews being cancelled. There are moments of theatrical magic that the show thoroughly owns for itself though, most notably for me the way in which the other children are revealed as they each get their golden tickets being the undoubted highlight of the first half. Jamie Harrison’s illusion work brings a couple of lovely moments too and the Act 1 closer, It Must Be Believed To Be Seen, is a great introductory number for Hodge’s Wonka. The opening Quentin Blake-inspired video which details the making of chocolate is excellent too though perhaps a little long for the younger viewer. The use of Jon Driscoll’s projection in the second act enlivens the trip around the factory where perhaps a little more originality could make the set pieces themselves sparkle a little more. The Oompa-Loompas are well done, and pleasingly large in number which fills the stage well, though it’s a real shame that their iconic theme tune isn’t used here (especially if Pure Imagination is being borrowed) and there’s a misjudged disco moment which seems mainly designed to give them a costume which allows the actors to stretch their legs… By and large, the new score by Marc Shaiman errs to a traditionally classic sound, Nick Skilbeck’s orchestra sounding excellent, and time will tell if the tunefulness possess longevity (I can’t say I was humming any of the new songs as I left). The child performers all gave an impressively high level of performance (nice to see Adrianna Bertola again) and there’s good work from Nigel Planer as a sprightly Grandpa Joe (though the other grandparents could do with being defined a little stronger). It was definitely interesting to see the show at such an early stage in its development, though I do feel for people who paid considerable amounts of money for something that isn’t quite ready yet. Charlie and the Chocolate Factory is a largely faithful adaptation which is full of impressive set pieces, but still has room to introduce a deal more theatrical magic to make the most of the unique opportunities offered by presenting the story onstage. As stated, there’s a good month of previews in which this could ha

“Nowadays, it's so hard to tell" London’s newest theatre opened its doors in Finsbury Park last week but the Park Theatre also has a more intimate studio and it is the UK premiere of David Henry Hwang’s Yellow Face that christens that space. Hwang was the first Asian-American to win a Tony for Best Play and so was a predictable figurehead for the 1990 protests against the casting of Jonathan Pryce in a Eurasian role in the Broadway production of Miss Saigon and it is this that forms the starting point for his play Yellow Face which questions ideas of race and identity and whether any such thing as a multicultural society can really exist when prejudices continue to weigh in from all sides. Hwang uses his own experiences but also weaves elements of fiction into the play – the version of himself who is the lead character is (barely) renamed DHH - to create something of a fantasia, which allows him to heighten the absurdity of many of these situations whilst simultaneously maintaining the chilling realisation that most of it is not too far from reality. It’s a heady mixture and one which frequently pays off. The trickiness of dealing with the sensitive subject of race is tackled head on and with no little humour - trite aphorisms about tolerance and looking beneath the skin are constantly rehashed and recycled, even borrowing lyrics from an En Vogue song at one point, as the difficulties of verbalising what racial identity really means and just how important it actually is are thrown under the spotlight. So from the Miss Saigon debacle, we move to a farcical scenario where DHH gets involved in his own casting scandal when he employs a white actor as an Asian in one of his own plays, trying to pass him off as a man with Siberian Jewish descent and unwittingly creating a faux ethnic crossover superstar in the process. And latterly we watch a financial scandal envelop his banker father with its uncomfortably institutionalised anti-Chinese rhetoric, a much more serious strand to the drama and one which ultimately feels the most compelling. The play does take a while to get there though, Hwang mocks his own self-indulgent tendencies in the text, and it is hard not to feel that some judicious trimming could make this into a shorter yet more intense interval-free experience. That said, there’s much to enjoy in Alex Sims’ committed production, staged in the round with Lily Arnold’s simple but effective design. Kevin Shen makes a remarkably assured stage debut as an engaging and frequently bemused DHH, and the remaining six actors rattle through a vast array of supporting characters with quick-changing verve. Ben Starr is excellent as Marcus Gee, the corn-fed American who somehow becomes the biggest new star in the Asian community; Christy Meyer is sizzling as a calculating journalist determined to play on perceived notions of patriotism to get the scoop; and Gemma Chan and Davina Perera also both impress. At a time when people are quick (maybe too quick) to jump on any comment that might display racial intolerance, Yellow Face offers a fascinating opportunity to look at the situation from the inside and question what one holds as acceptable or otherwise. It may not be a perfect piece of drama but it is certainly one of the most thought-provoking right now. Running time: 2 hours 15 minutes (with interval) Programme cost: £2.50 Booking until 16th June Originally written for The Public Reviews

777 Theatre, Off Broadway By Joseph Samuel Wright BOTTOM LINE: A gut-buster about gut-blasting, its infectious music and a fabulous cast make Spandex a good-time musical that delivers just that. In the new musical Spandex, the hilarity is no stretch. This power ballad-packed two hours of self discovery and aerobics will get your heart pumping and your toes tapping. In Spandex, every person has the chance to be the best you you can be, and you’ll leave the theatre wrapped tight in that same sentiment. Lorraine (Sims Lamason) and Tripp (Jaquez Sims) where Olympians together where she choked and he medaled, now Tripp runs an aerobics empire and Lorraine is its underappreciated heart. Housewife Linda (Jerielle Morwitz) is neglected by her husband (Brian Drummy) and eclipsed by her family’s needs until she joins Lorraine’s class and learns that with aerobics anyone can fly. Meanwhile Tripp wants to expand his business by launching a line of questionable diet pills, and newcomer Israeli fitness guru Dov (Will Boyajian) makes a pilgrimage to Tripp’s gym and falls for Lorraine. Things get messy when Linda’s newfound sense of self threatens her marriage, Lorraine goes toe-to-toe with Tripp over his dangerous dolls, and Dov tries to win Lorraine’s heart. All comes to a head at the 1987 Crystal Light National Aerobics Championship hosted by Alan Thicke. (Can you imagine a better finale? It’s stunning.)

For years now, the sociologist Richard Florida has been preaching that young people in what he calls the creative class don’t want to just sit back and be fed their culture, they want to get all up in it. And now it seems that theater producers are taking heed. For the most buzzed about shows of the past couple of months have, in one way or another, followed this formula: •Hire a comely cast of young actors (see above) •Put them in a musical with a rock-inflected score. •Stir in a some melodrama and a little bit of sex. •Make the audience a part of the action •Spike the mixture with booze (optional). And voilà you’ve got Here Lies Love, the David Byrne-Fatboy Slim disco musical about Imelda Marcos that is packing them in down at the Public Theater (click here to see my review) or Natasha, Pierre and The Great Comet of 1812, the electro-pop adaptation of a segment of “War and Peace,” that I talked about on Wednesday (click here for my review of it). Now come Murder Ballad, the love-gone-wrong rock musical that opened at Union Square Theatre this week and, to a lesser extent, Bull, the non-singing but still we're-all-in-this-together drama about office politics that’s playing through June 2 as part of the Brits off Broadway series at 59E59 Theaters. Murder Ballad had an earlier run at Manhattan Theatre Club that drew mixed reviews but struck the right chord with New York Times critic Ben Brantley, which probably played a large part in its move downtown. I think the thing that turned off the other critics is that the show is basically just another riff on the old “Frankie and Johnny” story about cheating lovers. The main lovers in this version are the can’t-live-with-‘em-can’t-live-without-‘em couple Sara and Tom. When they break up soon after the show begins, Sara meets, marries and tries to build a life with nice guy Michael. Then, as the character called the Narrator tells us, Sara bumps into and starts an affair with Tom and all hell begins to break loose. The music for this 80-minute, sung-through melodrama was composed by Juliana Nash, the frontwoman for the '90s band Talking to Animals, who also co-wrote the lyrics with the show’s book writer Julia Jordan. I can’t honestly say that I remember any of the songs but I had a good time listening to them while I was there and it is great fun to see women proving that they can write rock music just as hard charging as the next leather-panted guy. The cast doesn’t hold back either. Will Swenson usually strikes me as a self-conscious performer, never really at ease in the skin of whatever character he's portraying but that quality works perfectly for the insecure Tom. Plus Swenson is dandy eye candy. Meanwhile, John Ellison Conlee is winningly sympathetic as the cuckolded Michael. But it’s the women who really rock. Rebecca Naomi Jones’ bad-girl sexiness and powerhouse pipes make the Narrator the most charismatic onstage storyteller since the Master of Ceremonies in Cabaret (click here to read an interview with her). And Caissie Levy brings a leavening touch of innocence to Sara’s wantonness. Levy also deserves kudos for getting up to speed with her cast mates after being called in to take over the role from Karen Olivo who played Sara in the earlier production (click here to read about how Levy pulled it off). The real star of the show, though, is director Trip Cullum's hip staging, which turns part of the theater into the dive bar that Tom owns (the rest of the audience sits in a horseshoe around the playing area). Cullum has the actors weaving in and out of the tables, sometimes singing directly to audience members and even jumping up on a table or two. Doug Varone’s choreography goes all out too. And special shout-outs must also go to lighting designer Ben Stanton and sound designer Leo

Even if you hate “environmental theater,” how could you not want to see some of the  ideas that all of you guys came up with? I mean . . .Xanadu in a roller rink . . . West Side Story on a playground on the, well, the West Side, of course . . . The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas in a, ahem, you know what. You can read the rest of the great and hysterical suggestions here. But for the winner, I went with . . . wait for it . . . Floyd Collins . . . in a Cave! Congratulations, Stephen!  You win, scoring points for choosing a more obscure show, and setting it in a sound designer’s dream.  I mean, those acoustics! Email me and I’ll set up your tickets. Make sure you check in for tomorrow’s giveaway.  It’s got a $1,000 value! (Got a comment? I love ‘em, so comment below! Email Subscribers, click here then scroll down to say what’s on your mind!) _ _ FUN STUFF: - Play our Tony Pool and you can win an iPad.  Click here to enter and win! - Only 44 performances of Macbeth remain!  Get tix.

It’s got a pretty catchy title and it is at the awesome Finborough Theatre in Earl’s Court…if this is not enough to entice you to enter this competition to win a pair of tickets to see the show, then the blurb below is sure to secure the deal. Scroll down to see how to enter. Nothing is the End of the World (except the end of the world) By Bekah Brunstetter Directed by Max Pappenheim Designed by Susannah Henry Finborough Theatre 21st May- 8th June “In middle school, my parents dressed me in nothing but pro-life t-shirts with fetuses on them. I’m discovering it’s a hard rep to shake.” In the near-distant future, a New York City charter school becomes the first to welcome artificially intelligent students – but an ever-present reality show film crew doesn’t help things go smoothly. From Jessica, the student body president, who never wants to fail, ever; to Kit, who’s solid, athletic, and trapped; to Danny, a theatre nerd (the very good kind), now really isn’t a good time to take part in ‘documented partially scripted reality television’. Suddenly priorities and moralities turn inside out as the androids try to integrate, the students try to help them integrate, and everyone tries to survive junior year. finboroughtheatre.co.uk Enter the competition To win a pair of tickets to any night before the end of the run, simply fill in the form below or re-tweet this tweet by 5.00pm on Saturday 1 June. Subject to availability; terms and conditions apply. [contact-form-7] The post Competition: Win tickets to Nothing is the End of the World (except the end of the world) at the Finborough Theatre appeared first on A Younger Theatre.

Incredibly difficult to watch, Belarus Free Theatre’s Trash Cuisine is a hard-hitting and haunting 90 minutes that will stay with you long after you leave the theatre. Introduced as “a cook’s tour of the Globe”, the uniformly superb company use food, cooking and eating as a route into discussing human rights abuses and atrocities the world over. It’s a surprisingly funny show some of the time, although a large amount of the giggling feels nervous, but the touches of humour also serve to highlight the horror that the cast discuss and depict on stage. Having spent time travelling and talking to people, it’s truly chilling to know that all of the stories shown on stage are true, from the breath-stoppingly awful story of a Tutsi woman in Rwanda, to the casual execution of political prisoners in Russia and the bleak mundanity of the death penalty in the USA. The use of movement is distressing and dark, saying what words sometimes struggle to do; the movement sequences articulate the awful things that human beings do to each other in subtle and shifting ways. As the lighting switches suddenly and repeatedly from gloom to dazzling, interrogating light, Belarus Free Theatre foreground the things that we usually try not to think about. They don’t shy away from brutality – cast members are stripped, bound, manhandled – but the violence is never allowed to feel gratuitous. Even a water-boarding scene, carried out live onstage, feels vital, despite being awful to watch. Amongst these scenes of abuse and torture, there are quiet moments where the statistics are allowed to speak for themselves, to great effect. The numbers (of political prisoners, of years spent in prison, of murdered Tutsis, of people who’ve “disappeared”) are powerful in their context without any additional trappings. What’s so impressive about Trash Cuisine, apart from its boldness, is its scope. The USA comes in for just as much criticism over its use of the death penalty as any other country, and death-by-electric-chair is explored in upsetting detail. Parts of the performance are gut-churningly awful to watch and genuinely horrific. I’m pretty sure I stopped breathing at one point. But the trust that the performers show each other makes the piece confrontational without being alienating – it lectures and provokes without ever patronising or preaching. If the last scene is a touch long, well, one can’t help but feel that Belarus Free Theatre have earned the right to hammer their point home. An intensely powerful piece of theatre, Trash Cuisine is brutal, bold and brilliant. Trash Cuisine is at the Tobacco Factory in Bristol as part of Mayfest. For more information and tickets, visit the Mayfest website. The post Mayfest review: Trash Cusine appeared first on A Younger Theatre.

Risk-averse? Us? No, no no. As recently as a few years ago the Whingers went white water rafting (well, brown water rafting, really) and only weeks ago went on Stealth at Thorpe Park (although Andrew did have to exercise a little last minute cajoling to get Phil on board). Obviously they survived to tell the tale, though had Phil not plumped for quad-biking in the dunes over Andrew’s suggestion of skydiving in Namibia it may well have been an entirely different story. Perhaps the Whingers have Phil’s fumbling in the recesses of cautiousness to thank for their longevity. Generally though the Whingers’ risk-taking is limited to parting with money for untried, untested shows or, ipso facto, anything at the now defunct Cottesloe Theatre. But since its temporary replacement, The Shed, was offering “a unique theatrical experience featuring mind reading, levitation and, if you’re brave enough to stay for it, the most notorious finale in show business.” they just had to be there. And when Rob Drummond asked for volunteers for his entertainment both waved their hands eagerly – like swots at the back of the class wishing to impress Sir – hoping it might be one of their fingers on the trigger in “a stunt so dangerous Houdini refused to attempt it, the Bullet Catch has claimed the lives of at least 12 people since its conception in 1613.” Oh yes, we both reached for The gun, the gun, the gun, the gun. Sadly, we weren’t selected. Drummond whittled down his potential assistants with a series of qualifying questions until “Have you had one too many drinks?” did for us.  Unfortunately the woman who joined him on stage was supremely relaxed and self-assured on stage (how unlike Phil when he assisted Paul Daniels). Did Drummond spot a quality in her that was lacking in the Whingers? Now, of course, we NEVER talk during a performance but Phil just had to hiss to Andrew “She’s an actress”. And so it proved. Or at least she was until she eschewed the stage for banking. Once an actress always an actor actress, no wonder she confessed her ambition to return to theatre. Her on-stage poise rather worked against this performance. Some may have thought she was a stooge. Not us. We’ve seen many of these tricks – or variations of – before. Some are mind-boggling; we have no idea how he does the mind-reading stunts, a word chosen at random from a pile of books or the details of an important memory from life that she was asked to remember. He also offers us the chance to see how he does his levitation trick. Andrew was one of those raising his hand when the audience were offered the chance not to be party to its secret explaining when asked why by the illusionist that he “wanted to maintain the wonder of it”. So Andrew covered his eyes as the mystery was silently “revealed”. Phil kept his open (unlike at the 205 ft top of Stealth), though he isn’t at all convinced we weren’t really shown how the effect was actually achieved; it seemed too obvious. The build up to the finale was a roller coaster of anticipation. Drummond increased the tension by offering us the chance to leave or again cover our eyes. One woman buried her face in lap the of the person sitting next to her. We assume they knew each other. When the moment came it was, of course, all over very quickly. A bullet is so small we had to rely on the ex-actress to assure us the one “caught in his teeth” was the same marked one. There were too many opportunities to switch it. For us it proved something of a damp squib. Whilst Drummond has a likeable low-key stage persona, there’s a bit too much time wasted in the build up, too many times when the volunteer has to read out passages  (it’s just as well we weren’t selected, the print on the papers she had to read from looked too small for us to run our unsteady fingers along it

Review of the Wednesday, May 22 matinee at the Broadhurst Theatre in New York City. Starring Tom Hanks, Peter Gerety, Richard D. Masur, Christopher McDonald, Peter Scolari, Maura Tierney, and Courtney B. Vance. A new play by Nora Ephron. Directed by George C. Wolfe. 2 hours 10 minutes, including intermission. Closes July 3.Grade: CI never thought in a million years that I'd write anything with the words "Tom Hanks" and "disappointment" in the same sentence. But here we are. Despite a worthy stage performance by film icon Tom Hanks, the new play Lucky Guy by the late Nora Ephron was an enormous disappointment. One has to wonder, in all fairness, how different the play would be had Ms. Ephron lived to see the production and work on her play in previews. And I have to respect that the creative team pretty much left the work as is out of respect for the playwright. But, as it stands, the play comes across more like a series of movie cues with general notes like, "Mike and wife have a gentle argument over anonymous call." Unfortunately, what works in screenwriting or on the written page in general does not translate to the stage or live performance. The overall result is that Ephron (and director George C. Wolfe) has a play that does the worst thing a play can do: 95% of it tells us everything we need to know, while only 5% of it shows us. Ah well, it is what it is.Tom Hanks and Maura Tierney So what did I learn from Lucky Guy? Generally, that news reporters are a loud, foul-mouthed bunch, with a fierce loyalty to each other, until the shit really hits the fan, then they jump ship like the rest of us would have. Specifically, that famous New York columnist Mike McAlary was the loudest of them all, hungry for a story, a lead, anything that uncovers the uglier side of the city that he loves and that is his bread and butter. He has his professional ups and downs - including the ultimate "I won't reveal my sources" show down that is the staple of all newsroom dramas. And he has personal ups and downs - his home life faces the typical challenges when work seems to always take precedence over family, and he wages a triumphant battle over a deadly form of cancer. It is no wonder they got Tom Hanks to play this role - when the inevitable (and hopefully much better) film is made, he can make room for another Oscar on his mantle. To his credit, Hanks makes the most of what he is given, entirely at ease on stage, and giving his adoring fans everything they want. Heck, there are even a few minutes when he gets to channel a version of the guy he played in Philadelphia. Those few moments, coupled with a brief second when he has a heart-to-heart with his wife (an otherwise bored looking and oh-so-bland Maura Tierney), show us what could have been. The reporters at the bar...The reporters at the office...Otherwise, the remaining two hours traffic on the stage, is a series of narration bits followed by brief scenes of dialogue that usually lead to a joke. (Picture a film with rapid, cross-cut scenes, and a voice over.) As the stage is filled with actors I am familiar with, I was able to distinguish between the inebriated newspaper hacks that populate the stage in various pools of light (designed by Jules Fisher and Peggy Eisenhauer) as they bark out the series of events that make up the plot. If I didn't know who Peter Scolari, Christopher McDonald and Richard Masur were already, I wouldn't have been able to distinguish between any of the reporters. They all play real life reporters, but I couldn't tell you one thing about any of them as individuals. Not even when, at the end, there is a "roll call of death" where those that have passed announce their demise as the projections (designed by Batwin + Robin) give us their epitaphs. Clearly designed to make us shed a tear or two, I was left dry (as was everyone around me as a matter of fact) and not feeling a whole lot more than a sense of relief that it was almost over.Tom Hanks

Kenneth Gentry, founder and acting chief executive officer of NETworks Presentations LLC has announced the addition of Orin Wolf to the company's executive staff. Effective July 1, Wolf will act as t