○Ompapapa! There's plenty of it, with just enough emphasis on Fagin as surrogate dad to suggest puns in this loudest of numbers. Oliver! After all, this is a show about families lost, restored, and invented. However, there is a lot of darkness swirling around there. London fog and rain falling outside the workhouse. The song, cut from the 1968 film, was delivered into the coffin with the joy of the Addams Family. Shanae Holmes as Nancy delivers “As Long as He Needs Me,” moments after Bill Sikes (a clenched Aaron Sidwell) punches her, with sobbing anger and frantic self-persuasion.
Many of Matthew Bourne's productions, first seen in Chichester last year, were glorious, celebrating the switchbacks of Lionel Bart's music and lyrics. It's proof of how much of a boon Bourne is to the stage. It's been over 30 years since I first choreographed. Oliver! And it was performed swan lake It revolutionized the way ballet and men themselves thought. He revisited both shows this year and made minor but effective changes.
Nancy and Sykes are given a new scene of them rolling around in bed, suggesting how she convinces herself that she has something to lose. After Sykes kills her, he howls. Bad, crazy, and sad. Force captures multiple prisoners. Cian Eagle Service puts his heart straight as a cruel and greedy orphan in “Where Is Love?” It wasn't a feeling of pity, it was a sadness that made me feel angry. The family here isn't just on stage. “Consider Yourself” reaches out to the audience with a rarely earned clap-along.
Stunning lighting by Paul Constable and Ben Jacobs shows the action as if through Oliver's eyes. A harsh gray glow can be seen above the workhouse. The deceptive golden glow of Fagin's lair. Lez Brotherston's busy brown Victorian stock design is unsurprisingly efficient. The vocal and visual movements are constant, and urchins are thrown like parcels. A solo that blends into the chorus. Oscar Conlon-Molly is the wonderful Bumble, the 'chubby husband' whose voice rocks the stage. Billy Jenkins, physically as well as morally bent, is as lithe and nimble as the artist Dodger, but his gaiety only fades when Bill is called a role model, a bad father.
And what about Fagin? Simon Lipkin is devouring and menacing, yet hardly evil. A colorful one-man band who waved their gloved fingers like puppets, like strolling players or hippie magicians. On the Wings of Klezmer, he's a great piper, but in the second half his purpose wanders, targeting the audience rather than his onstage companions (or himself). The temperature will drop. Until he leaves arm in arm with the Artful One. Father discovered. A member of the family.
Bernard Shaw claimed to have written it himself. devil's disciple As a 19th century melodrama skit. You failed again, Sho. Thanks to director Mark Gieser's clever reworkings, the play doesn't seem like a dramatic reversal. On the contrary, it feels alive to the world and politically astute. I would have approved of the paradoxical show as well.
Giesser transplanted the drama from 1777 to 1899 and changed its title to The Devil May Careand cancel the conversation. Various political movements, recent barbarities, Indian independence, waterboarding, etc. are covered. A major hint about the character's nature was changed with the show calling her Da-jung. But the central area of contention, the fight against colonization at home and abroad, remains the same. Due to the nature of the talk, a clever discussion with a twist follows. Sometimes this provokes the audience, and hopefully captures them – or perversely subverts their expectations. Sometimes it's a triumph of rationality over sloppy thinking.
Callum Woodhouse beautifully plays the man who takes pride in the sanctity of being the devil's disciple. An unprincipled person who is amiable and anarchic, overflowing with casual arrogance, and acts better than anyone else. An egoist who denies himself. He has strong support from Beth Burrows. A real Shabian woman is smarter than most men, but she is not allowed to appear so, and begins to tremble with righteous pity and ends up being shaken by emotion.
Rough but impressive, the act of stirring so many things around on a small stage may not quite capture one of the show's points, but it hints at it. He suggests that he wanted men to be “ruthlessly kind.” Everyone can be kind in emotional moments. ”
One of the biggest stories in recent days has been the theater, not the show. Michael Sheen has announced the creation of the National Theater of Wales, funded by Michael Sheen. This is good news. It's about starting anew, with Welsh writers and performers at the center. This is bad news. This is a response to the collapse of the National Theater of Wales, which lost Arts Council Wales funding last year. Sheen has Laurence Olivier's The National in mind as he prepares his first film, scheduled for next year. And the actor himself. He has just bought an artificial nose that fits Olivier's face at auction. Richard III.
Star rating (out of 5)
Oliver! ★★★★
The Devil May Care ★★★