Dominic Gettins Archives - Page 5 of 18

Moby Dick

Jack Studio Theatre

Reviewed – 10th October 2019

★★★★★

“Technically slick, the lighting, sound, music and movement coalesce to create a West End experience in miniature”

When Ishmael arrives at ‘The Spouter’ run by Peter Coffin, it’s clear Moby Dick’s author, Herman Melville, loves an ominous portent, so he would have loved the fact that the opening week of Douglas Baker’s stage adaptation started with a dead humpback in the Thames. However, with humanity’s disregard for nature a central theme of both the book and this radical new envisioning, Melville would have seen the current climate change protests as just as relevant and a dark testament to his prophetic work.

Rather like Theatre Workshop’s ‘Oh! What a Lovely War’, the full throttle irreverence in the treatment of a deadly serious subject is a powerfully winning formula for this ‘So it Goes Theatre’ production. Accentuating the homoerotic undercurrents and humour of the original while modernising its scope to encompass the problems of junk food, plastic waste and reckless corporate behaviour, the show miraculously manages not only to remain faithful to the essence of this literary leviathan, but to make it fresh and accessible though the inventive use of projections, Baker’s own video design and some corking sea shanties (Alex Chard).

It’s not immediately clear that the approach will hold water. The opening sketch leading to the book’s iconic first line ‘Call me Ishmael’, is inspired, but seems to be based on the trivial fact that Starbucks derived its name (fairly randomly) from the Pequod’s first mate. However, the storyline cleverly pivots into Ishmael’s meditation that whenever life becomes formless and incomprehensible on land he hankers for the sea, where a sense of comradeship, structure and purpose creates, paradoxically, more certainty. Which is all fine until Captain Ahab’s obsession with the great white whale increasingly becomes a madness that embraces murder and waste without conscience.

Charlie Tantam conveys Ahab’s destructive will with increasing force, assisted by a terrifyingly exaggerated limp. Equally accomplished are Rob Peacock as Old Ishmael and Ben Howarth as Young Ishmael; collectively they comprise an ingenious narrative tool allowing the book’s narrator voice to survive alongside the thrill of the protagonist’s journey. Stephen Erhirhi is a distant and disengaged Queequeg at first, though his detachment takes on heavy significance later as he accepts the fate that the humanity of which he is a part has in store. Lucianne Regan plays Starbuck fairly straight too, but as an ensemble they are well balanced and create the movement of the ship in a storm and the hunting scenes with great skill. Technically slick, the lighting (Toby Smith), sound (Calum Perrin), music (Richard Kerry) and movement (Matthew Coulton) coalesce to create a West End experience in miniature, overseen by Douglas Baker’s direction. This format for Moby Dick neutralises the dense 19th Century prose without losing some of its finer passages, whilst delivering quite the topical punch.

Reviewed by Dominic Gettins

Photography by Carl Fletcher

Moby Dick

Jack Studio Theatre until 26th October

Last ten shows reviewed at this venue:

Sweet Like Chocolate Boy | ★★★★★ | November 2018

Cinderella | ★★★ | December 2018

Gentleman Jack | ★★★★ | January 2019

As A Man Grows Younger | ★★★ | February 2019

Footfalls And Play | ★★★★★ | February 2019

The Silence Of Snow | ★★★ | March 2019

Queen Of The Mist | ★★★½ | April 2019

The Strange Case Of Jekyll & Hyde | ★★★★★ | September 2019

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★★★½

“As a concept, it’s alluring in its originality”

Though it has a love triangle storyline in common, this is not Mary Shelley’s Trial of Love, but an ambitious fusion of genres and styles all its own, vaulting across time and space between Chinese opera and Western horror, physical theatre and black comedy.

It starts with a nicely turned sitcom premise. A wealthy Chinese bachelor studying in London, Archie (Sam Goh), calls in Annie (Rhyanna Alexander-Davis), a specialist in exorcising oriental spirits, via a very plausible app called Ghostbusters. After the initial confusion caused by Annie’s black South Londoner identity, Annie discovers that Archie’s girlfriend, Hannah (Seisha Butler), is possessed by the spirit of Ann (Ning Lu), the lover Archie left behind in China. In a sudden change of mood, Ann now takes over the stage to sing her sad story, in flowing costume and with precise dance steps in the Chinese opera tradition. Then the genre moves on to ‘scary movie’, as Ann’s ghost variously inhabits, fights and controls the other characters.

As a concept, it’s alluring in its originality. Despite modern setting and dialogue the performance retains the formal quality it inherits from its roots, with percussion marking the beats, stylised poses and exaggerated facial expressions to portray the emotional narrative. There is a suspicion that the production is forged into its unusual shape to suit the personnel available, yet as an apparently random collision of ideas it wards off the ever-present danger of baffling the audience. Ning Lu’s classical training is apparent as Ann, but Director Sally Jiayun Xu must take much credit for blending the ensemble so fluidly, as well as for the production’s (otherwise uncredited) art direction, careful use of colours and costume.

The script is a kind of love triangle itself, between the Director’s modernisation of an ancient tale and its westernisation by Dwain Brown but, however it was devised, its tight dialogue and meticulous execution allow it to slalom through funny, then beautiful, magical then scary without much difficulty, very much helped by slick lighting changes (Melanie Percy) and sound (Andrea Lungay). The mesmerising spectacle ends with a neat coda as tea is ritually taken by the remaining characters.

Though elegantly done, there are a few holes and oddities, perhaps lost in translation. Archie is supposed to be wealthy, yet later appears to be financially supported by his hardworking, abandoned first lover, who is also busy haunting his girlfriend. The theme of stereotyping and interrelating cultures that is set up so intriguingly at the start is undermined by being left unexplored. The unhelpful naming of the characters appears to be an unmotivated whim. However, the outcome is fresh, witty, visually enchanting and not without depth, while the universal themes of love, greed and betrayal keep it one piece.

Reviewed by Dominic Gettins

Jack Studio Theatre

Reviewed – 10th October 2019

★★★★★

“Technically slick, the lighting, sound, music and movement coalesce to create a West End experience in miniature”

Reviewed by Dominic Gettins

Photography by Carl Fletcher

Moby Dick

Jack Studio Theatre until 26th October

Last ten shows reviewed at this venue:

Bread and Roses Theatre

Reviewed – 11th September 2019

★★★½

“As a concept, it’s alluring in its originality”

Though it has a love triangle storyline in common, this is not Mary Shelley’s Trial of Love, but an ambitious fusion of genres and styles all its own, vaulting across time and space between Chinese opera and Western horror, physical theatre and black comedy.

Reviewed by Dominic Gettins

Trial of Love

Bread and Roses Theatre until 14th September

Previously reviewed at this venue: