Tag Archives: Ana Inés Jabares-Pita

RHINOCEROS

★★★★

Almeida Theatre

RHINOCEROS

Almeida Theatre

★★★★

“an appeal to the senses, an experience as peculiar and nonsensical as a fit of the giggles”

Director Omar Elerian’s electrifying interpretation of the absurdist classic Rhinoceros is as much about theatre as it is about marauding pachyderms.

In his vision of French Romanian writer Eugene Ionesco’s 1959 fable, Elerian meticulously parodies the conventions of theatre and presents them back to the audience with a knowing wink.

In this case, theatre becomes a series of artificial and disconnected moments that meld alchemically into a kaleidoscopic whole.

People don’t so much talk to each other as engage in the mechanics of dialogue, delivering nonsensical retorts and ever spiralling repetitions. No-one listens. Communication is impossible. Extended riffs on, say, the number of horns on the eponymous rhinoceros rise into a dizzying tumult of words, sometimes pin sharp, then losing focus, only to return to a semblance of meaning measured by weight alone.

The audience is puzzled, bored, irritated, mesmerised, intrigued, amused – often within the same minute.

In an overlong and sometimes grating production, the story features a provincial French village – perhaps something out of a Wes Anderson movie – with a cast of deadpan pedants and eccentrics. A rhinoceros charges through the village square causing chaos. Then another, which tramples a cat. Soon it emerges that the villagers themselves are becoming the beasts.

Political writer Ionescu was, perhaps, thinking of the spread of fascism in pre-war France, making points about conformity and appeasement to the monstrous.

Elerian, wisely, veers away from heavy-handed politics and leans into the comedy. In his own translation, he updates the gags to include references to Covid, Wallace and Gromit and Severance. He gathers about him a troupe of actors superbly adept at the challenge of farce.

John Biddle, Hayley Carmichael, Paul Hunter, Joshua McGuire, Anoushka Lucas, Sophie Steer, and Alan Williams – in suitable white coats against a box-of-tricks white stage – are put through their paces in a series of scenarios, like an improv troupe picking suggestions out of a top hat.

Elerian creates a grandiose, meta-flecked circus – complete with clowns, kazoos and funny wigs. His message appears to be that laughter creates community when meaning fails.

In the most effective sequence McGuire, as Jean, battles with the agonies of transformation, a rousing set piece that exemplifies the thrilling choreography that is a highlight of the production.

Like Jean, the villagers succumb one by one to the plague until the hero of the piece, flustered slob and everyman Berenger (Ṣọpẹ́ Dìrísù), is left on his own, making a stand against the onslaught.

At this point, anti-theatre becomes theatre again. Rhinoceros finally relies on the tropes of storytelling to make a connection – but too late. Without the groundwork, this burst of coherent humanity feels unearned.

Never mind. Rhinoceros is an appeal to the senses, an experience as peculiar and nonsensical as a fit of the giggles.



RHINOCEROS

Almeida Theatre

Reviewed on 1st April 2025

by Giles Broadbent

Photography by Marc Brenner

 

 

 


 

Previously reviewed at this venue:

OTHERLAND | ★★★★ | February 2025
WOMEN, BEWARE THE DEVIL | ★★★★ | February 2023

 

 

RHINOCEROS

RHINOCEROS

RHINOCEROS

PRIDE & PREJUDICE* (*SORT OF)

★★★

UK Tour

PRIDE & PREJUDICE* (*SORT OF)

Theatre Royal Windsor

★★★

“The audience were there for a fun night out and they left happy”

The UK national tour of Pride & Prejudice* (*Sort Of) opened this week at the beautiful Theatre Royal Windsor.

Pride & Prejudice* (*Sort Of) by Isobel McArthur, after Jane Austen, is a fun reinvention of Austen’s caustic tale of love and manners, performed by an all-female cast of five, with double-quick costume changes, playing all the roles. Audiences never seem to tire of the endless TV, films and theatre productions based on Austen’s beloved classic period romance, and devoted fans will quickly recognise a nod to Colin Firth’s Darcy “wet shirt” scene in this adaptation.

The original production of the show started life at the Tron Theatre in Glasgow, went to the Fringe, toured, transferred to the West End and won an Olivier Award for Best New Comedy in 2022. This current touring production feels somewhat re-hashed and clunky, knowing too well where the comedy moments are; be it the cast as baaing sheep, presenting a plate of Ferrero Rocher at a ball, grabbing a mike and singing a karaoke song or a quick change – it will get a laugh out of the audience. The biggest laughs of the night were always the casual expletives.…

Comedy is centre stage as we meet the five, playing below stairs maids wearing white Regency style petticoats and yellow marigolds, cleaning the Bennet family’s chamber pots. They rue Austen’s lack of care for the servants in her books, who never get a happy ending. Then with a grab of a microphone they break into song and turn into Mrs Bennet and the five Bennet sisters – well four Bennet sisters, we don’t ever meet Kitty.

McArthur’s adaptation is for modern audiences to enjoy and mostly keeps close to the original story of the Regency period dating game, when women could not inherit wealth and must marry for financial gain. A few new touches include friend Charlotte’s unrequited love for Elizabeth Bennet – but she still ends up with Mr Collins.

The cast of young actresses Emma Rose Creaner, Eleanor Kane, Rhianna McGreevy, Naomi Preston Low and Christine Steel clearly relish all the roles that they play as the tale of the uncouth Mrs Bennet’s race to marry off her five dowry-less daughters before they lose the family home unfolds. We never meet Mr Bennet, who is played by a back facing armchair reading an open newspaper – genius casting! Love is eventually found with Mr Bingley and Mr Darcy but not with the devil may care Wickham.

Slightly disconcerting to the ear, was the fact that all the Bennet family members had different accents, as the cast were playing them with their own natural accent, making the production feel slightly studenty, but perhaps that was the intention. A standout moment was Rhianna McGreevy capturing Darcy’s pride with his sincere love for Elizabeth Bennet, with the audience routing for him to win her hand. And then there was Emma Rose Creaner whose every role was beautifully delivered be it her feisty Irish maid, the accident prone, stuck hand in a Pringle carton Mr Bingley, the dull yet softly spoken Charlotte or the stuck-up vicious Caroline Bingley.

Ana Inés Jabares-Pita’s set featuring a curved staircase, was cleverly designed to transform into another stately home or ballroom by simply adding a modern standard lamp or a life size horse (!), and her costumes were uncomplicated yet said everything that needed to be said about each character.

The audience were there for a fun night out and they left happy.



PRIDE & PREJUDICE* (*SORT OF)

Theatre Royal Windsor then UK Tour continues

Reviewed on 17th February 2025

by Debbie Rich

Photography by Mihaela Bodlovic

 

 

 


 

 

 

 

Previously reviewed at this venue:

BOYS FROM THE BLACKSTUFF | ★★★★ | January 2025
FILUMENA | ★★★★ | October 2024
THE GATES OF KYIV | ★★★★ | September 2024
ACCOLADE | ★★★½ | June 2024
OH WHAT A LOVELY WAR | ★★★★ | April 2024
CLOSURE | ★★★★ | February 2024
THE GREAT GATSBY | ★★★ | February 2024
ALONE TOGETHER | ★★★★ | August 2023

PRIDE

PRIDE

PRIDE