★★★★

“a beautifully told love story”

Firebird by Richard Hough tells the story of Sergey Fetisov during the 1970s in occupied Estonia, and how he fell in love with fighter pilot Roman Matvejev. Due to homophobic attitudes in the soviet regime – still present today – they’re ability to keep their love secret is challenging and ends up splitting Roman and Sergey’s life into pieces.

Hough succeeds in adapting the previously made screenplay of the same name of this story into a well crafted and succinct 90 minute stage play. The pacing of the action is good and doesn’t linger on any unnecessary details. Immediately introducing the three central characters via a play boxing fight before a radio recording of the news at the time, established both the key points of the characters’ relationship dynamics, as well as the context of the time period. Despite the play being based on Sergey’s memoir; Roman was framed as the central character – depicting how he was likely central to Sergey’s life. Roman follows Sergey through his life throughout the story, but it is always Roman who leads the way. Robert Eades plays Roman with an incredible sense of optimism wrapped around a straight backed matter-of-fact and blunt approach. This contrasts with Theo Walker’s Sergey, who is often nervous and confused, yet innately curious and controversial. I did find I often struggled to see romantic or sexual chemistry from the pair. The initial kiss felt stiff and out of nowhere due to not seeing any flirting or hints to their attraction previously. In the end, however, their love is believable and creates some wonderfully touching moments.

Another key component in Roman’s wild affairs is Luisa Jannsen, played by Sorcha Kennedy. Kennedy is incredibly engaging in her performance, I was often drawn closely to her eyes and found a whole world of truth and emotion deep within them. Nigel Hastings also stands out as Colonel Alexei Kuznestov, with excellent focus, poignant intention and a flare with the rhythm of the text. All are complemented by Owen Lewis’ direction which manages to make an intimate staging feel massive with an incredible use of space, that manages to glide through different locations and times with ease. Clancy Flynn’s lighting design must also be praised at this point, often fading between warm or cool tones to indicate different locations based on their atmospheric tone. There was also one sequence where various colourful lights were used to portray fireworks, which then quickly transitioned to an explosion. A subtle yet effective portrayal of the events moving forward. The same can be said of Gregor Donnelly’s design, with the use of a simple set that leaves the stage pretty much bare asides a few pieces of furniture: two stage-like wooden blocks, a few chairs, a desk. All of which are transported throughout the piece as and when needed, achieving the same goal of making the intimate staging feel larger than it is.

Overall, Firebird is a beautifully told love story that shows how happiness can be found in human connection in spite of all the challenges put against it.

CANNED GOODS

Southwark Playhouse Borough

★★★

“The final scenes are affecting – the clever use of lighting being one of the stars of the show”

A farmer, a petty thief and a Jewish philosopher walk up to some bars. Sounds like the beginning of a bad taste joke. And it is. This is the sickest of all jokes as the three mismatched Third Reich prisoners – the eponymous Canned Goods – are fattened, flattered and sold a lie about their date with destiny.

So why are they receiving unexpected kindnesses from their SS jailers? The answer is to be found in the programme notes which somewhat drains the evening of tension.

This is writer Erik Kahn’s retelling of the Gleiwitz incident on August 31, 1939, which effectively began World War Two.

The Gleiwitz Incident was a false flag operation carried out by Nazi Germany to create a pretext for invading Poland. In the incident, SS operatives, dressed in Polish military uniforms, attacked a German radio station in the town of Gleiwitz.

To bolster the illusion, they used the bodies of prisoners, dressed them in Polish uniforms, and left them at the site as “evidence” for the Press to photograph.

Much of what is known about Gleiwitz comes from the affidavit of SS-Sturmbannführer Alfred Naujocks at the Nuremberg trials. In this uneven production, Naujocks – all oily smiles, cognac, and swirling cigarette smoke – re-creates the operation as grand theatre, alluding to our complicity as docile and gullible voyeurs.

Among those whose bodies were left behind were that of Honiok (Tom Wells) who had Polish sympathies. Others were anonymous prisoners of Dachau and here they are revived and given names and lives to lose. They are wry Jewish teacher Birnbaum (Charlie Archer) and petty criminal and anti-Semite Kruger (Rowan Polonski), naively patriotic to the end. Archer and Polonski provide the most nuanced performances of an evening consisting mostly of archetypes.

The conceit is rich in potential – stick three contrasting figures in a cell, give them an occasional stir by the provocative Naujacks (a lupine Dan Parr) and then set them raging against the dying of the light. But the three never have time to evolve much beyond their prescriptive origin stories, the script lacking rhythm and momentum in director Charlotte Cohn’s ambitious but over fussy production.

The play is presented as a series of academic explorations of war – from polemics on anti-Semitism, to the role of God on the battlefield – issued as pleas from clueless pawns in a global conflict.

The prisoners, whose performances are rigorous and well-constructed, hold out the tantalising hope that they might break free from their oratorical straitjackets and become rounded characters, but this promise is too frequently snatched away in the rush to hammer home some on-the-nose point about Hitler being a bad sort.

The final scenes are affecting – the clever use of lighting (by Ryan Joseph Stafford) being one of the stars of the show. And the image of a press photographer posing bodies brings us smack up to date with evocations of Abu Ghraib and the shocking iconography of degradation.

Ultimately, though, the play demands less of us than the subject matter should insist upon.

FIREBIRD

King’s Head Theatre

★★★★

“a beautifully told love story”

FIREBIRD

King’s Head Theatre

Reviewed on 21st January 2025

by David Robinson

Photography by Geraint Lewis

Previously reviewed at this venue:

FIREBIRD

FIREBIRD

FIREBIRD

CANNED GOODS

Southwark Playhouse Borough

★★★

“The final scenes are affecting – the clever use of lighting being one of the stars of the show”

CANNED GOODS

Southwark Playhouse Borough

Reviewed on 20th January 2025

by Giles Broadbent

Photography by Mark Senior

Recently reviewed at Southwark Playhouse venues:

Canned Goods

Canned Goods

Canned Goods