Outside Waterstone’s in Newcastle, young women wearing clothes with flashes of pink, are queuing to see Katie Price signing copies of her new novel. The former glamour model, who is also known as Jordan, experiments with different identities, and she could be described as an independent woman making it on her own in the savage and brutal world of a celebrity-focused culture. About 100 yards away from…
Read more As You Like It (Theatre Royal Newcastle, 24th October 2009)
I wouldn’t say that this was gripping theatre and some of the effects were just a little bit cliched. All those flashing lights on the white set with phrases about life in the 1980s such as ‘Greed is Good’ and ‘Material Girl’ and all that music from the 80s that was about power and material items,…
Read more The Black Album (West Yorkshire Playhouse, 21st October 2009)
There are the groups of young women trying to recreate their summer holidays in Ibiza dressed in their short dresses without a jacket or coat, alongside other revellers out to have fun after working hard all week. This is the familiar Friday night in York, but they are joined by the families wrapped up well against the creeping autumnal chill. They all move down…
Read more Illuminating York (York City Centre, 23rd October)
This was a very well-played piece, which worked beautifully in York Theatre Royal studio space. The thing with Beckett is that you find yourself laughing when you feel maybe you shouldn’t. A member of the audience felt that he has to leave early because he had a fit of giggles at the start of the performance, but…
Read more Krapp's Last Tape (York Theatre Royal, Friday 23rd October 2009)
I am starting to feel that I am becoming addicted to review broadcasts and reading reviews in newspapers. The addiction includes watching my favourite programme, The Culture Show and making sure Newsnight Review has been recorded on Sky + to watch later in the week. My keenness for reviews also includes listening to Radio Four’s Front Row and Saturday Review, as…
Read more Addicted to reviews…
I saw some excellent theatre this week. Having seen The Caucasian Chalk Circle in Leeds, The Trial in York earlier in the week and now Punk Rock in Manchester, I feel that I have experienced the best of theatre and what’s great is that it isn’t all happening in London. When I read on notices around…
Read more Punk Rock (Manchester Royal Exchange Theatre, 11th October 2009)
As I stand outside York Theatre Royal in the chill of the evening, I have no idea where I am going. The interval crowd from Equus has inhabited the foyer bar and it is clear that Belt Up’s The Trial will not be using the front of stage of the Theatre Royal as mentioned on my ticket. …
Read more The Trial (York Theatre Royal, 8th October 2009)
I really enjoyed this production of Brecht’s play at the West Yorkshire Playhouse and the Quarry Theatre was an ideal venue for this big production with a choir on stage. There was that sense of a theatrical event that the National Theatre were trying to achieve with their production of Mother Courage, but none of…
Read more The Caucasian Chalk Circle (West Yorkshire Playhouse 9th October 2009)
I failed miserably in my attempt to read all the Booker novels before the winner was announced. I manged to read Sarah Walters The Little Stranger and J.M Coetzee Summertime. However, I think I’ll plod on and read the other four as soon as I can. I normally buy the shortlist when they are in…
Read more On the Booker Prize (Tuesday October 6th 2009)
I have seen Belt Up before, but only in the Studio space at York Theatre Royal. In their energetic production of The Tartuffe, the company of young actors, use the whole of the auditorium and stage of the main house to great effect. The audience loved this production, which explored the idea of playing and theatre,…
Read more The Tartuffe (York Theatre Royal, 2nd October 2009)
Julie Raby 