Stan’s Café and Birmingham Repertory Theatre present Made Up, a play in which the audience get a glimpse behind the scenes of the glamourous world of the movies. Blending seamlessly together humorous dialogue with the unique idea of live theatrical makeup.
Made Up centres around two characters, Sue, the well experienced makeup artist and Kate the fresh-faced actress. Sue, played by Alexis Tuttle instantly became a likeable character with witty remarks and lightning fast comebacks, making the audience connect with the character. Tuttle seems to work well in this piece as the maternal figure, taking the young inexperienced Kate under her wing.
Emily Holyoake plays Kate, a successful actress, representing today’s generic actress of the Hollywood obsessed industry. However, her portray of this character fell flat, as Kate lacked the energy behind her performance.
Made Up really focuses on the stories of these two ladies, looking at their friendship and how talking about each other’s problems bond them together. However, with all these issues that come up in the piece, each one seems to be mentioned but doesn’t go into much detail. Consequently the audience aren’t given time to think over the problem they have been presented with, before the dialogue has moved on, as if too many points are trying to be covered in a 70 minute play.
So many issues and situations were presented to the audience in such a short space of time, that when the performers started changing characters it became difficult for the audience to keep up with what all the different scenarios were. There were a few moments this worked well, however towards the end of the piece this just got too much for the audience to keep up with and became confusing.
Made Up, also focuses on doing live makeup, this was great element that was really enjoyable to watch for the audience, yet this felt like the performers seemed to be limited by this, as the makeup had to be rushed, so it wasn’t done to standard that it would be for the camera. Even with this factor, this is something I have never seen on the stage in a play, and has huge potential to be pushed into an exceptional element.
The concept of this piece is very original in its design, with something always for the audience to be watching, including its interesting theatrical makeup transformations. However, this piece lacked the vital energy that the audience needed to fully engage with the characters. ★★☆☆☆ Georgina Randall 18th May 2016
