Tag Archives: Tom Lorcan

Beryl

★★½

Arcola Theatre

Beryl

Beryl

 Arcola Theatre

Reviewed – 23rd October 2019

★★½

 

“direction lacks subtlety, and the broad strokes with which all the characters are painted make for a repetitive evening”

 

Beryl Burton is an unsung sporting heroine; an extraordinary sportswoman whose list of achievements is mindblowing. She was a cyclist, and records that she created in the 1960s and 70s stood for 20 years and more; her 12 hour distance record standing for an astonishing 50 years, only finally to be broken two years ago. She was a working class Yorkshirewoman, wife and mother, yet despite being decorated by the Queen, remains almost unknown in the popular history of British sport. Maxine Peake has sought to change that with this play, first performed five years ago in 2014. It is easy to see why Peake was attracted to Beryl’s story. Peake is a proud Notherner as well as an outspoken feminist and socialist, and Beryl’s very Yorkshire breed of grit and determination, allied with the fact that she has been largely buried by history, dovetails neatly with Peake’s passions. The problem lies with the fact that, outside the parameters of her sporting life, Beryl led an unremarkable life. She was happily married to her exceptionally supportive husband from an early age – it was he, in fact, who first got her on a bike – and had a daughter, Denise, who became a competitive cyclist herself. Beryl was diagnosed with a heart problem when she was still at school, which she refused to let restrict her sporting ambition, and ultimately she succumbed to a heart attack, just short of her 59th birthday party.

The fact that Beryl’s life was so unremarkable only magnifies her extraordinary sporting talent. It does not, however, make for riveting theatre. There is precious little drama in Beryl’s story, and Peake’s decision to write it, documentary style, as a linear narrative, from her school days to her death, does nothing to help lift it off the page. Ed Ullyart’s design works well, and treads the right line between playfulness and functionality, but Marieke Audsley’s direction lacks subtlety, and the broad strokes with which all the characters are painted make for a repetitive evening. Audsley has chosen to liven up the story by creating slapstick cameos throughout, but with only varying degrees of success. Mark Conway clearly has a gift for this type of work, and creates some terrific characters and comedy moments, not least owing to his deft physical work, but the other two supporting cast members frequently fall flat in these situations. There are some bizarre directorial choices too; why, for instance, do the two authority figures (teacher and doctor) in Yorkshire, speak in exaggerated RP? And, given the small size of Arcola Studio 2, why does one of the actors continually shout all their lines? It became exhausting to watch.

Jessica Duffield, as Beryl, is believable as the ordinary woman with extraordinary drive, but the script doesn’t give her much opportunity to flesh her out beyond that. There are some flashes of dramatic interest in the second half, when we are briefly allowed to see a less sympathetic side to Beryl’s character, but they are never developed, to the play’s detriment. What we do see an awful lot of is Beryl on her bike. There’s no denying that it makes a good stage picture to see her pedalling away on stage, but once you’ve seen it and got the point, you’ve seen it and got the point. Tom Lorcan was charming as Beryl’s husband, and again, did his best with the skin-deep sketch given to him by the script, but there was nowhere for him to go. He is the same man at the end as the one we meet at the beginning. Perhaps that is how he actually was (although that would be surprising, given the nature of his wife’s ambition) but there’s no drama there.

Maybe in an effort to address the inherent lack of theatre in this tale, Maxine Peake intermittently gets the actors to break the fourth wall. They make quips about their agents and auditions, and the low-budget nature of the production. This meta-theatrical device doesn’t work however, precisely because of the lack of theatre in the main narrative. It merely has the whiff of in-jokes in the school playground, and sets us further apart as an audience, rather than inviting us in. There’s no doubt that Beryl Burton should be remembered, but her story might have been better served by Maxine Peake herself, in a monologue of half the duration.

 

Reviewed by Rebecca Crankshaw

Photography by Alex Brenner

 


Beryl

 Arcola Theatre until 16th November

 

Last ten shows reviewed at this venue:
Stop and Search | ★★ | January 2019
The Daughter-In-Law | ★★★★★ | January 2019
Little Miss Sunshine | ★★★★★ | April 2019
The Glass Menagerie | ★★★★ | May 2019
Radio | ★★★★ | June 2019
Riot Act | ★★★★★ | June 2019
Chiflón, The Silence of the Coal | ★★★★ | July 2019
The Only Thing A Great Actress Needs, Is A Great Work And The Will To Succeed | ★★★ | July 2019
Anna Bella Eema | ★★★ | September 2019
Meet Me At Dawn | ★★★ | October 2019

 

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The Sweet Science of Bruising
★★★★

Wilton’s Music Hall

The Sweet Science of Bruising

The Sweet Science of Bruising

Wilton’s Music Hall

Reviewed – 7th June 2019

★★★★

 

“Now in a venue every bit as grand as the writing deserves, The Sweet Science of Bruising is a gripping spectacle”

 

If you were given a minute to name as many stories about boxing as you could, you’d probably get into double figures. After all, there were six Rocky films alone. However, if this was narrowed down to women’s boxing, you might get Million Dollar Baby and then hit a wall.

In ‘The Sweet Science of Bruising’, Joy Wilkinson has written a worthy addition to this untapped canon. The play follows four women from different stratum of Victorian society who take up fisticuffs for a plethora of reasons: to champion women’s equality, to overcome domestic abuse or just because they’re good at lamping people. The first act romps along with the sort of feelgood factor – all upper cuts and corsets – that wouldn’t be out of place in the sort of Britcom film starring Gemma Arterton. However, things take a turn for the darker after the interval and there are several devastating moments that take the wind out of you.

The production premiered at Southwark Playhouse last October and since then, you can tell it’s been honed further, with the overall pacing now as lean as a boxer weighing in pre-fight. Some of the dialogue is ladled on a bit thick, but only to minor detriment. The main change is, of course, the venue and it’s difficult to imagine anywhere more fitting to stage it than Wilton’s Music Hall. Built in real life only ten years before the play was set, the venue certainly adds a seedy realness to the underground fighting in the script. Director Kirsty Patrick Ward utilises the space brilliantly. One climatic fight scene has the majority of the ten-strong cast rushing in and out of the wings and onto the balconies in such an explosive manner that it has your eyes darting about like a dog watching a volleyball match. Even the subtle touches are there too – a layer of dry ice hangs in the air like the sort of deep Victorian smog in which Jack the Ripper lurked.

Credit must go to Kate Waters, the fight director – not a title you see on a programme all too often. What could have easily looked like drama school graduates pulling on boxing gloves for the first time actually looked fairly convincing. In fact, Fiona Skinner – who was difficult to prise your eyes off as the hyperactive northern lass Polly Stokes – looked like she could be quite handy in the ring if the whole thesp thing doesn’t work out. What’s more, while it seems churlish to pick out a male actor’s performance for particular praise in a play all about female empowerment, Owen Brenman is especially amusing as the verbose Svengali figure who organises the bouts.

Now in a venue every bit as grand as the writing deserves, The Sweet Science of Bruising is a gripping spectacle that never drops in quality and doesn’t shirk in getting stuck into the burning injustices of the time.

 

Reviewed by Joe Holyoake

Photography by Mitzi de Margary

 


The Sweet Science of Bruising

Wilton’s Music Hall until 29th June

 

Last ten shows reviewed at this venue:
A Midsummer Night’s Dream | ★★★½ | June 2018
Sancho – An act of Remembrance | ★★★★★ | June 2018
Twelfth Night | ★★★ | September 2018
Dietrich – Natural Duty | ★★★★ | November 2018
The Box of Delights | ★★★★ | December 2018
Dad’s Army Radio Hour | ★★★★ | January 2019
The Good, The Bad And The Fifty | ★★★★ | February 2019
The Pirates Of Penzance | ★★★★ | February 2019
The Shape Of the Pain | ★★★★★ | March 2019
The Talented Mr Ripley | ★★★★ | May 2019

 

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