Uncategorized – Page 8 – Live Art Alive

Letters to Windsor House

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By Sh!t Theatre

This the very best kind of pick and mix entertainment. Someone else on stage doing the karaoke, social and political commentary that never seeks to preach and an open letterbox giving a candid view of life for those at the more vulnerable end of the renting crisis in London.

Rebecca Biscuit and Louise Mothersole are Sh!t Theatre and this is their very personal experience of renting a sh!t flat in Windsor House, Hackney, North London. They share this two bedroom council flat with their friend Ruth who plans to move out to a houseboat and with Reggie the cat. The cramped space includes a pigeon sh!t splattered balcony and a hallway which has been converted to a makeshift garden. They pay nearly £500 each per month but have no contract so have no real security to safely call this home, especially when their curiosity reveals they are actually renting a sublet council flat.

Curled up on a sh!tty sofa as the audience walk in these best friends chat, sprawl and break into song just as they probably do around their home. The set also includes a disco ball, a cheery cotton rug and a pile of cardboard boxes. A projection screen is on the wall behind them with front of stage their mike stands connected to a loop pedal and two red cardboard post boxes.

Everything happens on stage in an endearing way that seems both childishly haphazard and skilfully engineered to fill this hour to achieve maximum impact. Using photos and video they walk us out of their cramped home unto the streets of this N4 neighbourhood. There are noisy Romanian neighbours they do sonic battle with at 7am, there is the local chippy #hashtag Fish & Chips, and the sometimes very loud St Johns Deaf Centre. Windsor House is one of 4 regally named blocks of council flats behind which is The Finsbury Park Homeless Family Project. Images of this rundown and depressing area appear on screen accompanied by a slick voiceover selling the merits of the new kids on the block. Woodberry Park is the second new private development to sit on the foundations of the old council estates now demolished. These new properties are not for local families but are glossy six figure luxury flats with gyms and 24 hour concierge facilities.

Becca and Louise film themselves viewing a home they are unlikely to ever own as they are part of Generation rent. This is a moment where they fantasise about cushions in a £925,000 apartment. Back in their flat where the thin walls allow them no illusions about each others personal habits there is an ever growing sense of desperation about their future and an ever growing mound of mail representing the past lives of previous tenants.

It is human nature to be curious and often to prevaricate. Sh!t Theatre do both very well. Thanks to a quaint legal loophole they can start opening the mail. Like all our Christmases together the letters reveal colourful hints of other lives lived in Windsor House. A kaleidoscope of song, dance and social media feeds reveal Rob Jecock the adult baby or grief stricken single father, Daisy Murray and her magazine loving dad and Saad Madras who gambles his way into debt with the Turkish mafia. They buy aspirational shirts from catalogues like The House of Bruar. They cheerfully stalk their old neighbours in attempts to help them though no one appears to be interested in supporting or reassuring them re their own rental rights. In their search they are irrepressible singing silly songs, switching accents and clambering over sofas to build cardboard houses. This could have been an unholy mess.

There is a very different energy present when they break up their search to don the anonymity of their red cardboard post boxes. Here they read each other heartfelt personal letters from the sanctity of the post box as confessional. It is these moments which highlight the social housing crisis in a way that transcends shocking statistics. Ordinary loving friends who are both petrified of change and desperate to embrace new opportunities. Windsor House is for now both a refuge and a prison.

Postscript:

Ruth moves to a houseboat.

Becca moves out after a row.

Louise still lives in Windsor House.

Friendship survives.

Sh!t Theatre continues to develop new work.

The shirts from House of Bruar cost £65 each and are sh!t quality according to Louise.

The Tenant of Wildfell Hall

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The Bolton Octagon

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This was how I imagine dinner theatre might feel but without tables and without food. Anne Brontë wrote this gritty portrayal of married life in 1848 in which she spoke passionately about domestic abuse, alcoholism and women’s rights. Two hundred years on those issues are still relevant and still require our consideration, however a modern audience is perhaps much harder to shock. Deborah McAndrew has done a very effective job of adapting this weighty classic for the stage however it a solid rendering rather a stimulating and passionate portrayal.

Phoebe Pryce is very believable as the stoic and driven Helen. She is an intelligent and independent woman who is determined to shield her young son from the excesses of his fathers hedonistic lifestyle. The first half of the play sees her disguised as the widow Mrs Graham who in her desperation to remain hidden is so unsociable that she generates a storm of gossip and speculation in the quiet rural community around Wildfell. Prickly and intelligent she is a world away from the dull and vapid females who sip tea and delight in local gossip rather than art or literature.

In the second half we revisit her unhappy marriage through the device of her lovelorn suitor reading her diary. Here we see an immature young woman infatuated with her new husband the charming but dastardly Arthur played with aplomb by Marc Small. Unlike her friends Helen is not prepared to accept a bad marriage and escapes with her only financial security being her ability as a landscape artist. Set in the 1820s this is the act of a strong and deeply wounded women so it is difficult to believe either her quickly falling for another man or her choice to return to Grassdale Manor to nurse her ailing husband.

Gilbert Markham initially appears dull and dependable but is perhaps stifled by the society he is surrounded by – epitomising a man whose best friend truly is his dog. Michael Peavoy is well cast as the quietly handsome farmer who finds his love and admiration finally reciprocated. It is very telling that the rather fabulous Sancho the sheepdog is discarded in the second act as the farmer falls more deeply in love.

The other performances are all reliable and rise to the challenge of playing dual roles as the action moves to Grassdale Manor. The younger females are mainly either sweet and vapid or vindictive and petulant whereas the older women are bossy and opinionated or careworn and stoic. The menfolk are also a mixed bag of flawed characters. The local cleric stood out as adding a comedic element as an ale loving Irish buffoon. Colin Connor kept the audience amused though at times his performance felt too much like a nod to Ian Paisley and Mrs Brown.

The set was disappointing as the fake dry stone walls felt more suited to Wuthering Heights. The fire was a cosy touch of the safety of home and hearth but the move to portray Helens marital home felt lazy and did little to convey the luxury she gave up in order to have her independence.

It is a clever move to adapt a classic for the stage as it often acts to reassure a prospective audience that their investment of time and money is a safe one. This is especially apt as this piece still has a lot to say in modern society and it may create curiosity as it is written by the lesser known but most radical Brontë sister. Anne was only 29 when she died and this her last novel was published less than a year before her death. It was a brave and shocking novel for its time and after her sisters death Charlotte Brontë chose to suppress a proposed third edition citing the subject matter as inconsistent with her sisters “reserved and dejected nature”. Perhaps living in her own claustrophobic community with an opinionated Northern Irish cleric as a father and a carousing alcoholic for a brother she had good reason to feel dejected and frustrated. Like her heroine she sought financial independence through her own artistic abilities so thumbs up to Deborah McAndrew and Artistic Director Elizabeth Newman for allowing her to speak to a new audience.

At The Bolton Octagon until April 22nd, then touring.

The People Are Singing

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Royal Exchange Theatre Studio

Text by LIZZIE NUNNERY

Directed by TAMARA TRUNOVA

This new work by Lizzie Nunnery makes for uneasy viewing. We flinch as 12 year old Irina plays with a skipping rope that seems to scourge her flesh. As she chalks out Hopscotch or bounces over rope we reconnect with the universality of play. Mother and child are hungry and vulnerable. Songs, games and rituals are all that hold them to sanity in a mad world where no one can be trusted and nothing is quite what it seems.

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Cora Kirk is wonderful as the young Irina. She is on stage throughout the performance and handles this demanding role with apparent ease. The characters are well chosen to give a sense of fighters – Mikhailo (Sam Redway) the embittered and disillusioned revolutionary and Dima (Graeme Hawley) who is excellent as the Russian soldier who is a loving father turned monster by this war. The other women embody mothers driven mad by war. Katya (Chloe Massey) is the stoic mother feeding her starving child imaginary Borsch and Olena (Kate Coogan) as a grief stricken woman who has watched her son die in a landmine explosion.

The use of physical theatre is wonderful and there are some very deft moments – especially the use of the elastic rope. In the yellow and blue of the Ukrainian flag it allows some great moments on stage while cleverly reminding the audience of how pliable our sense of truth and physical borders can be.

The creative staging allows the actors to conceal themselves in a range of ways. The sliding doors illuminated with church candles serves to move the actors on and off the stage while evoking a candle lit heaven or hell for the dead.

The use of song and music is central to Nunnery’s work. The singing of Russian and Ukrainian folk songs move the story along and give a sense of history and national pride. The tragedy for mankind is when our songs no longer fits our borders. What survives? Do we write new songs or sing the old ones louder?

This World Stages project brings together Nunnery and Ukrainian director Trunova gathering stories from the local Ukrainian community. They share a passion for story telling and the desire to give a voice to marginalised people. The themes of who we are in wartime and what choices we make when struggling to survive are prevalent in this piece. This is a brave production with a lot to say. There are some standout moments however it requires some editing especially towards the end where it risks becoming muddled and losing its focus. A case of too many ingredients in an excellent Borsch.