Category Archives: Rated: Outstanding

Work that aims high and hits every mark.

‘Achilles, Death of the Gods.’ (Venue 152, Aug 9-10, 12-17, 19-25)

Posted in 5*, EdFestivals 2024, Rated: Outstanding by

“If you like the Ian McKellen reading of ‘The Odyssey’ you will love Jo Kelen’s telling of ‘The Illiad’.”

Editorial Rating: 5 Stars (Outstanding)

“Sing, O muse, of the rage of Achilles, son of Peleus, that brought countless ills upon the Achaeans.”

To be honest, I had never expected to encounter the muse herself but here she is persona personalmente. Memory’s daughter is a dark-eyed classicist with a grip on her material tighter than how a Cyclops holds his dinner. We enter to discover nothing more complicated than a camping stool and a table, the latter dressed in red with three candles as well as jugs for water and wine. This is as close as many of us will get to the authentic experience of having a storyteller rock up to our mead hall, take the best seat by the fire, and sing a story for their supper.

And what a story we have tonight. The hugely ambiguous amorality tale of when the barbarians were at the gates. Women plundered like cattle. Men butchered like goats for the spit. The highest of high drama so familiar and yet… and this is the good bit… delivered so fresh. This is a story that lives in our cultural marrow, yet Jo Kelen tell it as fresh as the spring flowers which upsprang from the Earth on which Zeus and Hera were making the divinity with two backs. If you like the Ian McKellen reading of ‘The Odyssey’ you will love Jo Kelen’s telling of ‘The Illiad’. She is as poised and perfectly to the point as when Colin Firth beats up a pub full of yobos at the start of ‘The Kingsman’ franchise.

This is an EdFringe show and with only 45 minutes runtime so something had to be cut. Kelen has made the bold (and certainly definitely probably controversial) choice to leave out the gods – who have taken themselves off to lounge around in fruit baskets at the Paris Olympics. What is left is more. More of the bromance. More of the anger. More of the self-centeredness. More of the sacrifice. More of heroism and yes, more of the brutality and more of the suffering. This is an unapologetically bold and self-confident production which makes no effort to accommodate our Celtic predisposition towards swiftly flowing changes of rhythm and tone. This is the classics done classically and, if you are fortunate and sensible enough to secure a ticket, it will be recalled for time immemorial as a classic of EdFringe24.

Get your bronze armoured coats on and go see this!

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‘The Old Queen’s Head’ (Venue 8, Aug 9-22)

Posted in 5*, EdFestivals 2024, Rated: Outstanding by

“David commands attention in the way that the Field Officer in Brigade Waiting commands the Trooping of the Colour.”

Editorial Rating: 5 Stars (Outstanding)

It is a truth universally acknowledged that the head of Queen Elizabeth II appeared on more coins, stamps, in more photos, on more film, sculptures, and paintings than any other human being in history. “We have to be seen to be believed” is a quotation often attributed to our late, much-lamented monarch. So it’s not at all surprising that many people feel a deep personal (spiritual even) bond with the longest-serving head of the Church of England.

David Patterson adopted Elizabeth as his spirit guide early in life. It was something he shared with his grandmother and carried with him through school and high school and on to the lofty heights of student politics at East Fife College. Elizabeth was there, in a sense, at every step of his journey as a closeted gay man. Coming out for David involved asking some deep and meaningful questions about his self-imposed, Elizabeth-inspired mantra to avoid being “’too much, too obvious, too different.”

This is a deeply personal story ringing with universal truths. David commands attention in the way that the Field Officer in Brigade Waiting commands the Trooping of the Colour. His material is mustered, drilled, rehearsed and regimented BUT it is never stiff or stilted. This is a lively performance sparkling with spontaneity like a tira sparkles on the head of a blushing newlywed. The set is precisely the right kind of minimal, reflecting each stage of this coming-out journey. Every detail of this production has been considered and curated so as to highlight and understate in all the right places. This is how storytelling at the Fringe should look and feel.

Come for the personal journey. Stay for the lively portraiture of the supporting characters in David’s life. Get your royal rainbow coats on and go see this!

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‘Chokeslam’ (Venue 8, Aug 9-10, 12-25)

Posted in 5*, EdFestivals 2024, Rated: Outstanding by

“Tegan Verheul might not be doing any of the moves. She might not be that comfortable standing on a chair even, but she delivers an inspiringly fearless performance.”

Editorial Rating: 5 Stars (Outstanding)

I don’t know anything about professional wrestling except that it has something to do with ‘Moana’ and the greatest movie ever made – ‘The Scorpion King’. Tegan Verheul on the other hand fell head over heels in love with pro-wrestling even as she fell in and then out of love with her husband. It’s not hard to see why creative people would be drawn into the high-energy, high-stakes, high-cannot-believe they just did that world within a world of big muscles, big personalities, and even bigger rivalries.

Pro wrestling immediately captures the imagination in a way that only the very top six or seven Fringe productions about the impacts of climate change on inland colonies of kittiwakes during the prohibition era can. Is mass appeal crass appeal? Who chuffing cares if it makes people happy?!

Tegan Verheul might not be doing any of the moves. She might not be that comfortable standing on a chair even, but she delivers an inspiringly fearless performance that will leave you feeling like you too could just about pull off an Inverted Death Valley driver on the grandmother of whichever EBay bidder it was who jumped in at the last minute and stole that mint condition Saraya Jade Bevis action figure from under your nose.

Just like the megastars she’s describing, Verheul has a pedigree scaffolding her rise to greatness. I don’t know if The Royal Central School of Speech and Drama or the Guildhall School of Music and Drama offer programmes in pro wrestling, but maybe it’s time they did. It is a joy to hear one highly trained professional throw so much love and light on the work, dedication, struggles, and legacy of those working another cultural seam. This is a show that hits all the high notes (with a steel chair) even for an admittedly disinterested newbie. This is a show that simply crushes those same high notes (and makes them cry for their meemaw) with the wrestling super fans in the audience who are on the edge of their seats from the get-go and on their feet stomping like Rey Mysterio just slammed Silo Sam into the mat.

The show is structured with a double-helix. It’s a fan’s starstruck journey and it’s also a woman’s heartsick journey. There is a pretty hefty shovel in my garage and I would take it kindly if you would bash my brains out with it the very moment I ever turn down a woman like Tegan Verheul. But somebody did! Repeatedly! leaving Tegan feeling starved of love even as her cup of wrestling friendships overflowed.

If you have ever felt underappreciated, this is a show for you. If you have ever wondered what it takes to step back, re-evaluate, pick a new life course, abandon the disappointing but familiar present and take a chance on the possibility that you too deserve to be loved and happy, then this is a show for you. If you are totally unmoved by pro wrestling but simply love a cracking bit of storytelling delivered by a professional at the top of their game and loving it, then this a show for you.

Get your Wrestlemania coats on and go see this!

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Jess Carrivick: Attention Seeker (WIP) at Venue 236 until 24th AUG (not 11th or 18th)

Posted in 5*, Comedy, EdFestivals 2024, Greenside, Rated: Outstanding, Theatre by

“…a must-see for anyone who loves comedy; it would also serve as a masterclass for those who hope to bring a one-hander show to the Fringe.”

Editorial Rating: 5 Stars (Outstanding)

Regular readers of this site will know that I’ve got a bit of a thing about solo shows this year. They’ve been one of the mainstays of the Fringe for decades (especially one-woman shows) and are becoming a genre all of their own. The quality of such shows can be highly variable, but this one is the best I’ve seen this summer by a country mile.

Jess Carrivick is a self-confessed “almost” ex-child TV star nepo baby and in this show she tells the story of her life. In a whirlwind of character vignettes, multiple costume changes, bits, skits, and sketches, she whisks us on an absurdist journey which showreels her first ten years that peaked with BBC TV sitcom stardom in the noughties. Apart from one genuinely tearful episode this is a laugh-a-minute romp, see-sawing between hilarious observations on the mundanity of post-fame life and peeks behind the barbed wire curtain of celebrity telly.

As both performer and writer (2021 BAFTA Rockcliffe shortlist), Carrivick pulls off a tour de force in the small black-box Mint Studio, part of the Greenside @ George Street venue. An experienced improv and sketch comedienne, she’s one of those confident and engaging performers it’s impossible not to like. In several silent routines, she has the audience in stitches of laughter with her range of facial expressions and stares that speak a thousand words. A brilliant caricaturist, she evokes a number of showbiz and “civilian” stereotypes with mercilessly effective style and aplomb; regularly complemented by her own deprecating self-criticism. In some gently merciful and non-embarrassing audience participation, she effectively gives a little stage skill coaching to those punters keen to join in the fun. A skilled performer to her fingertips, Carrivick even manages to entertain whilst getting changed behind her costume rail.

At 45 minutes, this is an ideal piece of quickfire entertainment to squeeze in between other shows as you sample the delights of George Street. It’s a must-see for anyone who loves comedy; it would also serve as a masterclass for those who hope to bring a solo show to the Fringe.

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‘3 Chickens Confront Existence’ (Venue 139, Aug 8-11, 13-18, 20-26)

Posted in 5*, EdFestivals 2024, Rated: Outstanding by

“Three superbly measured and talented performances.”

Editorial Rating: 5 Stars (Outstanding)

Go see this. Seriously stop reading this review and go see this show. This. Is. It. This is THE show to see this EdFringe. Ludicrous premise. Superb chicken costumes (by the lady who made the hats for ‘Boardwalk Empire’). A genuinely thought-provoking script. Three superbly measured and talented performances.

Three chickens, each alike in indignity, in a battery farm awaiting the inevitable. Can they find meaning? Can they discover purpose? Can they be anything greater than their crappy situation? Over the course of 60 tightly caged minutes, we see ourselves as we are – trapped, vulnerable, pecking for a pellet of joy or comfort as the end draws near. Will it be a welcome release or simply a deeper form of darkness? You’ll laugh till you cry and then you’ll just cry.

Three beings are trapped in a world not of their making. They are confined as confined can get and yet so much of not a lot happens. There are rivalries and jealousies. There are quiet moments of reflection, sudden bursts of terror, and always the ever-present shadow of the inevitable end – gruesome, heartless, unstoppable.

If you aren’t triggered by the themes in this show, then there is something wrong with you. If you can walk away feeling the same after as you did before, then there is something wrong with you. Theatre is supposed to be triggering. Theatre is supposed to change how we look at the world. Theatre is an unkind mirror. Get your real feather coats on and go see what’s staring back at you!

 

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‘Tom Greaves: FUDGEY’ (Venue 139, Aug 7-13, 15-18, 20-26)

Posted in 5*, EdFestivals 2024, Rated: Outstanding by

“A show bursting at the seams with drama, sturm, und drang.”

Editorial Rating:5 Stars (Outstanding)

Effortless takes effort. If art is anything it is the ability to make a thing look natural that isn’t. Perhaps the most annoying thing about Olympians is their total lack of puffed outness at the end of the race. I want them to look how I feel after encountering any sort of gradient after months spent trotting around the falter-than-flat Cambridgeshire fens. Instead, they have all this… what’s the word… composure. Learning to go through life composed is one of the hardest things to achieve and, like so many things in the age of viral rage, composure is in short supply.

For centuries, those with the means taught their offspring the art of ‘composed’ by shipping them off to boarding school where the routines and regime could (not so gently) bash them into a composed shape. James Bond’s sang-froid is the intentional product of this system. Problem. It turns out that most little human beings don’t like being separated from their parents and that placing very young children into institutions can do more harm than good.

We enter to find little Tom Greaves prepping for his first day at boarding school. It’s a big deal that he’s going. It’s a massive point of self-identity and pride for Pater Greaves that his progeny can take the toll road less travelled and start off several runs up the social ladder from the kids little Tom is currently spending his carefree days with. But there is trouble in paradise. Little Tom can see, even if he cannot yet fully understand, that his parents are deeply, irreconcilably unhappy with each other. As will become painfully clear during the subsequent stage traffic, adult Tom’s world is as unstable as a top-heavy very unstable thing and no amount of front, bluster, laddish banter, and emotional disconnection can compensate. As becomes painfully clear, the early death of innocence does not have a happy afterlife. The very things that were obtained at so great a cost are anchoring poor Tom to the storm where he must now suffer for our amusement.

Effortless takes effort and it would take a lot of effort to unpack all the stagecraft, all the tricks of the trade, all the raw energy that has gone into this super powerful and super memorable production. This is a show bursting at the seams with drama, sturm, und drang. This is storytelling at its most profound. This is a dark comedy for people who like to see society’s imagined social betters falling apart and failing, flailing at life. This is a production for people who like their theatre chaotic and spontaneous yet also techie and on-target.

Come for the comedy-drama. Stay for the mayhem. Leave with a revitalised sense of what real living theatre can make happen. Get your smart new uniform coats on and go see this!

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‘Ted Hill: 110 Percent Normal’ (Venue 17, Aug 7-12, 14-26)

Posted in 5*, EdFestivals 2024, Rated: Outstanding by

“Saying that Hill’s material is surreal is like saying that the ocean is deep or that lava is red.”

Editorial Rating: 5 Stars (Outstanding)

Being asked to review Ted Hill is rather like being asked to write a review Edinburgh’s Mosque Kitchen or Kebab Mahal. There is so much to say and yet there are not sufficient quantity or quality of words to encompass the experience. Ted Hill has to be seen to be believed. This is an experience as much as it is an act, routine, or set. Ignore the listing, there will definitely be multimedia mayhem, plenty of computer chaos and absolutely mind-altering amounts of silliness.

Saying that Hill’s material is surreal is like saying that the ocean is deep or that lava is red. Noting that his delivery is unique is like noting that London buses are red or that UK elections always happen on a Thursday – Hill’s quirky, tech-heavy delivery is unlike anything else out there. His theme is himself. This is a show about self-awareness and the possibility that all this surreal uniqueness has a medical label.

Here is a standout set from a comedy legend in the making. Here is a pacey, bizarre, weird, joyous exploration of one human being’s attempt to comprehend his existence on planet Earth. If you stumble over one act that surprises, delights, and entertains in the most unexpected of ways, make it this one. Come for the line graphs. Stay despite the creepy AF robotic mannequin. Leave knowing you’re now a member of that most exclusive of clubs, people who saw Ted Hill reaching for the stars and just about getting there. Get your normalist of normal coats on and go see this!

 

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‘The Last Laugh’ (Venue 17, Aug 7-11, 13-25)

Posted in 5*, EdFestivals 2024, Rated: Outstanding by

“Damian Williams as Cooper delivers a masterclass in pathos done proper.”

Editorial Rating: 5 Stars (Outstanding)

We enter to find ourselves backstage in a somewhat very shabby dressing room. The decor may have faded but the stars of yesteryear are shining bright as Tommy Cooper enters. Thomas Frederick Cooper (1921-84) was a giant in every sense of the word To fully appreciate his stature we must stand on the shoulders of other giants. The towering titans of comedy selected to join Cooper wherever it is that he is, by writer and director Paul Hendy, are Eric Morecambe and Bob Monkhouse.

In the hour of stage traffic that follows we get singing, we get gags, we get musings on the meaning of life, we get an insight into the sheer chuffing effort that effortless laughter demands. Hendy’s script is a vehicle for three finely honed impersonations of three instantly recognisable and immensely loved and respected icons of British popular culture. ‘Impersonations’ is a clumsy word which entirely fails to describe the acting talent, insight, and ability on offer. This is a triptych of heavy-lifting portraiture which captures not only the individuals but also their relationships with one another in this super-select creative group.

Damian Williams as Cooper delivers a masterclass in pathos done proper. There is an edge and edginess to his performance, the ideal counterweight to Cooper’s larger-than-life utter daftness which Williams delivers by the leaky bucket full. Simon Cartwright as Bob Monkhouse is pitch perfect as he perfectly pitches every familiar gesture and on-screen mannerism. Bob Golding, reprising his take on Eric Morecambe, completes the picture with that characterful character study which has been celebrated as a Fringe favourite.

This is a show with big personalities requiring big performances and yet it is perfectly balanced. Even when the discord and tension are heating up, the drama stays steady and the laughs come fast and furious. Here is a play that does exactly what it says on the tin and does it really, really, really well. Get your dinner coats and fezes on and go see this!

 

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‘Victor’s Victoria’ Venue 20, until 25th AUG (not 7th or 20th)

Posted in 5*, Cabaret, EdFestivals 2024, Rated: Outstanding, Theatre by

“You may know him as Doc Holliday or Samson or Demetrius… I knew him as Dad.”

Editorial Rating: 5 Stars (Outstanding)

Spoiled for choice as we are at the Fringe for drama and stand-up comedy, it’s always good to side-step every now and again into that much-loved genre Cabaret & Variety. One of the standout shows in that category this year is this very engaging and entertaining show in the Drawing Room: one of the more cosy medium-sized theatres at the Assembly Rooms on George Street.

In this slick one-woman show, Victoria Mature – the daughter of Hollywood golden age legend Victor Mature (1913-1999) – tells the story of her life with a famous father. Though his star may have faded a little in recent years, even Generation Z must surely be familiar with that craggily handsome, lantern-jawed face from all of those sword-and-sandal biblical epics that show up on TV every Christmas and Easter? He was equally at home as a hard-boiled noir detective or in a Western. As his daughter notes early in this show: “You may know him as Doc Holliday or Samson or Demetrius…I knew him as Dad.”

As Victoria takes us through her own life and her father’s glittering career, her lively monologue is interspersed with projected movie clips inspired by his career. There are also musical interludes from several shows with which both she and her father were involved. As an opera singer with an international career, Ms. Mature certainly knows how to put a song over. We were treated to her warm, dramatic soprano voice, accompanied by a live pianist, giving powerfully emotional renditions of excerpts from Broadway shows and classical opera, as well as movie soundtrack favourites. The range of material is fascinating, ranging from Dvorak to Kurt Weil, via the Gershwins. No prima donna (in the pejorative sense, at least), Victoria cheerfully invited the audience to sing along with the best-known numbers.

Victoria has inherited a great deal of her late father’s showbiz sparkle. Her raven black hair reflects his Italian ancestry, accentuated by the off-the-shoulder black cocktail dress she wears throughout the show. Indeed, there were moments during the songs when, pouting in concentration between lines, there were striking glimpses of her father shining through in her facial expression.

In telling his and her life stories, there are anecdotes aplenty from the golden age of Hollywood. As a precocious child star herself, she met and worked with what sounds like a Who’s Who of studio-era Tinseltown. But this is no mere name-dropping exercise; her reminiscences of this bygone era are told with panache and all of the theatricality one would expect from a woman who had an insider’s view of the movie business.

The show runs at the Fringe until 25th August, so get along to see this, its UK premiere, while it’s still in a relatively small venue where the encounter is close-up and personal. I suspect we’ll be seeing and hearing more of it in the future.

‘The Untold Fable of Fritz’ (Bedfringe, 21 July 2024)

Posted in 5*, Bedfringe 2024, Rated: Outstanding by

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“A powerful story powerfully told by a company with a growing reputation as master distillers of ultra-fine blends of devised and scripted.”

Editorial Rating: 5 Stars (Outstanding)

There are few greater pleasures in this world than sitting back in your seat and sensing that your child is getting properly immersed in something special at the theatre. All that past handholding. All the previous coaxing. All those not-too-subtle BIG, LOUD, JOLLY shows that helped get us to this place, they’ve paid off. Feeding children’s minds is like feeding their wee bodies. There comes a (much-needed) point where subtlety, craft, and nuance creep in and take a seat at the table. Tomato ketchup gets substituted with olive oil. Tea and cake take the place of lemonade and Harribo. If you are wise, which I am not, this will have been an organic maturation with the pace set by the growing human entrusted to your care.

ME: “I don’t like sitting front row centre.” HER: “Well I do.” We take our seats. All this learning to share things, places, and experiences involves compromise. I tell myself that giving in every time is helping to show her how to compromise. I’m not sure that’s the take-home she’s learning. And yet, it was a good choice by Daughter 1.0 (9yrs). What’s about to envelop us is 45mins of immersive storytelling by a company that excels in small, subtly unmissable detail.

The heir to the throne is sick. Very sick. The King must take him on a journey of recovery through the ice and the snow. From the low to the high. From sunlit heights of majesty to icy depths of helplessness. It’s a powerful story powerfully told by a company with a growing reputation as master distillers of ultra-fine blends of devised and scripted.

Unsettled Theatre is a company which places mindfulness and sensitivity at the heart of its process. And yet, the group successfully summit a story about a king, about a man, who is anything but. They plant their flag on this perilous peak without, and this is the genius bit, without oversimplifying the toxicity or trauma. This truly is a healing space. The pre-Newtonian gravity of Philip Pullman’s original concept, on which the story is based, grounds proceedings in an ultra-linear, ultra-fluid calm until at the pivotal moments, just for an instant, the safety curtain between modern secular theatre and the ecstatic sensations of drama as known to the ancients falls. We glimpse the almighty power humans share to transport ourselves beyond a particular moment and location.

In her notebook, the one with a painting of the Brontitallian statue of Arthur Dent on the cover, Daughter 1.0 wrote:

“At the Bedford festival fringe I saw the untold fable of Fritz. I really enjoyed it and would definefly want to see it again. There are some happy bits in it and a few sad bits. There was a very cool bit were all the lights go off but there is one light behind a sheet and you could see the shadow of a small cart which I thought was very cool. I also thought thoght the wooden doll that played Fritz was also cool. Fritz is very mischevious but is very good at games! I really recomend it!”

Come for a show that pushes creative boundaries while pressing all the right buttons. Stay for the stagecraft. Leave knowing that productions of this quality are out there waiting to be discovered. Get your warmest coats on (seriously, your very warmest coats) and go see this!

Reviewer: Dan Lentell

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