Footloose started life as a 1984 film musical, starring Kevin Bacon. Reviews were mixed, but it went on to gross over 80 million dollars. It is yet another tale of a stranger coming to a sleepy backwoods town and shaking things up. In this particular instance the stranger is a young lad called Ren whose father has recently run off, forcing him and his mother to move to Bomont, a remote spot in West Virginia.
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Despite its dark theme, Out Of Sky has a celebratory feel, fueled by the young actors’ obvious joy in performing. Co-directed by Julia Head and Jack Orozco Morrison, this play is packed with an extraordinary variety of images and ideas, perhaps a little too much so, but they and their talented writer should be congratulated for such inventiveness and ambition. All of Splint Theatre should be very proud of what they have achieved.
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Although his first big hit was the comedy French Without Tears, Rattigan is best known today for serious dramas depicting the upper-middle class struggling with barely suppressed emotional conflicts. We certainly don’t think of him as a farceur. Nevertheless, the decidedly farcical While The Sun Shines was his biggest hit in its day and ran for well over a thousand performances at the Globe . . . Yes, it’s a period piece, but a good one. Thoroughly enjoyable.
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There is much in Spill that is excruciatingly funny and, to these old ears, downright peculiar – I shall never look at a shower curtain in quite the same way again. But in general we are not invited to mock, but rather to empathise. One of the characters is a poetically articulate gay man who ruefully recognizes that his experiences so far have clearly fallen far short of his aspirations . . . I am sure its multi-talented, energetic cast will have great success when they take Spill to the Edinburgh Fringe.
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Desperate Men have been devising highly original and often startling street theatre for 35 years . . . Dada prepared the ground for a wide range of ‘anti-establishment’ comedy; think of The Goons or Monty Python. Free from all the usual restraints of narrative, character and even language, Slapstick And Slaughter will not be to everyone’s taste, but it’s perfect for the Wardrobe and was received rapturously last night. Street theatre indoors! I loved it.
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