The Grass is Greener

‘The Grass is Greener’ is undeniably a slick, polished, well acted and aesthetically pleasing production. The script is competent throughout and funny in parts, and although there are occasional comic gems and tastefully set up gags, it is a muted comedy style which is particular to the 50s when it was written and set. Unfortunately, this dated feel extends throughout the piece, and there is a pervasive sense of the inaccessible, elitist and rather antiquated style and subject matter of traditional theatre: the universality of enumerable other classic plays is sadly lacking.
Although the script is somewhat moralistic, with the clear maxim that marriage is for better or worse, it treads quite lightly, and so avoids having many eye rolling moments. Nonetheless, once the situation of the impoverished English Lord’s wife falling in love with the American oil millionaire is set up, it is apparent that the plot could only result in a couple of outcomes, and the denouement feels slightly inevitable, without any real sense of excitement or tension. The actors are all strong and polished in their roles, with Liza Goddard and Christopher Cazenove delivering particularly good performances as Lord and Lady of the manor. This may be due to the fact that they are the only fleshed-out roles, next to the stereotypes of the butler, rich American and high-society diva.
A polished production with a rather irrelevant script, it is a shame that pieces of theatre with so much money thrown at them cannot be innovative or important in the context of their contemporary society. ‘The Grass is Greener’ feels sadly representative of the world of mainstream theatre: catering for a well off, elderly audience who are the only ones willing and able to pay en masse the extraordinarily high ticket prices of venues such as the Theatre Royal.

David Hoyle

As I was leaving the venue after the show, I overheard several people saying “that was excellent,” and, as I paused outside, I couldn’t help feeling uneasy about those words. I don’t know how I felt (and still don’t), but excellent?

There was an intimacy between David and much of the audience; however, like entering a clique, one either left initiated, or not. David is brutally open about himself: like a character from a Wes Anderson film, he was able to articulate himself with an exactitude that was frightening. Because of this, one cannot help but have a moral reaction to David and the show – he gives and we take, with an alarming immediacy. Excellent?! I wandered the streets and felt bad for disagreeing.

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Rocky Horror Show

Alright I admit it: I’m a Rocky Horror virgin. I have neither seen the stage show nor watched the film. I have in short completely bypassed the alleged brilliance of the Rocky Horror experience.  When people hear about this they seem surprised, even shocked.  It’s like admitting that you’ve never seen a Tarantino film (something I was guilty of until fairly recently) or that you’ve never once felt the inclination to read a Harry Potter book. I also happened to be going alone to the Brighton performance, having only managed to get one press ticket, The Badger being not important enough to garner a plus one.

Some anxiety then accompanied my anticipation of the evening.  Would it be sadder to dress up in Rocky Horror costume, and go alone, or dress normally but be surrounded by groups in fancy dress, therefore betraying my virginal status?  A quick internet search proved to be alarming.  Apparently it was fine, as a first timer, to dress normally but I was likely to be asked if I was virgin and then subjected to some kind of initiation ritual.  Eeek.  Further perusal of websites informed me that I had to bring toast, rice and newspaper to the event, to throw on stage as part of the audience’s participation in the show.  Confused and overwhelmed,   I arrived  a few hours later at the Theatre Royal, normally attired but wearing red lipstick and uncomfortable high heels, with a small packet of rice in my bag, just in case.

Since having never seen the Rocky Horror Show this review is being written from the perspective of a first time goer, perhaps a disadvantage for a show that revolves  around an audience’s familiarity with the script.  So forgive me if the things that I remark upon seem wildly self evident to Rocky Horror veterans.

The pace of the show seemed initially slow at first;  although the excited audience eagerly shouted out ‘asshole’  and ‘slut’ whenever Brad and Janet appeared,  and the narrator proved to be none another than Christopher Biggins in predictably fine form, I was left initially underwhelmed.  Even the advent of the Time Warp failed to get things going, with only a few members of the audience jumping up to sing along.

This all changed, however, with the entrance of Dr Frank N. Furter. Played with brilliantly salacious glee by David Bedella, he utterly dominated  and enlivened the performance, embodying all that was gloriously smutty and extrovert  about the show.  Favourite moments of mine included the glove gag with Magenta, and the (very rude) bed scene with Brad and Janet.

I suspect that quite a few of the audience were virgins, as the level of audience participation never quite reached the pitch of frenzy that I’d been told to expect.  There was also no mention of toast or newspaper, and the rice remained in my bag (where it spilt, incidentally).  Nevertheless  by the close of the show  virtually everyone  was up on their feet, (I even managed a passable time warp dance) and the cast received a standing ovation  from hundreds of faux Frank N. Furters, Rockys and Magentas in the audience.  All in all I thoroughly enjoyed myself.  After all, who wouldn’t want to watch a glisteningly muscled young man prance about in skimpy leopard  print underwear?

Sutherland steals the show

I was admittedly not in the most receptive of moods to listen to poetry that evening. I was tired from working all day and, because of the short notice nature of the tickets, failed to bring someone along with me. Thus I was at eight o’clock in the evening sitting rather dolefully alone at the table nursing a drink. Perhaps because of that it was difficult at first to engage myself and listen to the poetry. Nevertheless I endeavoured to rouse my sluggish faculties and was rewarded with an entertaining evening of poetry varied in nature, tone and delivery.

Desperate for Love, a regular event at Komedia studio bar showcases the poetic talents of various wordsmiths. Tonight’s offerings included the likes of Neil Palmer, Sophie Robinson, Wolfy Jones, Alan Hay, Gary Goodman and the University of Sussex own Keston Sutherland. The YouTube clip of the latter reading his poem ‘Hot White Andy’ might be familiar to some, (although I confess not to me until I had googled Sutherland.)

The first half of the evening contained a number of small readings from Wolfy Jones, Gary Goodman and Alan Hay, ones which, if I’m honest, bypassed me in my post-work apathy. Longer pieces by Neil Palmer and Sophie Robinson proved to be more engaging. I enjoyed the calm tones of Palmer’s ‘Hillwaking’, a poem akin to a philosophical conversation, as well as the evocations of intimacy and loss in Robinson’s poetry.

What distinguished the evening for me however was the striking singularity and strangeness of Keston Sutherland’s reading; one that, in contrast to the others could truly be described as a performance, characterized by an agitated intensity, replete with jarring stops and starts, odd explosions of noise. I couldn’t tell whether Sutherland’s body language, twitchy, squirmy and jittery, apparent even as he walked onto the stage and prepared to read was affected as part of the performance, or evidence of genuine anxiety, (something that he confessed to the audience as the

result of having to read from a new collection). Whatever it was, the performance was one that was compelling and almost draining to watch in its intensity, an excellent conclusion to the evening.

Pass me a pillow, man

It’s never an encouraging sign when you start to a wish that a play would hurry along or, as I did, nearly doze off. There is potential for The Pillow Man to be a compelling theatrical experience, as amply demonstrated by the numerous awards it has garnered in other productions. However the performance that I attended at the Little Theatre proved to be disappointing.

McDonagh’s play centres around the figure of Katurian, a writer living in

a fictional totalitarian state who has come under suspicion of committing a number of child murders due to the startling resemblance they bear to the ones that figure prominently in his short stories. The play poses probing questions about concepts of narratives and reality; interrogating

the human compulsion to use stories to shape and frame our existence, the ambiguous delineation between fiction and reality, the uncertainty and instability of truth and meaning. The grisly tales of Katurian form the core around which the play revolves.

At the beginning of his interview with two detectives Katurian repeatedly protests that his stories mean nothing, that he has nothing to say: ‘I just tell stories’ yet it becomes increasingly apparent as the play progresses that Katurian’s narratives exert a far more potent influence than his initial denial may have suggested. The play seems propelled by the urge to interpret events through a narrative, reflecting the way in which people seek stories as a means of understanding and shaping their experiences; we see this reflected in how at the very end of the play after the final action, the main character returns to retell the previous minutes, as if to suggest that the event only becomes real once it has been shaped into a narrative.

The Pillow Man appears to be a play that tackles its subjects with impressive sophistication and complexity, however much of this is negated by the productions amateurish and clunky interpretation of the work. Small errors included the cliched ‘portentous’ music pumped out of the speakers before and after every scene, while larger ones revolved chiefly around the quality of acting. Crimes included an overly mannered and melodramatic performance from Katurian, ‘Acting’ as opposed to just

‘acting’. Especially grating were his frequent, false sounding sobs, which I began to tired of five minutes into the performance. Much of the interaction between all of the cast seemed stilted and unbelievable, in particular the relationship between Katurian and his brother, Michael. However, the production did exploit the rich vein of heavy dark humour that The Pillow Man is liberally doused with. The more successful moments of interaction between the actors and better moments in the play overall

occurred during the blackly comic banter between the two policeman .

A more professional and accomplished production would have made better work of Mcdonagh’s play.

Valentine’s date with a twist…?

For those who fancy something a little bit different from the normal Valentine’s Day date, the world of performance has a lot to offer come 14th of February!
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It’s business time…

Loved up? Single? In between? Whatever your Facebook relationship status, the Badger arts team have found the best music, films and nights out to accompany your Valentine’s Day.
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Brighton arts this year…

What do we have to look forward to in 2009? The Badger Arts team have decided to impart a little of their wisdom in three bitesize portions:

• Perfomance
• Music
• Film

Performance (Brighton arts this year…)

2009 is set to be a good year for performance in Brighton, with a whole variety of shows rolling into town. Tamsin Greig (of Black Books and Green Wing fame) will be starring in Gethsemane at the Theatre Royal in April, a show which has been described as ‘the despairing cry of a socialist romantic at the managerial pragmatism of modern government and at the separation of politics from vision’ (Guardian, November ‘08). Although this may sound like a mouthful it promises to be an interesting and gripping exploration of the shortcomings of modern day politics. Read more

Short Fuse: Literature review, Komedia

Komedia’s place as one of Brighton’s most interesting and varied venues is reinforced at the Halloween special of long-running fiction event ‘Short Fuse’. The audience was presented with a variety of short horror stories from some of Brighton’s best writing talent, which ranged from the sinister to the downright surreal. Read more

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