Royal Exchange Theatre – Live Art Alive

NO PAY? NO WAY!

Katherine Pearce and Samantha Power.
Image credit: Johan Persson

Written by Dario Fo and Franca Rame in a new version by Marieke Hardy

Directed by Bryony Shanahan

ROYAL EXCHANGE THEATRE

We are in a cost of living crisis with strikes becoming our everyday norm and inflation seemingly spiralling out of control. Our NHS is haemorrhaging staff and needing more than just life support. Post-Brexit Britain is a joke in the eyes of our European cousins and on the World Stage. Our current government is utterly self-serving and increasingly more fascist. So no time like now for our Royal Exchange to stage the anarchic farce that is NO PAY? NO WAY! Written in the Seventies by world renowned Italian playwright Dario Fo and his wife Franca Rame; this new version by Marieke Hardy was first performed in Sydney in February 2020. Bryony Shanahan could have opted for her last production of this season to be something earnest and sensitive but in choosing this gloriously silly and madcap farce she has struck the perfect mood for so many of us. This a production that celebrates the ridiculous and the absurd while packing in a powerful political rallying call against poverty and injustice.

Cécile Trémolières has created a high energy, hugely entertaining set filled with bright colours, divided up by orange pipes with exits and entrances composed of bright yellow slides and round metal tunnels. It evokes a sense of childlike exuberance that is reminiscent of a scene from Super Mario Brothers blended with the playfulness of early Eighties French cinema. Everything has a cartoonish element from the costume design with actor’s roles spelled out on t-shirts to the fun packaging of foodstuffs. The periscope adds to the sense of industrial workers living in the underbelly of society despite being the very foundation of the economy.

Katherine Pearce as Margarita.
Image credit: Johan Persson

The cast of five work as a tight unit making the slapstick, madcap humour flow seamlessly. They hit all the right beats and keep the pacing of the original play while balancing the new writing in a manner that celebrates Dario Fo while staying fresh and relevant in all its topical references. Samantha Power as Antonia delivers a powerhouse performance as she fizzes with the thrill of revolution and liberating bagfuls of groceries from the local supermarket. Her deft wrong footing of her beleagured hubby resembles a Premier goalscorer as she deflects his concerns and persuades him into believing the most ludicrous suggestions. Katherine Pearce delights as the younger, initially more reticent wife who ends up having to fake a pregnancy to hide the stolen groceries. She really hits her stride in the second act as her character grows in confidence and her anger and desperation yields a polemic speech that ricocheted through the theatre.

The male characters pontificate loudly but in the hands of Marieke Hardy and Director Bryony Shanahan they are as easily outwitted by the women as they have been molded by management. Roger Morlidge gives a gorgeous performance as Giovanni providing a solid foil to Antonia. His eye rolling and hapless brandishing of a fish slice during the birth scene are joyful. The chemistry in the scenes with Gurjeet Singh add to the Chaplinesque qualities of the production…none more than the physical comedy when they are on the non existent travelator and breaking the fourth wall. Anwar Russell flounces through multiple roles delineated by t-shirt logos, a selection of comedy moustaches. His posturing and camp asides are a real pleasure as he gives a hi-octane performance filled with playful charm.

Roger Morlidge and Gurjeet Singh.
Image credit: Johan Persson

Anwar Russell.
Image credit: Johan Persson

This production feels like a real labour of love. The lighting design by Elliott Griggs is playful and adds to the cartoon elements of the humour. The repeated breaking of the fourth wall allows Shanahan to ramp up the comedy and ingeniously add big drama elements to the production including large scale lorry crashes and helicopter swoops which are eluded to but are comically conveyed by responses to supposed theatre staff strikes. It’s a clever twist in this madcap frolic but also deftly illustrates all the theatre staff working behind a big production who sweep up or climb rigging and whose part in creating the magic on stage is usually unseen and unheard. This fun filled production packs a mighty punch as it eviserates those responsible for an unfair and unjust system. There is a system…The system is broken. Thankfully the only thing broken in this production is the fourth wall!!

ROYAL EXCHANGE 12th May – 10th June 2023

Cat On A Hot Tin Roof

Large Theatres

Ntombizodwa Ndlovu as Maggie “The Cat”
Image credit Helen Murray

Written by Tennessee Williams

Directed by Roy Alexander Weise

Royal Exchange Theatre

It’s rather apt that this new staging of this classic play about greed, lies and family rivalries opens at the Royal Exchange as the final series of Succession also hits our screens. Director Roy Alexander Weise is clearly fascinated by themes of family dynamics and the ugliness that may lie beneath the surface and bubble up to the surface at any family gathering. There is a powerful moment when the Pollitt family circle in and sing Satan, We’re Gonna Tear Your Kingdom Down (memorable from another family drama series Greenleaf). The stage and cast are bathed in blood red light and the violence of avarice and mendacity is palpable at what is, on the surface a family birthday celebration.

Patrick Robinson as Big Daddy.
Image credit: Helen Murray

Weise subverts the classic text by casting black actors as the wealthy Plantation owning family. The themes of exploitation, greed, capitalism and pride look as authentically ugly here as in the original. They are timeless and not subject to any one race or creed. Patrick Robinson is a stylish suited and booted Big Daddy, his veneer of brute determination and utter self-belief is softened only by his adoration of his younger son Brick. Bayo Gbadamosi is a beautiful, detached Brick who is weary of his wife’s passion and vitality. He has checked out and no longer has an interest in anything but liquor and chasing the click. There is a potential issue in the modern day setting in that it is more tricky to understand his absolute avoidance of confronting his own homosexuality. Perhaps it is best contextualised in the setting of Brick as a sportsman and football player and his absolute emotional paralysis as that of a man broken by guilt and grief.

Bayo Gbadamosi as Brick.
Image credit: Helen Murray

Ntombizodwa Ndlovu makes a memorable stage entrance and dominates the first Act. Her Maggie is as bootilicious as Beyonce and as lush as an overblown gardenia. She is all women and outwardly confident of her sexual allure but Ndlovu seamlessly also shows her vulnerability and frustration in this sexless, childless marriage. Alternating between funny and vicious, this cat on a hot tin roof is not to be trifled with. Jacqui Dubois is great as Big Mama choosing only to see what suits her and flitting away any inconvenient truths. Danielle Henry relishes her role as the fecund Mae, flouting her pregnant belly and constantly referencing her brood of would-be heirs or as Maggie terms them…no neck monsters.

Set in modern day, Milla Clarke has created a beautiful set with a sleek bedroom setting and loads of hidden alcoves secreting as many empty booze bottles and wigs as the family hide secrets and ambitions. The huge rumpled bed is a constant allusion to restless but sexless nights in this unhappy marital bed. High above the bed and constantly turning like time is a stylish suggestion of a child’s mobile taunting Maggie. Gold beaded curtains hint at the great wealth in this house but also suggest the binding, suffocating chains of gleaming greed in this luxurious prison.

The soundscape by Alexandra Faye Braithwaite and the lighting design by Lizzie Powell work brilliantly together to build the dreamy, slightly unreal mood of the production. Ethereal echoes of voices and music and flashes of far off lightening or fireworks in the grounds create a great illusion of the space and scope of this grand house beyond this steamy, claustrophobic bedroom. Overall Weise has created a gorgeously engrossing piece of theatre worthy of sitting back and binging on.

Royal Exchange Theatre 24th March – 29th April 2023

BEGINNING

Large Theatres

Written by David Eldridge

Directed by Bryony Shanahan

ROYAL EXCHANGE THEATRE

The first in a trilogy, David Eldridge wrote BEGINNING in 2015 and had a hugely successful run when it made its debut at the National Theatre in 2017. The play runs in real time over the course of an evening after a house warming party ends. Laura has a smart new flat in West Didsbury and the last guest left is Danny who is a newcomer to her social circle. Eldridge takes this boy meets girl drama and manages to subvert what one might expect by exploring the immediacy and intimacy of two vulnerable people navigating possibilities. The sheer simplicity of Laura articulating what she wants without any artifice creates a beautifully multi-layered drama as the play explores the complexity of what happens when two people caught in a moment reveal their back stories and how they impact on their choices.

The set design by Ty Hay is an estate agents’ dream with a sleek kitchen island complete with Smeg oven, dishwasher and wine chiller while the lounge furniture looks like an ad for LOAF. Surfaces are littered with the debris from the recent party and the designer rug has a fresh cigarette burn. Either side of the set loom street lamps and the stage gleams with smooth fresh tarmac. The overall effect is as subtle as the storytelling, allowing for lots of movement by the two actors as they at times literally dance around each other. The tarmac effect sleekly eludes to fresh starts and gleaming possibilities while the glowing street lamps suggest a voyeuristic feel to this production. Watching the actors for nearly two hours as they learn about each other feels very much as if we the audience are peering in on our neighbours in a gripping Will they/Won’t they scenario.

Laura is a 38 year old company MD with a new flat in West Didsbury while 42 year old divorced Danny is back living at his Mums’ house. Erin Shanagher and Gerard Kearns are perfectly cast as these wounded characters who are navigating points in their lives that they had not foreseen. Shanagher is wonderful as she makes quicksilver shifts from feisty to goofy to weary and anguished. Her Laura is endearing and brave in her vulnerability as she navigates the evening and propositions the uncertain and wary Danny with the possibility of sex, breakfast and a baby. Kearns gives a perfectly pitched performance in his laddish ordinariness and stained shirt and his Danny is a revelation as he opens up about himself. This is a man mourning being a dad who gets to be nothing more in his daughters’ life than a monthly direct debit and seems to have lost hope for his future. There is a single moment where Laura is dancing her heart out to a Bros track and Danny is watching and clearly amused…what tracks across Kearns’ facial expression is a dawning realisation that he could really fall in love with this woman…theatre at its best!

Beautifully crafted writing by Eldridge and mature and caring direction by Bryony Shanahan coupled with strong performances by Shanahan and Kearns make for a winning production. It’s a brave move to hope an audience can be absorbed in watching 2 people cook and eat fish finger Butties in real time, debate Strictly and the merits of a Ginsters and dance around a kitchen. Beginning draws the audience into routing for this burgeoning relationship despite there being more missteps than slick moves in this courtship dance. Utterly absorbing in its sharply observed take on loneliness and longing, this play is funny, poignant and exciting as the couple navigate the stepping stones and roadblocks peppering their first night together.

Royal Exchange Theatre 16th Feb – 11th March

LET THE RIGHT ONE IN

Horror, Large Theatres

Pete MacHale and Rhian Blundell as Oskar and Eli. Photo credit Johan Persson

Stage Adaptation by Jack Thorne

Based on the novel and film by John Ajvide Lindqvist

Directed by Bryony Shanahan

ROYAL EXCHANGE THEATRE

To the uninitiated LET THE RIGHT ONE IN might look like a typical Halloween vampire gorefest, but thankfully this production is so much more. The blood and gore may spurt in a plentiful supply, but at its glistening heart this a story about love, otherness and acceptance. A lonely young boy being viciously bullied at school and ignored by his alcoholic mother meets an ageless, sexless vampire hungry for more than just blood. This hugely successful Swedish novel has spawned numerous film, television and theatre adaptations. Director Bryony Shanahan takes this 2013 adaptation by Jack Thorne and creates an almost immersive audience experience in the round. As the tension builds and the exits are blocked the audience is trapped just like the victims, the peril of leaving the theatre blood splattered is viscerally real and the poignancy of such a macabre love story becomes painfully vivid.

Rhian Blundell as Eli
Photo credit Johan Persson

The set design by Amelia Jane Hankin is highly effective in creating an early Eighties atmosphere that is versatile enough to function as the inside of a school sports facility, a bleak Swedish council estate, eerie woods and a Sweetie concession in a neon bright shopping mall. The ladders and platforms over the stage, and the climbing frame all give the production room to build the drama and a real kinetic energy; however the continual wheeling in and out of additional props is often as distracting as it is effective. The startling use of light by Joshua Pharo to propel and enhance the horror elements of the drama is stunningly good especially when coupled with the sound design by Pete Malkin. The overall effect is to create a real sense of nothing ever being quite what it seems or that permanence or security is fleeting and can vanish in a curl of steamy air or the sudden silver flash of a blade.

In the main this is a strong cast with some lovely character driven performances from Darren Kuppan and a bleak and intensely creepy Hakan delivered by Andrew Sheridan. The two central performances are uniformly excellent with the inspired casting of Rhian Blundell as Eli and Pete MacHale as Oskar. Blundell is utterly captivating as the centuries old vampire child. Her physical presence morphs like quicksilver between wary and tentative youth to muscular and visceral blood hungry creature, and then on to winsome innocent charm. MacHale as Oskar is sweetly awkward and geeky with a keen intelligence that comprehends the failures of the adults around him while his innocence is bewildered by his bullies and mesmerised by the sexless Eli who smells of death and stale blood. Both actors are utterly believable and allow for this story to rise above the usual teen vampire fare to become something much more emotionally satisfying.

There are some problematic issues with this production but the overall feel is of a stimulating and satisfying night at the theatre. Director Bryony Shanahan may have sometimes allowed for overly busy scenes or in the case of the scene with Oskars’ father a somewhat redundant one, however overall this is a gorefully gorgeous production. Some of its most memorable moments such as the swimming pool scene were climactic on so many levels and a potent reminder of The Royal Exchange at its very best.

The Royal Exchange October 22nd – November 19th 2022

THE GLASS MENAGERIE

Large Theatres, Memory play

Joshua James and Rhiannon Clements as Tom and Laura. Photograph: Marc Brenner

Written by Tennessee Williams

Directed by Atri Banerjee

ROYAL EXCHANGE THEATRE

Like so many other productions delayed or impacted by the Pandemic, Atri Banerjee’s vision for The Glass Menagerie altered over the last two years. We will never know exactly what this production might have looked like in early 2020 but it is hard to imagine it being better than this current reimagining of the Tennessee Williams‘ poignant classic. Our personal experience of lockdowns in our homes lends itself perfectly to this claustrophobic image of a home constrained by unfulfilled desires. Like Williams, Atri Banerjee understands love in its many flawed manifestations and allows the intense emotional pain in the writing to be illuminated with the warm glow of empathy.

The claustrophobia of lockdown for so many mirrors Tom who is trapped at home with his Mother and Laura with his true nature stifled and all his hopes for the future in limbo. In contrast his deeply introverted sister is actually more content cloistered within the home than she ever could be in the outside world, as were so many introverts who actually thrived during lockdown. In this memory play, the Mother takes all her solace from the past as this faded Southern belle relives past glories when she graciously received gentlemen callers on her parents’ porch. The visitor Joe is the first caller of note and as such is both a breath of fresh air in this stale environment and inevitably the catalyst for radical change.

All four performances are uniformly excellent. Joshua James as Tom is weary and hollow eyed, bitter and despondent, trapped in a job that serves only to support his family but dreaming of escape and excitement. Frequent evenings spent in the cinema allude to a secret life, further hinted at when he gives his sister a rainbow scarf from his evening sojourns. James is utterly believable with his Southern drawl and dry whip smart retorts. He embodies the tortured young man equally capable of casual cruelty and genuine tenderness. Rhiannon Clements as Laura exudes the palpable discomfort of a young woman far more socially hindered by her neuro diversity than by her physical impairment. It is a thing of quiet magic to observe as she blossoms with the positive and genuine admiration from Joe. Eloka Ivo has little to actively do or say in the first Act yet this actor ensures he maintains an absorbing presence throughout. His performance illuminates the second Act like the glow of candles which Tom lights all around the stage. He has an energy and a physicality that separates him from the others and serves effectively drive the narrative. Geraldine Somerville is perfectly cast as Amanda, the relentless mother whose love can appear monstrous yet comes from the heart of a lioness seeking security for her cubs. Her performance is as brittle as the delicate glass in the Menagerie yet as a Mother she has a core of steel.

Geraldine Somerville as Amanda and Rhiannon Clements as Laura.
Photograph: Marc Brenner

Eloka Ivo as Joe. Photograph: Marc Brenner

This is a gorgeous production where less is always more bar one brief dance scene with Laura and Joe that jars with the overall tempo and pacing of the play. The design by Susanna Vize is stripped back to basics where even the glass menagerie is subtly alluded to rather than centre stage. The simple wooden chairs, the candles and the evoked heavy scent of flowers evoke theatre and home as church like manifestations of weddings, baptisms and funerals. The multiple vases of pale flowers which overshadow Laura’s glass animals also serve to allude to the floral tokens received from all 17 of her Mothers gentleman callers. The heightened drama of the set is the huge illuminated sign saying ‘PARADISE’ which turns through the performance and echoes the church like feel as though a metaphor for Christ on the cross giving up his life for us…just as Tom is being expected to for his family. The staging is complemented by wonderful lighting from Lee Curran and a dreamy soundscape from Giles Thomas.

The Glass Menagerie cast at The Royal Exchange.
Photograph: Marc Brenner

The Glass Menagerie is the 1944 play that was the breakout success for Tennessee Williams and it continues to be a classic that doesn’t date. The themes of family bonds, duty, responsibility and love are intrinsically bound up in the complexities of being different or not wishing to fit with normative values. Atri Banerjee directs this production with intelligence, compassion and perhaps his own personal experience of what love and duty may look like within a family unit. He certainly nails the pain and the passion of love that seeks to find its own way to flourish. Like Williams whose beloved sister is celebrated in Laura, Banerjee is celebrating difference as all the nicer and nothing to be ashamed off.

THE ROYAL EXCHANGE 2nd September- 8th October 2022

Glee & Me

Large Theatres

Royal Exchange Theatre

Written by Stuart Slade

Directed by Nimmo Ismail

Lola is 16 and super bright. Lola has big plans. Lola has a future as bright as the interior of her bedroom. And then suddenly Lola has Glee (Glioma Multiforme) and a median life expectancy of 11.2 months. Glee & Me was the winner of the Judges prize at the 2019 Bruntwood Prize for Playwriting . Writer Stuart Slade has created something incredibly special in this portrayal of living your best life in the face of your impending death. With this kind of subject matter it is such a delicate line between creating some magical and memorable and producing misery porn… Sykes has done the former.

Director Nimmo Ismail has done an exquisite job of encapsulating the spirit of the writing. Liv Hill ensures that the Lola on stage is the girl next door, the clever, capable girl at college, the daughter you worry about, the mate you’d like your own daughter to have and the bright funny girl that some of us have already seen taken by a lethal brain tumour. Liv Hill shines in this role as she navigates her way through diagnosis, surgery, treatment and hospice care. Never maudlin, she faces life or what’s left of it and makes plans for the future she has. There is a defiance in her actions but increasingly a calm when all she has is each moment in each day. We talk so casually about living in the moment but perhaps nothing quite focuses the mind than impending death.

The play is a one hander yet Hill brings life to those around her…we sense a mother struggling with losing her only child, we meet best friend Clem who helps Lola make her video blog and Rufus her student boyfriend who supports her while valiantly assisting Lola cram in a lifetimes sex into under a year…no mean feat! In short this a production teaming with life. The staging is bright with yellows and pinks while the lighting has pulsating beams that hum and crackle with energy or flash as neurons die as the tumour advances.

Glee & Me is emotive but oddly inspiring and reassuring. I found it impossible not to emerge with moist eyes but mainly it feels uplifting. We are so afraid of death and often so sad and angry when it draws close. It is easy to forget or miss that other core emotion, joy. This is a sublime piece of writing that does not ignore or minimise the fear, the sadness and the anger, but it allows a light to shine on the joy too. The joy we find in sex, in paddling on a beach, making a log fire or simply being with those we love. As Lola says having a finite amount of time…makes everything more – vivid. In the end what remains is love.

Royal Exchange Theatre 11th Sept- 30th Oct

Bloody Elle – A gig musical

Gig Theatre, Large Theatres

Written and Performed by Lauryn Redding

Directed by Bryony Shanahan

ROYAL EXCHANGE THEATRE

It’s 14 months since the Royal Exchange closed its doors on the eve of press night for Rockets and Blue Lights. Racing across St Ann’s Square to the cheers across the city as England scores in the footie, I spot the smiling faces of the theatre Comms team as they welcome everyone back to press night. There is a general feeling of goodwill and excitement in the building so undoubtedly huge pressure on Writer/Performer Lauryn Redding and Director Bryony Shanahan and the team to make this a night to remember. It’s a huge gamble to have only one performer sustain a 2 act 2 hour plus performance on the main stage and make it work, make it matter, make it memorable for the work not just as a reopening after a global pandemic…Lauryn Redding does just that. Funny, tender and raw, Bloody Elle is a rousing tale of sexual awakening with all its joy and sorrow. As Redding tells us Censoring. Of anything. Of anyone. Of yourself. Of someone else. Is exhausting and it cuts you from the inside.

Director Bryony Shanahan and Movement Director Yandass Ndlovo ensure that the performance has flow and energy and never feels like a static piece of solo story telling. The staging by Designer Amanda Stoodley dispenses with the famous banquette seats and their potential covid risks. Instead she introduces red stools and candle lit tables to create a cosy pub vibe that effectively frame the stage. This is gig theatre and a true one woman band. The original music by Redding with direction by Sound Director Alexandra Faye Braithwaite is great and drives the narrative but also creates a swirling soundscape to add mood and shade to the story telling.

The multi levelled stage aids the introduction of characters and scenes including Elle’s high rise council flat in Cloud Rise and is splashed with what seems to be a bucket of white wash? This picks up the bursts of coloured light that flood the stage or envelop Redding. The white wash effect also seems to reflect the way we can paint out aspects of ourselves or let others not see our true colours, to continue to not see the whole of us, the truth of what and who we may be if we own our own story. Corny perhaps but I wish Redding was flooded with glorious rainbow colours as she look her well deserved second curtain call.

The story is a simple story of girl meets girl. There is a division of class and aspirations when working class Elle meets posh Eve with guacamole green eyes on route to a medical degree at Oxford University. They bond over vinyl records and work at Chips and Dips despite their differences – Eve has a pony in a paddock whereas Elle has Big Sally on the 12th floor. The driving force of this narrative is less about class, it zeroes in on the agony and ecstacy of first love and how this is still intensified by the difficulties for many of coming to terms with your sexuality and being accepted for who you are and how you love.

This is a show that might not have been seen at the Royal Exchange without the global pandemic. Redding would probably been too busy working to create this show and a solo gig theatre performance might not have been an obvious choice for this theatre. It probably needed ten years of growing and healing for Redding to be ready to tell such a personal story. There is a vivid whip sharp authenticity to this performance. Insouciant banter with the audience, poignant and emotional song writing, raw, vivid storytelling filled with poetic observations…Bloody Elle ticks every box and more. Kintsugi is the Japanese art of rebuilding what is broken or damaged using gold to create something stronger and even more beautiful. Redding has taken her broken heart and using her artistic talent as Kintsugi – the result is the threads of gold running through this gorgeous show. Hopefully as we navigate the new normal of Covid-19, the Royal Exchange is also emerging with new seams of gold too.

Royal Exchange June 23rd – July 17th 2021

Wuthering Heights

Large Theatres

Rakhee Sharma and Alex Austin as Cathy and Heathcliff. Photo credit- Helen Murray

Directed by Bryony Shanahan

Written by Andy Sheridan

ROYAL EXCHANGE THEATRE

This new adaptation of Emily Bronte’s Wuthering Heights creates an exciting theatrical opportunity to explore the moors and their doomed inhabitants in the round of the Royal Exchange. Would Director Bryony Shanahan and writer Andy Sheridan perhaps place a modern day damaged and doomed Heathcliff and Cathy up on Saddleworth Moors with a despairing school attendance officer? Might they be recognised as probably suffering from impulse control disorder, ADHD, Borderline Personality Disorder and possibly anorexia? This fresh take instead seeks to move between mining a comedic vein that borders into laugh out loud farce while equally revering the beauty of Emily’s poetry. Sadly the real emotional depth in this production is only really there when it glories in showcasing Bronte’s poetry with a dreamy soundscape by Alexandra Faye Braithwaite. The end result is disjointed in terms of character development so it feels impossible to believe in the innate complexity of these wild, unbridled creatures of nature and their tumultuous relationship.

Alex Austin as Heathcliff. Photo credit- Helen Murray

There is a serious issue with the chemistry between Rakhee Sharma as Cathy and Alex Austin as Heathcliff. It is actually the mood established by the lighting and the musical accompaniment that drives and creates emotional depth and potency in this relationship. The rest is simply swagger, spits and hisses punctuated by glib swearing or beautiful and passionate speeches spoken eloquently but petulantly when they need to resonate with raw passion. There is a wonderful gawky awkwardness that Alex Austin brings to the young Heathcliff but too often his characterisation slips into glib gangster menace rather than wild, embittered and wounded soul. Sharma as Cathy is wild and feisty but often too shouty and pouty to truly convey the raw unfettered soul that Emily Bronte envisaged. I wanted to revel in her complexity but found myself just wishing she would calm down and not spoil the glorious sound of musicians Becky Wilkie and Sophie Galpin. At key moments my eyes were drawn to the impassioned face of Wilkie and sadly not that of Rakhee Sharma. David Crellin as Earnshaw brings warmth and humanity with a performance that is rich and complex.

In her first production as Co- Artistic Director at the Royal Exchange Bryony Shanahan brings a lot of energy and movement to the production that at times creates a real sense of the wild moors and their freedom from the constraints of societal norms as the characters run free. There is a genuine pathos as Cathy struggles with letting go of childhood freedoms to be a mother and a wife. Creating magic and mayhem this is a Cathy that is perhaps closer to the weird sisters in the recent Macbeth at the Royal Exchange than the weird sisters at Haworth Parsonage. The casual cruelty shown by all the main protagonists is brutal and brutish, and perhaps this explains the decision to play so many key scenes for laughs. Moments such as when Heathcliff and Cathy are once more together on the moors struggle with the emotional depth of a key scene being undercut by Isabella raising laughs as she comically clambering over the rocky landscape. The humour does offset the darkness but sometimes this is at the expense of driving the plot forward in a believable manner.

The use of light shards works really well and designer Zoe Spurr has created a really painterly effect on mood and landscape. The set design is however more problematic with its messy blend of heath and hearth. The barren tree is beautiful as is the design allowing characters to depart this world or spy on others. The floor space however resembles a post apocalyptic golf course and has a playmobil feel rather than a naturalistic landscape. Overall this production may be as divisive in its execution and reception as the original book was when first received by its readers!

ROYAL EXCHANGE 7th FEB- 7th MARCH 2020

Images by Helen Murray

Light Falls

Large Theatres

Written by Simon Stephens

Directed by Sarah Frankcom

Original music by Jarvis Cocker

ROYAL EXCHANGE THEATRE

Light Falls marks the end of Sarah Frankcom’s tenure as Artistic Director at the Royal Exchange Theatre. It seems only fitting that she bows out with a play about loss and endings. In the same week as iconic Northern soap Coronation Street is opening up a frank conversation about death, grief and kindness comes this new play by Simon Stephens. He has written a delicate and beautiful play about death that is also a eulogy to kindness and a testament to fortitude.

Christine (a very moving and understated performance by Rebecca Manley) is nine months sober after a life of alcoholism when she walks into a Stockport supermarket. Married to Bernard and a mother to Jess, Steven and Ashe, and a grandmother to baby Layton, she hovers at the shelf of vodka before dying suddenly from a sub-arachnoid haemorrhage. It is 12 minutes to 5pm. It is a Monday in February 2017. What happens next moves from the mundane to the sublime as Christine hovers around her family watching the defining moments in their lives as they hear of her death. What this quiet play does so well is capture how time can suddenly stand still yet life moves on around us and so inevitably must we, even when our world has irrevocably changed.

The cast of ten explore the intertwined relationships of a family and those around them as Christine dies. There are standout performances from Lloyd Hutchinson and Carla Henry as Bernard and his mistress as they navigate through a fumbling attempt at a threesome in a Doncaster hotel. There is a terrible poignancy and dark humour to this blustering, overweight man striving for new experiences yet ultimately lusting more for a double cone icecream than two young women in his hotel four poster bed.

All three children are emotionally damaged by their upbringing with an alcoholic mother who took wine to McDonalds and was drunk in the school playground. Defensive and wary in their emotional relationships they struggle with attachments having known a parent who at times favoured vodka over them. The play touches on each of their partnerships and through interactions and fragments of dialogue gives a sense of ongoing internal struggles.

Katie West is simply wonderful as Ashe, a desperate, exhausted young mother who has attempted suicide only months before her mother’s death. She exudes vulnerability and raw emotion in all her scenes and it is her presence that lingers after leaving the theatre. This is a portrayal of grief, fortitude and love that makes this play soar.

The stark, bare elegance of the set by Naomi Dawson ensures this is always about the actors. The stairs and tiered steps open out the staging and also feel like a gentle hint of stairs to heaven and steps in the grieving process. The cascading downpour that drenches has the catharsis of an outpouring of grief and emotion. The much heralded music by Jarvis Cocker is also understated in a less is more way. A recurring melody and a single Hymn of the North feel like the familiar comfort of a lullaby.

This is a low key production that favours subtle touches, gritty humour and beautiful writing to colour and shade an ordinary family dealing with the stark pain of loss. I’ll be watching from the shoreline epitomizes what many of us hope for when we have to survive loss. We yearn for that sense of being watched over and still cared for, as Christine does with her children. Much has been made of Light Falls as a Northern play by a Northern writer with a hymn by a Northern songwriter. Personally I’m not sure it matters where they are from, North or South. We are shaped by our roots, our heritage and whether we embrace or reject that, or run from it or back to it, our shoreline is simply our core, our gut, our safe place. We all need a haven when our world is rocked by loss regardless of who we are or where we live.

Royal Exchange Theatre 24th October – 16th November 2019

Images by Manuel Harlan

MACBETH

Large Theatres, Shakespeare

By William Shakespeare

Directed by Christopher Haydon

Royal Exchange Theatre

Director Christopher Haydon delivers a production of Macbeth that is packed full of ideas and creativity. There is a veritable smorgasbord on display that is as colourful and attention grabbing as the infamous banquet where bloody heads compete for space with luridly iced party cakes and doughnuts. Unfortunately although iced delights can tempt us to a quick sugar fix this is a drawn out affair which fails to deliver in a more ultimately satisfying manner.

Lucy Ellinson is a mercurial leader who is believable as a toughened soldier and a popular leader. Sinewy and earthy she appears one of the lads, however as the prophecies of the three weird sisters start to tighten their grip, she becomes increasingly paranoid and driven by bloody ambition. Ellinson soon morphs into a power crazed maniac complete with sunken eyes and bone bleached skull. The performance itself is strong and gripping, however it somehow fails to provide a truly satisfying Macbeth. The physical fragility of a woman who increasingly resembles a crack addict searching for her next fix simply cannot deliver a plausible final battle scene with Macduff. Ultimately there is too much petulance and vulnerability here that could work with Hamlet but not as successfully here with Macbeth.

This is only part of the frustration with this Macbeth which had the opportunity to really shine a light on relationships for ambitious women in power. This lesbian couple seem emotionally ill matched and implausible as this war hardened hero seems incapable of questioning or even noticing Lady Macbeth’s scheming greed and machinations. There is no exploration of their lack of heirs as a gay couple which could have been a really interesting angle to explore in their quest for the crown. The ambitious Lady Macbeth would have surely contemplated a modern ruthless attempt at altering their fate – perhaps spurgling the sperm of Macduff or Banquo?? There is no tenderness between them or any real sharing of the damage their actions cause them personally.

Motorway murder scenes, torrential storms, helicopters, red balloons and chatty interactions with the audience members pepper this production. Designer Oli Townsend has a stark but beautiful heptagram on the stage with a steaming cauldron at its heart. All is as minimalist as a soldier’s rations until the Mad Hatters tea pparty that is the lurid banquet complete with fancy dress and part games. Looking like something from a Ken Russell movie this is OTT in the best way. Dreamlike and drug fueled the game of musical chairs drily reflects our current political situation.

Lucy Ellinson as Macbeth Image- Johann Persson

The ever present weird Sisters as drug addled party girls supplementing their incomes as sinister, sulky waitresses at the castle is an entertaining aspect to this Macbeth. They bring both light and dark elements to the production. For such a female heavy cast it is troubling that the real heart of this Macbeth ultimately seems to belong to the men. Banquo and Macduff balance career and family with grace and honour. Actors Theo Ogundipe and Paul Hickey give performances that resonate and truly highlight the tragedy of this piece.

Royal Exchange Theatre 13 Sept – 19 Oct 2019

Images by Johann Persson