Me and my Freedom Pass

2012-01-25T16:33:00.000Z

Cliff didn't Make it to Lowestoft

Maybe I thought myself too mature for the early 1960s pop music scene. In 1963 I turned 20 and was living in Portsmouth, where my husband was a full-time student at the Polytechnic, so maybe there was too much going on in my immediate circle to take much notice. I remember we played a lot of Subuteo, when I wasn't busy as an unqualified teacher in a local junior school. All the same, it was there in the background, I suppose, on the radio.

Luckily, I have a music-loving friend who lives a short walk away from Churchill Theatre, Bromley. So when I volunteered to review 'Save the Last Dance for Me' and it was one of Roy's bridge nights, I was very happy to have Diana sitting next to me to offer comments.

'Mm, the choeography looks a bit samey', I'd say, thinking it was mainly arm- waving,' but she remind me the stage was a tad small. Another thing she noticed, which I probably never would, was how well individuals played their instruments. For me the sounds were pleasant and faintly familiar from a rock n roll era that never really captured my attention when I was of an age to appreciate it.

Here's my review on The Public Reviews website:

Dramatic Island

2012-01-11T17:19:00.000Z

Puerto del Carmen in the Canary Islands,where I spent the last three weeks,compared badly with London in two respects. I couldn't use my Freedom Pass to get around and there were no theatres or cinemas. Why wasn't I more bothered? I decided it was because Lanzarote is pretty dramatic of itself.

Apart from one or two coach excursions, instead of sitting on trains and buses I walked. Since my favourite Galician restaurant was at the far end of the resort, my pedometer clocked up at least five or six miles a day. With a pause for coffee at a beachside terrace we strolled along the firm sand of the Playa Grande or on the wide promenade opposite a line of bars and souvenir shops known locally as 'The Strip'. These resembled Blackpool's Golden Mile' and offered 'English breakasts' at €2.50.

They soon petered to small bungalows in the quieter suburbs of Los Pocillos and Matagorda with their five-star hotels. Apparently it was Lanzarote's 'Gaudi', architect Cesar Manrique, who persuaded the island's goverment not to allow the behemoth hotels that loom over the mainland Costas. Lanzarote offers clear vistas of volcanic mountains that cover the interior of the island

It all seemed like a brightly lit play. Characters unswathed in layers of thick clothing show more expressive body language. Their gestures and speech are expansive, their clothes varied and colourful. Checkered pedal-pushers, plastic 'flitflops' and baseball hats or floppy brims look good with bronzed skin.

The restaurants entertained, too, with bright salads to accompany grilled fish or 'sizzling prawns' or the likes of 'conejo caza' or hunter's rabbit. Piquant red and green sauces called 'mojos' accompanied the ubiquitous 'papas arrugadas' - golf-ball-sized potatoes cooked in brine until their skins shrivelled.

It seems to be a rule on the island that all houses are painted a sparkling white, to contrast with the black volcanic soil and rocky outcrops of the interior. Palm trees are mainly of the squat 'bottle palm' variety, fed from irrigation tubes that lay on the surface, or bright profusions of purple, pink and yellow bouganvillea.

This trip we made no excursion to the island's many scenic attractions - volcanic 'fire mountains',lake-filled grottoes and lava bubbles big enough to turn into living rooms. I did bring back a small bougainvillea plant. By Summer it may ramble round my front door covered in brilliant blooms.

2011-11-23T18:50:00.011Z

Bikes and Horses: Watching Films and Plays

Two plays I attended in West End theatres recently were ones I'd already seen as films, in both cases some years before. Although films and plays have ingredients in common -storyline, acting and settings, to name the three most important elements, I think they're very different.

What it boils down to, really, is that watching plays needs more effort, and I don't just mean having to book in advance and tunr up on time or they might not let you in.

A film runs the same every time regardless of the audience, but actors in a play rely on a response to bring out their best performances. It's the difference between riding a bike and riding a horse (not that I've ever ridden a horse)I was once an amateur actor, so I know something about it. Nowadays, when I'm in the audience,the nearer to the stage I am the more I feel obliged to respond to the actors.

In The Killing of Sister George at the Arts Theatre, for instance, I felt bound to laugh loudly at Meera Syals' lines. It was partly because I thought the actress playing Alice, or 'Childie' put in a weak performance. It wasn't down to me to compensate, but I'm sure I'm not the only member of the audience who felt the same.

I've seen the film of The Killing of Sister George twice, in the cinema and on TV, and thought it was much better than the play. It was funnier - Beryl Reid's tweedy drunk so much more credible as the radio soap's nurse on a scooter, and Suzannah York overtly playing up her sexual charms in her baby doll pyjamas, pretending (in close up) to relish eating George's cigar.

I can hardly remember the film Cool Hand Luke, probably because it's so long since I saw it. I just recall Paul Newman lying on his back on a pool table, his stomach swollen from eating fifty hard-boiled eggs for a bet.

I thought the play Cool Hand Luke at the Aldwych theatre was much better, because the staging was clever and the acting powerful. Marc Warren comes ready supplied with his eccentric loner persona ready-formed from his TV roles, in series such as Hustle.
I was impressed, too, by Lee Boardman, playing his side-kick and promoter,'Dragline'. He was the teeth-baring monster who terrorised Steve, landlord of Coronation Street's Rovers Return. Dragline, Luke's chief supporter in the prisoner bunk-house when he realises that there's money to be made, comes to admire the self-assured outsider bent on self-destruction. The complex role gave Boardman a chance to shine.

There was a real sense of the heat of the Deep South, created by lighting and acting. I liked the musical accompaniment provided by a quartet of female choristers - two gospel singers and two salvation Army members in uniform.

Someone once said that being in a cinema reminds us of the womb - floating in warm darkness, reluctant to return to the real world. Theatre, I think, wakens you up and gives you some responsibility. When all goes well, you feel you played a part the play's success.

2011-10-24T16:27:00.003+01:00

Picturing Montmartre: Toulouse Lautrec and Jane Avril at the Moulin Rouge at the Courtauld Institute ;Degas and the Ballet:Picturing Movement and the Royal Academy; Midnight in Paris(2011) dir.Woody Allen; French Cancan (1954) dir. Jean Renoir

A couple of exhibitions and films I've enjoyed recently featured the Parisian artists' quarter, Montmartre, in its glorious turn-of-the-century heighday.

Toulouse-Lautrec and Jane Avril at the Moulin Rouge was lavishly supplied with background information about the artist and his favourite muse. Jane Avril, not her real name, worked as a part-time prostitute before she entertained customers by dancing at the the Moulin Rouge. Toulouse Lautrec himself was an alcoholic and died young,from syphilis. A sense of decadence presided over the exhibits, reinforced by newspaper cuttings and articles that suggested Jane's gawky but frenzied dancing style and her emaciatied appearance was caused by infirmity. The paintings depicted a cast of grotesques, customers and entertainers alike.

There was relatively little information about Degas at the RA, and, for some visitors, too few of his paintings. He seems, going by the evidence, to have been not so much a stage-door Johnny as a backstage Peeping Tom with an eye for young girls in unusual poses. The emphasis in this exhibition was on early photography and its ability to capture movement, a quality that was to prove so useful to painters.

More prosaically, I once stayed in Montmartre on a home-swap holiday. Streets in the area consisted mainly of steps leading up to the great white dome of the Sacre Coeur, with a terrace in front that afforded a view of Paris stretching to the horizon.In the surrounding area, it was easy to imagine oneself back to a time when artists contributed to the Bohemian atmosphere of its cobbled streets and cafe-lined squares.

In a nearby 'place', artists had set up easels under the trees and drew portraits for tourists. Small shops had street displays of prints, with more inside including Monet's Waterlilies, Van Gogh's Sunflowers, plus tiny statuettes of Degas' Little Dancer of Fourteen Years.

Both exhibitions place the artists' work in the context of their time, a mileu explored to comic effect in Woody Allen's most recent film, Midnight in Paris.

Given a double dose of nostalgia and fantasy, it's no surprise that the protagonist, a would-be novelist played by Owen Wilson, is whisked back in time to meet habitues of the quartier who include Lautrec, Degas and Salvador Dali, as well as literary giants Hemingway and Gertrude Stein.

Bohemian decadence and nostalgia have their attractions, but for sheer charm I'd back Jean Renoir's film, French Cancan, which I saw at the BFI a few weeks ago. In the film, Jean Gabin plays the founder of Montmartre's most famous nightclub with a cool-eyed insouciance, but the real triumph is the studio recreation of Montmarte, whose streets and characters echo well-known artististic portrayals, and the final twenty-minutes of high-kicking exuberance, when the signature dance is performance before an enraptured audience in a packed Moulin Rouge

2011-10-04T15:40:00.025+01:00

When Bobby Met Dora Delaney: Fanny's First Play by GB Shaw at Pentameters Theatre

North Londoners are spoilt for fringe theatres, but I haven't met a homelier venue than the Pentameters, a couple of minutes walk from Hampstead underground station and attached to a popular pub.

The 60-seater space is straight out of Alice in Wonderland: like an untidy living room where children are about to put on a show. Three rows of chairs with a mix of cushions are ranged on steps opposite a shallow stage. Cardboard boxes under each seat apparently hold programmes from previous productions.

The stage set itself is sparse: a table with fold-down flaps and a lacy cloth, on which stands a tiny bell. Five Edwardian dining chairs with green velvet seats are set nearby. Dark, striped wallpaper and an oval mirror with an elaborate gilt frame complete the decor; in fact, the theatre's proprietor, Leonie Scott-Matthews, comes out at the start to apologise, explaining that Fanny's First Play is a touring production, and Pentameters' normal staging is usually more detailed. She reappears at the end, too - a charming personal touch, I thought.

Chatter drifts through from the pub's street tables during the performance, but that's alright, because the plot has a dinner party going on in an adjoining room. The pub is handy, too, on a warm night, except for the charge of £10 for two drinks and a packet of admittedly superior crisps. 'That Duvel is 8.5%,' remarked my companion, who stuck to the bitter. I balanced the bottle on the step beside me for the second half.

The relaxed atmosphere was superb, as was the play. One of the lead actors was weak, so I gave it four stars out of five in my review, but on reflection that was a bit mean.

2011-10-02T09:13:00.010+01:00

The Baker's Wife at The Union Theatre

It seemed a bit unlikely that a musical would fit into the tiny Union Theatre, where we'd last seen an excellent production of Somerset Maugham's For Services Rendered. The Baker's Wife was adapted into a musical in 1938 from a film by Marcel Pagnol but not staged until 1989, directed by Trevor Nunn at the Phoenix Theatre. It only ran for a month because despite winning an Evening Standard award it was losing money.

The theatre space was completely changed, with the seats in straight rows instead of arranged in a horshoe shape as they had been for the Maugham play, and the air dark with billowing smoke. Whoever was working the smoke machine for the rehearsal had overdone it, so the first scenes took place in light more reminiscent of a London fog than a Provencal afternoon. Later on, there was supposed to be a fire in the bakery, but no extra smoke was needed.

The rendition was competent for the slight tale of a discontented wife, although the ensemble routines seemed cramped. As it was press night, the management provided cakes in the cosy bar, to chime with the bakery theme. I was disappointed not to have wine, but was feeling peckish so that when a sweet almond and cherry slice proved to be the best I've ever tasted I overdid it by eating two pieces.

Last time we'd approached the theatre from the Waterloo end of Union Street,walking along The Cut but this time we came from London Bridge. All the pubs round Waterloo had been crammed to the rafters but on this occasion we spotted a quiet little place in Union Street in the other direction, called The Charles Dickens, where we enjoyed a peaceful pint while we discussed the play. Oddly enough, the beer was called Oscar Wilde.

My review appears on the Remotegoat website.

2011-09-29T17:56:00.011+01:00

Concrete Evidence: a visit to 2, Willow Road, NW3

Living in London, I'm very conscious of architecture, including the domestic kind; as I live in a small flat I was keen to see what a modernist designer made of a restricted living space.

Raised in a northern terrace, I find TV house-hunting programmes like Location, Location, Location a bit bizarre. Maybe I've seen too many Hong Kong movies, where people seem to live in cupboards, but for me, a home's a launchpad by day and a shelter at night. So Le Corbusier's description of a house as 'a machine for living' is spot on. It's a shame he's associated with the high-rise blocks of the 1950s onwards. He didn't anticipate cheap materials and the lack of infrastructure that characterise British council estates built on his principles.

I have no problem with small - a tiny living space is a reminder of one's status in the grand order of things and even, these days, a statement about scarce resources. I feel sympathetic to squatters in empty mansions- it's a shame the places they occupy are such 'folies de grandeur', with all the attendant problems. No wonder the owners leave them empty.

A scene from the film Educating Rita is a reminder of the 'knock-through' craze of the 1970s; terrace dwellers suddenly wanted the sense of space that the middle and upper classes took for granted. The eponymous heroine takes a sledgehammer to a dividing wall in the terraced house she shares with her husband and the comic collapse in a cloud of dust identifues it as a 'supporting wall'.

Erno Goldfinger solved the problem of how to provide space without internal supporting walls, in Willow Road, Hampstead. Unfortunately, as far as fellow Hampstead dwellers in their Victorian stone villas were concerned, it involved concrete; very non-traditional. There was a lot of opposition from the likes of novelist Ian Fleming. He was so incensed he named one of his most famous villains after the architect.

For me it's an example of a house that serves its purpose, as a place to live in, not a showcase for the owner's possessions costing a fortune to heat in an English winter. Having said that, Goldfinger knew some leading artists and examples of their work are dotted about the rooms. I'd recommend a visit to this interesting house, a short walk from Hampstead tube and now a National Trust property.

2011-09-16T10:11:00.037+01:00

Bring on the Dancing Girls: Crazy for You by George and Ira Gershwin at Regent's Park Open Air Theatre and Donizetti's The Elixir of Love at The Coliseum, St Martin's Lane

My parents hooked me up to American film musicals in the 1950s. I can understand why Jonathan Miller set his 2010 production of The Elixir of Love , now in revival at The Coliseum, in that era. There's a nostalgic connection for elderly opera-goers, and even younger audience members would know of Marilyn Monroe, if only from Andy Warhol. The female lead, Sarah Tynan, was a Marilyn look-alike.

When I pay £19 for a seat in the balcony, I expect a great production, and ENO doesn't let you down. We're talking London's biggest theatre, apart from the O2, and I didn't want a repeat of last year's Carmen, when I couldn't tell who was singing. So I took my binoculars.

The set works well - a revolving wedge-shaped diner in a desert landscape, with a petrol pump outside. There's even room for a pink and white cadillac to be driven onstage when the snake-oil salesman hits town with his cure for unrequited love. Baritone Andrew Shore is outstanding in the part.

Garrison Keillor, of Lake Woebegone fame, is cited by the programme notes as an influence. You can see why: there's down-home feeling, reinforced when when the despairing male lead thinks of joining the army. It contrasts with the overlay of glamour represented by the costumes and the Elvis-style cavorting in front of the diner's stage mic.

The words of the libretto appear above the stage on a kind of autocue, directed at the audience. I haven't heard this opera sung in Italian but the translation, given an American tang, raised a laugh and the opera is billed as a comic one. I'd say the lyrics were weakest part of the production , although they didn't interfere with the famous tenor aria 'La Furtiva Lacrima' in the second act, the news that 'Uncle Joe had kicked the bucket' strikes a crude note that's fairly typical.

I'd had high hopes since I saw Jonathan Miller's production of The Mikado, and before that La Boheme. But The Elixir was Gilbert and Sullivan without Gilbert

Crazy for You had no such problems, being a genuine example although set much earlier, in 1930. The storyline deals with a stage-struck young man whose mother wants him to be a banker. When his job is to foreclose a theatre in Nevada showbusiness takes precedent and it becomes a 'let put the show on here' affair.

The dancing girls and the male chorus were excellent and the principals are competent, with Bobby Childs, as the male lead, sparking off Claire Foster as feisty Polly. Within the walls of the diner in The Elixir the best that can be managed is a kind of hippy-hippy shake.

The failure of The Elixir to convince as a musical is partly because the opera score doesn't allow for dance routines.

That said, I thoroughly enjoyed both productions. I even like the bit at the Open Air Theatre when the sweepers come on with towels to dry the stage after a shower. Since the Coliseum would be dancing-girl friendly, it's a shame the show there didn't have any. I wonder if there's an opera that does have dancing girls....

2011-09-12T09:22:00.024+01:00

An Everyday Story of Bindle Stiffs: Of Mice and Men at the Brockley Jack Studio.

As a teenager, I read Steinbeck's 1939 American novel, The Grapes of Wrath , for which he won the Pulitzer Prize, with astonishment. Steinbeck's empathy with an 'underclass' was almost unknown in English novels, where working class characters were used for comic relief or appeared as villains. There were plenty of servants, of course, since most novels were set in middle or upper-class households.

George Orwell was about the nearest English equivalent to Steinbeck, but there was something inauthentic about an old Etonian pretending to be down and out. In novels empathy with workers was almost nonexistent; failure to make it up the class ladder was generally ascribed to personal moral decrepitude. It's a view that's recently become popular again, but it only began to be challenged in English novels in the late 1950s.

The story of the Joad family's epic journey across the American dust-bowl derives from an era when few authors dared suggest that human institutions might be faulty. The recognition, let alone celebration, of humanity among ordinary working people was a literary novelty in England in the 1950s, although DH Lawrence's 1913 autobiographical 'Sons and Lovers' and some of his short stories had come close.

Of Mice and Men, as the title suggests, works on a smaller scale. Seemingly a portrait of two men locked into a toxic co-dependency, the theme of the sustaining power of dreams and their fragility is reflected in the setting: a rural workplace.It's a far cry from The Archers.

I enjoyed this production at The Brockley Jack Studio. It seemed superior to the 1939 film classic starring Lon Chaney and the 1992 Gary Sinese-directed version with John Malkovitch.

I appreciated the ten minute drive to the Brockley Jack and the easy on-road parking. What I didn't like was not hearing the starting bell or any announcement in the bar, which extends to a room round the back. As a result my companion and I crept into into the back row of the crowded 50-seater theatre after stumbling up creaky steps. I've never been so glad of an interval to stretch my legs.

The play continues until September 24th and my review appears on the Remotegoat website.

2011-08-29T10:16:00.031+01:00

The Summer of The Greeks at The Space

Just when you think you'll never see a Greek Tragedy again, two come along together.

Last week, I was thrilled at chance to revisit The Space, the arts centre on the Isle of Dogs, where the aptly-titled Lazarus Theatre Company (they specialise in revivals) is currently staging two adaptations of Greek plays: Electra and Orestes, billed as The Summer of The Greeks

As a rule I like small-scale domestic works , but there's something compelling about Greek drama, with its focus on stupendous events and legendary characters in extreme situations. The chorus and lead players give off waves of intense emotion so strong you feel quite battered by the experience.

They're meant to be staged outdoors, in vast open-air ampitheatres suited to epic themes of human pride and divine retribution.

The nearest I came to the theatrical experience they aimed for was watching Antigone at Holland Park. However, I recall once wandering around an authentic Greek theatre in a cliff-top location in Taormina, Sicily. I sat high among a myriad of stone steps curved around a three-sided arena, looking down on the stage below. I was trying to imagine what it must have been like be in the audience for one of the great epics, such as Oedipus Rex, with a gods' eye-view of human follies.

My first visit to The Space a few weeks back was to see Tartuffe, when the French comedy classic had been given a rambunctious treatment, with actors chasing around in period costumes between irregular rows of seats. Even a small-scale domestic drama seemed to burst the boundaries, so I wondered how a pair of epic tragedies would fare.

The adaptations had been trimmed to suit the small-scale ambience, but the theatre was amazingly versatile, too. The interior had taken on a dignity to suit the occasion; all straight lines and well-ordered rows, reminiscent of its origins as a Presbyterian church.

On the previous occasion there hadn't been time to visit the 'Hubbub' cafe, comprising an upstairs bar and bench-and-table combinations under the trees to one side of the theatre. A lively crowd of young actors stood about- the whole 30-strong company had turned out for the press-night showing of both plays as a double bill. In the interval, under cover of studying the programme notes I listened to them talking about rehearsal mishaps. It was a nice contrast to the soul-stirring drama onstage.

My review of the play is on the Remotegoat website.

2011-08-22T10:53:00.010+01:00

Boston and Brigadoon: The Gift of Lightning at Waterloo East Theatre

I was pleased to see a new venue, Waterloo East Theatre, listed on the Remotegoat list of venues. The play sounded a bit 'different', too - about a young Irishman whose life is changed when he's struck by lightning. Must be all the influence of all those blockbusters I see at Cineworld that attracted me. In fact, I think it was the proximity to Waterloo Station.

Sure enough, it was only a short walk up a street called Alaska, opposite the Waterloo Road entrance. As we arrived, at the same time as a jolly crowd of thirty-somethings, we even spotted a nearby pub to get a drink when we came out.

The theatre foyer was tiny, with a spiral staircase up to a balcony - but access to the theatre was off the foyer beside the quaintly-named 'Wet Bar' - no beer on pumps, but they served nicely chilled white wine and, according to my companion,a pleasant red, as well as the usual range.

The box office and bar staff were very welcoming, as you'd expect on a press night. Press nights are good for spotting celebrity thesps who attend to support their fellow actors. The downside is they laugh like hyenas and try to instigate standing ovations even when they aren't quite justified.

As it happened,The Gift of Lightning was thought-provoking as well as enjoyable and I gave it four stars in my review

The venue had about three times as many seats as the nearby the Union Street theatre, arranged in rows. I prefer the intimacy of theatre in the round, but in the Waterloo Rast's coffin-shaped space this would be well-nigh impossible

The play itself was short, giving us time to try for the pub, but it was so crammed and so noisy that once again we ended up in the basement bar called The Wellesley, on the main concourse of Waterloo Station

2011-07-31T07:01:00.027+01:00

Odious Comparison: Park Avenue Cat at Arts Theatre, Leicester Square and After the Dance on BBBC Channel 4.

It's a promising sign, I think, when a theatre programme consists of the complete text of the play.It promises a meaty plot you'll have to get to grips with later, or dazzling dialogue to savour at leisure. The last time I experienced this was at The Young Vic when Jane Horrocks starred in a fantastic production of The Good Woman of Schetzwan

But what a let down! Frank Stausser's joyless piece really isn't worth cramping your legs between the rows in the Arts Theatre for, even when the show lasts only an hour and a quarter. I felt relieved and ripped off at the same time.

The premise looks good: a Los Angeles psychotherapist is consulted by 41 year old model who can't decide whether to settle down and have kids with her staid middle-aged lover, or continue a passionate affair with a young playboy rich enough to have a pool and a butler.

Psychotherapist Nancy is played by Tessa Peake-Jones from Only Fools and Horses, who does a fine line in controlled exasperation. The older man, Philip, is Gray O'Brien, the mad-eyed charmer who terrorised Coronation Street's Gale Platt, and the model,Lilly, elegant Josefina Gabrielle, resembles a slimmer Nigella Lawson. The young millionaire Dorian has almost nothing to do but Daniel Wayna makes him plausible.

So what was missing? Only a credible plot, any hint of chemistry between the actors, or vestige of witty dialogue. Some amusement was provided by the phone voices of Nancy's other patients in crisis. Tess Peake-Jones wrung laughs from the contrast between the cheerful cliches of her advice and the irritation she was feeling at her clients' behaviour. It's a bad sign, though, when the scene changes are more entertaining than the play.

It didn't help, of course, that we'd watched Terence Rattigan's After the Dance, on TV the night before. Comparison was invited because it had the same insouciant attitude to relationships and a similar theme of a young woman caught between an older man's suavity and a younger one's ardour. The difference was the brittle half-amusement, half-depair, wholly engaging tone of the script; beneath the banter,there were real feelings.

While Anton Rodgers as the doomed writer doused his liver with whiskey and soda, Imogen Stubbs the dewy-eyed ingenue discarded her fiance to save him. Gemma Jones as the cast-aside wife put on a brave face while world-weary John Bird delivered witticisms from a sofa; all to a backdrop of an ongoing cocktail party and juicy gossip.

Speaking of cocktails, it's annoying that West End pubs are so crowded, inside and out; you can't face the fight to the bar, even to wash away the taste of a wasted evening.

2011-07-09T10:27:00.023+01:00

'Yes, awfully': For Services Rendered by Somerset Maugham at The Union Theatre

In my quest to find fringe theatres within half an hour of Lewisham, this was a real find. First a train to Waterloo East, then a walk to the other end of The Cut - a walk full of interest, too, passing The Old and Young Vic, popular pubs and lively pavement life.

A Latin American band played on the corner opposite the Old Vic.

The tiny theatre, with its scruffy cafe in front, is located near a railway bridge in Union Street. There's a licenced bar inside, but the cafe has a selection of cheap and cheerful baguettes and focacias, very welcome as we'd come straight from visiting the hospital at Camberwell.

The theatre interior was cosy - only about 50 seats, on three sides, but tiered, some comfortable cinema-style ones and some upholstered lecture-hall chairs. I just about managed the step up to seats in the second row to reach one of the cinema seats.I was glad of a companion to give me a hand down

I fancied seeing the play, too. I'm a fan of Somerset Maugham's short stories, although I'd only seen one of his plays before: The Circle at Greenwich Theatre a few years back, starring Googie Withers, an old screen favourite.

WS Maugham comes the same category as GB Shaw and JB Priestley - always reliable for a well-crafted play with a message.

I can't imagine the play much better done in the West End. The maid was slightly late on one cue - her part was a thankless task anyway - but it all added to the fun.

You can see my review on the Remotegoat website

2011-07-06T10:46:00.017+01:00

Moliere's Tartuffe at The Space, Westferry Road, Isle of Dogs

The Remotegoat website favours fringe venues, which suits me fine. I decided recently that sooner than go haring off to Islington, Camden and other points north I'd explore venues more local to me - theatres other than perennial favourites The Brockley Jack and The Greenwich Playhouse. Luckily, I live near the DLR, and The Space in Westferry Road seemed a likely prospect, a shortish walk from Mudchute station on the Isle of Dogs.

It's a building that started out as a Presbyterian church; now it's ornate of facade and shabby inside. The performing space is oval with double rows of chairs spaced in double rows around it. There couldn't have been more than fifty.

I was keen to see a performance of the classic French classic, Tartuffe, by Moliere.

The show was rambunctious, to say the least, so the chases round the auditorium had the added frission of making the audience wonder if chairs would go flying, or actors or audience members. Not to mention all the trailing wires from the hi-tec refurbishment. The rehearsals must have been fraught.

Tartuffe continues until the 16th July. There's a restaurant and bar, which I didn't try, but will next time.

You can see the review on the Remotegoat site by clicking here.

2011-06-30T14:13:00.017+01:00

Rollicking Farce: Lend Me a Tenor:The Musical at the Gielgud Theatre, Shaftesbury Avenue

When a failing operatic troupe in the American mid-West decides to stage a performance of Verdi's Otello they hire a real Italian tenor, hearthrob Tito Merelli.(Michael Matus)

The skirt-chasing star arrives late, and quarrels with his jealous wife,(Joanna Riding) who leaves him, prompting his apparent suicide. Self-doubting but talented Max,(Damien Humley) a member of the troupe, is persuaded to take his place. Problem solved ....or is it? In the best traditon of farce, things can only become more complicated.

Exasperated empresario Henry (Matthew Kelly) oversees the mayhem in the funniest musical farce I've seen for some time. The groundwork for the final mix-ups and hilarious set-pieces are carefully laid down, the singing is superb and the dancing hellhops are a sheer delight. The tour-de-force operatic performance by Cassidy Janson in the second act will leave you gasping.

The programme features an unusual piece (lacking a byline) about plays that change their names and one by Antonia Fraser linking a royal wedding and Betty Blue Eyes That's another superb musical currently running at the Aldwych.

2011-06-28T14:04:00.024+01:00

Candida by George Bernard Saw at the Greenwich Playhouse

I nearly didn't get to see this interesting play, which would have been a pity because I gave it four stars when I reviewed it for Remotegoat. The young man at the box office hadn't been notified that I'd be there and seemed to think I was trying out some get-into-theatres-free ruse.

When he finally relented he said he'd run out of programmes. I was flustered by then and said I couldn't do a review if I didn't have the names of all the participants. I was all for leaving and went back into the bar, but my partner persuaded me not to. Luckily, he's suave and tactful at times when I feel embarrassed and angry.

By then the young man had found a photocopy of the programme.

What made it worse was that there were only a dozen people in the audience, it being a Wednesday night. You could argue either way as to whether the box office man was conscientous or officious, I suppose.

In future, I'll note the name and number of the theatre contact, as supplied by Remotegoat, just in case the person at the box office is mistrustful. It wouldn't do me any harm, either, to copy some of my escort's manners.

Click here to read the review

2011-06-23T16:33:00.012+01:00

Kicking over the Traces

I saw two films recently that appealed quite independently of any inherent merit; they reminded me that film for me is chiefly an escape into another world, enhanced (ideally) by womb-like warmth, darkness and silence except for what's happening on the screen.

In Water for the Elephants a would-be vet is just about to sit his final exams in a sepia-tinted library, where it seemed the students sat so close round oak tables they couldn't help but see one another's answers. Just as he's unscrewing his fountain pen some fusty old men in suits arrive to say his father is dead. Cut to where lawyers are explaining his father's farm is forfeited to pay debts. Cut to him jumping on a moving freight train at night and nearly gets beaten up - it transpires that he's leapt aboard a circus train.

Pirates of the Caribbean: Stranger Tides starts with Johnny Depp as Jack Sparrow arrested for disguising himself as a judge. He ends up, manacled to a chair, in front of a bewigged Richard Griffiths as King George, in the wonderful painted hall at Greenwich Naval College. Cut to his escape in a coach through the grounds, with a startled dowager Judi Dench, then he's driving a truck of burning coals and scattering the street crowd.Cut to some sword play in a tavern. Cut to scrubbing the deck on a pirate ship, with the bosun's whip whistling round his ears.

I think you can forgive films almost anything if the openings are as exhilarating as this - minimal preparation and straight into the action. I came away from both regretting that I hadn't run away to the circus or to sea. Either seemed to promise a life that was colourful, companionable and full of incident.

2011-06-17T09:53:00.021+01:00

Two classic plays: Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream and GB Shaw's Candida

After two very different versions of Macbeth within a short time, Roy was apprehensive about my next choice of play to review for the Remotegoat website. I've taught the play a few times so I appreciated the novelty, but for someone who doesn't, the two very unusual interpretations were probably confusing.

Still recovering from a recent operation, I looked at the list of plays for review and picked out two classic plays that didn't involve too much travelling. I was a bit apprehensive all the same about A Midsummer Night's Dream at The Brockley Jack pub. It's a play more suited, I thought, to outdoor venues such as Regents Park Theatre. But the interpretation was superb. Thinking about it, although it's all outdoors the action takes place in a wood at night, so the slightly spooky atmosphere the players and the venue helped create was entirely appropriate. I gave it five stars.

The full review can be seen here

The production made me see the point of a play that I knew well but never really liked or understood, so it deserves the accolade.

The other 'classic' at Greenwich Playhouse was one I hadn't seem before - GB Shaw's play Candida is apparently rarely performed, but the Playhouse seems to specialise in classic revivals - good for me because, as with The Brockley Jack, it only takes me about fifteen minutes to get there.

I have fond memories of Shaw, as my first amdram role with the 'Castaways' in Penge was as a maid in Arms and the Man a play better known in its musical form as The Chocolate Soldier, just as Shaw's Pygmalion, is better known as My Fair Lady.

Candida is a perfectly structured play, although it suffers from Shaw's usual fault of characters seeming at times mere mouthpieces for his social reform ideas. The acting and direction were good enough to gloss over this aspect and I was thoroughly entertained so I gave it four stars.

The full review can be seen here

2011-05-01T13:12:00.034+01:00

Two Versions of The Scottish Play: Macbeth at The Greenwich Playhouse and The Tragedy of Macbeth at Charlton House

It's strange how a particular venue or a gimmicky detail can foreground certain aspects of a classic play. This was illustrated by two local productions I attended recently, within weeks of each other.

On April 7th I saw Shakespeare's Scottish play at the Greenwich Playhouse, the cosy studio space over a pub near Greenwich station and the DLR. An all-black cast were brilliant in a production that drew parallels between an ancient African kingdom and the belief systems of medieval England.

My review of the play appeared on the Remotegoat website (click to view)

More recently I went to a performance at Charlton House. A Jacobean manor house must be the perfect venue, I thought, for a performance of this darkest of Shakespearean tragedies. Best of all, it was on the bus route between Lewisham and Belmarsh.

Strangely enough, the venue had as many drawbacks as it had benefits. Or perhaps it wasn't so strange after all that a a purpose-built theatre is always going to score over a stately home, even one with a wrap-round minstrel's gallery.

This review also appeared on the Remotegoat website (click to view)

2011-04-17T11:40:00.020+01:00

A Musical Weekend: Betty Blue Eyes at the Novello Theatre and and The Kissing Dance at Jermyn Street Theatre

With son David visiting London for the weekend and grandchildren up from Surrey on Saturday, I jumped at the chance to attend two musicals, only one of which I agreed to review. In different circumstances I'd have been with the anti-cuts protesters instead of attending a Betty Blue Eyes preview, so I was delighted when a splinter group went on the rampage through Covent Garden. Fortunately, their intentions were peaceful.

It turned out to be the best musical I've seen for years. I expect I was influenced by the northern wartime setting, contemporary relevance and Alan Bennett's very funny script. Top quality directing by Richard Eyre, the magic of a state-of-the-art West End theatre and Sarah Lancahire leading a great cast. This is a hugely entertaining show.

Families of marchers thronged the bar at the Royal Festival Hall where we enjoyed drinks afterwards.

Son David said he'd preferred the intimacy of the tiny 70-seater Jermyn Street theatre where we'd been the night before. I could sympathise - Fringe theatre's a seductive experience, and this musical adaptation of She Stoops to Conquer evoked an enthusiastic response. My review appears on the Remotegoat website.

It'a a shame that Fringe theatre shows get such a restricted run, but The Kissing Game, is to tour to other venues.

2011-03-18T11:53:00.018Z

Reviewing just got easier (in a way)

I used to do regular website reviews but stopped when the main site I wrote for ran into problems. It was nice to go along to shows for a while without the need to spend two or three hours actually writing the review in exchange for two complimentary tickets.

Now I'm delighted to be accepted as an 'official reviewer' for a website called Remotegoat.

First I had to write a test review so I chose a venue in nearby Brockley. I didn't realise the play was the third in a trio of competition-winning plays by South London playwrights.

As it was a Wednesday night I decided no need to book, even though the theatre is tiny. But I met a stressed out young woman in the pub bar worried about getting in. It seems she'd booked tickets for herself and four colleagues in error for the night before and come along hoping to change the tickets but heard it was fully booked. She was upset because the producer's sister was a colleague. It was touch and go, but all got in.

Beforehand we had a chat with her and her pals about what it was like to live in Brockley. Really good, it seems, especially since the East London rail-link opened.

Another young woman sitting next to us said her tutor at Roehampton had written the play and she'd travelled from Wandsworth. People at big theatre events are polite enough as a rule, but can't compare with the enthusiasm and interest of the audience at a local event.

We both enjoyed Keeping Mum, a play about a Caribbean couple, newly arrived in England, facing the coldest winter on record (1962-3).

My first 'official' review was of a play I picked from a long list of local and West End events. I was attracted by the novelty of a 'site-specific' play that had a contemporary political theme.

As it was to take place in an Office block near St James's tube station I immediately thought to ask my young friend Joanna the Westminster guide, as she's an office worker and this is right in her territory. I told her on Facebook to be prepared for 'bad language, violence and sexual content.' It couldn't be any stronger than some of Roy's film choices.

I thought Quango 93 was a great example of experimental theatre and I'd like to see more of the group's productions. They originated in Newham, a borough I used to teach in.

The upside of reviewing for Remotegoat is having the website managers forward requests to the event managers. The downside is having to learn the site protocol and deal with the automated submission/request system. After a couple of date mix-ups, though, I've arranged a couple of future events, one local and one in the West End.

'Once a month is enough', said Roy. 'You don't want to become stressed.'

But I think once a week, with the following morning free to write the review, will be fine.

2011-03-06T13:13:00.022Z

A Conversation with Shirley Anne Field at the Cinema Museum

Ever since the National Film Theatre went all shiny and commercial,there's been nowhere for real cinema fans (as distinct from the blockbuster-and-pop-corn throng) to feel at home in London. All that changed for me on Saturday when I stepped into the shabby splendour of the Cinema Museum in Kennington. Housed in the old Lambeth Workhouse, unfunded by public money but stuffed with souvenirs of cinema's heyday, its second season of cinema events has just got started.

The walls of the cavernous upstairs interior were lined with decorative bricks and tiles but you can only see the tops. The rest are filled with shelves full of cinema memorabilia, with more spilling onto the the floor space. Usherettes in uniforms from the 1940s hover, and old movie cameras lean against one long wall. Along the opposite wall stands a refreshment trestle, loaded with home-made cakes and sandwiches; behind it, tea and coffee urns manned by volunteers. Rows of chairs face a low dais at one end of the hall with a screen on the wall behind.

Most of the audience for Saturday's event were in same age-bracket as the guest speaker, Shirley Anne Field. They were the children of the same pre-TV generation as myself.It emerged during the Q&A session afterwards that some had even worked with the star.

Shirley was a charmingly indiscreet raconteuse, sharing anecdotes from her long career, starting when she was one of the 'special' girls, or starlets of British cinema. As we were to learn, they were treated as anything but special, often badly-paid and overworked. Clips from her scenes in films such as Alfie(1966), My Beautiful Launderette(1985) and Hear My Song(1991) were interspersed with reminiscence. Stories about a quarrel in a caravan with Lawrence Olivier during the making of The Entertainer(1960), or being upstaged by Steve McQueen, carried a flavour of sharing backstage gossip with a friend.

I was thankful that my friend, Joanna Moncrieff, who organises some excellent London walks, introduced me - it made for a perfect venue to celebrate Roy's birthday. I'm looking forward to the rest of the events advertised in the Spring Season programme. In between times, I'll just have to make do with visits to Cineworld.

2011-03-01T13:06:00.013Z

Jekyll and Hyde: the Musical at New Wimbledon Theatre

Wimbledon Theatre last night was buzzier than most West End shows I've been to in quite a while.

Maybe the atmosphere brings out the best in the players but it was certainly a very impressive performance from Marti Pellow in the title role - the 'mad scientist' who falls foul of his own experiment, and from the supporting cast, including impressive sopranos Sarah Earnshaw and Sabrina Carter, playing respectively his fiancee and his unfortunate lower-class playmate.

Well-meaning Dr Jekyll, a scientist in Darwinian mode, is convinced he can separate good from evil in human nature so the bad part can be eliminated. The exposition of the plot and and songs was very clear, from Jekyll's initial appeal to a hospital board to allow him a human guinea-pig, to his eventual downfall. Upper-crust gatherings alternate with backstreet slums and and taverns until Jekyll's nature is overcome by his alter-ego Hyde and he keeps to his laboratory, venturing out only to murder enemies of society and abuse the prostitute girlfriend he picked up in a tavern. His behaviour comes to mirror that of the society he rails against.

Robert Louis Stevenson's story reminds us of our debt to Victorian writers for the creation of so many atmospheric works. Dr Jekyll synthesises a youthful Sherlock Holmes, a driven Doctor Frankenstein and a Charles Dickens charged with reformist zeal. On the darker side, Edinburgh-born Stevenson touches on Burke and Hare's gruesome activities, while the ghost of Jack The Ripper seems to hover over the stage.

Marti Pellow, who started as a singer with 'Wet Wet Wet', carries the role with assurance and his voice ranges form poignant sincerity to a deranged shout without losing clarity.

Mark Bailey's set seems underlit and confining in the first Act and only reveals its amazing versatility, with some projected image help, after the interval. Few of the songs are lyrical but the love duet 'Take me as I am' has strong emotional appeal and 'In his Eyes' is a touching paeon to female devotion. One of the best chorus songs is the tavern song, 'Bring on the Men', delivered in a 'Cabaret' style, and 'Facade', about public corruption, sung by a chorus of cockney street vendors.

My only complaint is that in the transition scenes there was not enough difference in the visual appearance of Jekyll and Hyde - mussed hair and the donning of a fur-trimmed cloak didn't do it for me. Arguably as I was at the back of the stalls I missed the full effect, but I heard laughter from further forwards as Jekyll emerged apparently none the worse after his doubled-up groaning. Arguably, too, it was more in keeping with the theme of how deceptive appearance can be.

There's an excellent programme with full information about all the cast, musicians and creative team, and I'd thoroughly recommend the show - the audience at Wimbledon were certainly enthusiastic. I'd hesitate to take young children because of a shocking throat-cutting scene towards the end. It plays all this week in Wimbledon and then moves for a week's run at the Churchill Theatre, Bromley.

2011-02-05T10:09:00.022Z

Not at all like Opera: The Arditti Quartet at the Wigmore Hall

I wouldn't say I'm a stranger to classical music, although I tend to prefer theatrical drama, Not surprisingly, the musical form I like best is is opera. A concert I attended recently almost had me convinced that words are no help if the music itself is difficult.

It was suppposed to be my friend's birthday treat - a concert at the Wigmore Hall, for which I'd been offered cheap tickets. According to the publicity notice, a countertenor was to sing an arrangement of Mexican poems. I remembered how much she'd enjoyed it some time ago when we went to hear James Bowman sing in a church at Spitalfields. It would be a treat for us both - or so I thought.

Four pieces were to be performed by a group called the Arditti Quartet. I hadn't been to the Wigmore Hall before because I hardly ever go to concerts, so that was a novelty, too. I admired the the art nouveau bas-relief figures on a cupola above the stage and the decorative metal sconces lighting the walls. I wandered about and took photos in the interval, trying to soothe my spirits after the shock of the playing.

I should have been suspicious when I didn't recognise the names of any of the composers : Clarke, Ferneyhough, Fujikura and Parades. The titles of the pieces didn't give any clue, either, except for Canciones Lunáticas, the poetry-based one: Lunar Songs.

The first three items were quartets of a very non-musical kind. They required a great deal of effort from the musicians to get the weirdest noises from their instruments. The viola player broke two strings and the violins and cello took a battering too. Even the composition with words, left until the end, seemed designed with the same intention to disturb. The meaning of the words was obscure - conjuring varying moods instead of making a narrative.

The first piece was the worst -like the sound track to a horror film, combining screeches in the attic, scrabbling in the cellars and a lot of rumbles and crunches as of wheels on gravel. I couldn't see how the sounds were produced, although we were on the second row, slightly to one side. My friend is French and elderly, so I was apologetic - but said she liked it, and that it reminded her not so much of someone strangling cats as the back-yard feline concerts remembered from her youth. 'They don't happen any more because they are all neutered!' She liked all natural sounds, she said.

The audience liked it too. The works were all premieres and the composers appeared after each piece to loud clapping and, in two cases, cries of 'Bravo!'.

What a surprise on Saturday night when the car radio, tuned to to BBC Radio 3, was about to deliver a concert of 'contemporary music'. Sure enough, the presenter announced a piece by Ferneyhough, played by the Arditti Quartet. I didn't want to risk crashing the car at Catford, so I turned it off.

I liked the friendly informality of the Wigmore Hall so I'll go again, but to something a bit less avant-garde in future. When even words fail to soften the blow, it's clear I need to creep up on this sort of thing.

2011-02-04T16:03:00.020Z

One thing after another: Love Story at The Duchess Theatre

A couple from oppposite ends of the social scale meet at college, fall in love and marry against the boy's father's wishes. The girl gives up her hopes of a musical career to support her husband when his father cuts him off. The girl is diagnosed with leukaemia a few years later and dies soon after.

This musical version of Erich Segal's 'boy-meets-girl-girl-dies' novel was too slick to be moving. We know the outcome because the story of poor Jenny Cavallieri and rich Oliver Barret IV begins at Jenny's funeral, to the song What do you say about a girl? and is told in flashback.It progresses on much the same level, one event following another, without much variety of tone.

Most people in the audience would have known the 1970 film of the same name, starring Ali Macgraw and Ryan O'Neal. Not having seen the film, I thought the music, delivered from a grand piano and some string players at the back of the stage, was the best part of this show. The lyrics were often tame, sometimes clumsy or cringe-makingly mawkish, apart from a song about varieties of pasta sung in the newlywed's kitchen, where Donizetti was made to rhyme with spaghetti.

The main problem, apart from the absence of dramatic tension, was the lack of credibility of the leads, Emma Williams and Michael Xavier, although both sang well enough. The leading man, a dislikeable 'hockey jock'. quarrelled with his father for no apparant reason and then let his ex-prodigy wife give up her music studies to support him.

Peter Polycarpou as as Jenny's deli-owning dad was credibly doting but Richard Cordery Oliver Barrett III could do little with his part but looked bemused and displeased.

Peter McKintosh's's white set, complete with white grand piano beyond corinthian columns, lent a celestial feel and a preppy sixties brightness that further drained the emotional impract.

Rachel Kavanaugh's brisk direction enabled it to be performed in about and hour and a half without an interval. I think people who liked the film would probably like this too, although it's a shame the leads weren't more charismatic and story so well known as to be predictable.

2011-01-30T13:43:00.029Z

Getting Involved: A Woman of No Importance by Oscar Wilde at the Greenwich Playhouse

The Galleon Theatre Company's successful revival of A Woman of No Importance owed much to the nature of the venue. The Greenwich Playhouse's 80- seat studio encouraged a much-needed intimacy and engagement with the issues of Oscar Wilde's darkest and, arguably, weakest play.

There's a wide quality gap between The Importance of Being Earnest and Wilde's other plays, and I was grateful that director Bruce Jamieson's light touch moved this along with appropriate briskness. The play suffers from the same muddled-logic deficiency as An Ideal Husband, (blogged Nov 10th, 2010, still showing at the Vaudeville theatre) where a dishonest politician hero is let off the hook.

Almost all the first half consists of aristos lounging around at Lady Hunstanton's country house, making witty remarks about marriage and society, punctuated by escorting one another into afternoon tea and dinner. The aphorisms are of high quality, including the famous description of fox-hunters as :'the unspeakable in pursuit of the uneatable'. Eleanor Wdowski's 1920's-feel costumes were interesting,and the actors excellent, but they didn't make make up for the play's static nature. Because the theme, the plight of an unmarried woman in high-class society, is altogether darker, the more amusing lines are not integrated with the action, as in Wilde's masterpiece.

The plot concerns a a middle aged diplomat called Lord Illingworth who has offered a secretarial post to a poor bank clerk, Gerald Arbuthnot. Just before the interval, when the young man's mother, Mrs Arbuthnot, arrives, Gerald is revealed to be Lord Illingworth's illegitimate son. His mother changed her name after being deserted by her dandified seducer. She makes it plain it would be very disloyal of Gerald to take up the job. The second half of the play depicts the various confrontations about what's to be done. Gerald falls in love with a pretty young house guest, the focus of a subplot, which further implicates the vile seducer and underscores the harshness of attitudes to women at the time.

The intimacy of the 80-seater studio allows a proximity that encourages involvement. I restrained myself from joining in the conversations of the first act, but couldn't help giving a sympathetic smile to the fallen woman, played with martyred dignity by Mary Lincoln. After all, at the height of her torment she was only three feet away and looking straight at me!

You can vote for The Offies, the best off-West-end production of the past year

2011-01-12T14:05:00.034Z

The Dinosaurs at Crystal Palace Park

When we were about to move south, I was surprised that it took my husband three days to find a rented flat in London; even more surprised that it was somewhere I'd never heard of.

As my knowledge of London geography was based on CND marches to Trafalgar Square in the early 60s, I wasn't prepared for Penge. I soon learned the latter was a by-word for South London dinginess and the subject of much media mockery.

I joined a local drama group and later went to Goldsmiths, only ten minutes by train to New Cross. At the height of the hippy era, it was an exciting place to be.

Best of all, we lived round the corner from Crystal Palace Park. Apart from something called a 'One O'clock Club', a kind of big shed with toys, where mothers with toddlers gathered on wet afternoon, it had a flamingo pond, a children's zoo and a lake area with monsters.

Nowadays a Sunday visit to Penge usually means lunch at the the Moon and Stars, which used to be a cinema, but on the first sunny Sunday afternoon for weeks a side-visit to the dinosaurs seemed in order.

Installed as an adjunct to the Crystal Palace, home to the Great Exhibition of 1851, the giant lizards were set up in 1854, not very accurate replicas of the prehistoric monsters, but at the time state-of-the-art. A big dinner was held in the bottom part of the biggest one and speeches made by local and national dignitaries before the top half was attached.

I notice they've cut back the vegetation so more of the creatures are visible and there's been quite a bit of tourist development, with notices round a 'trail' and better amenities, such as a big cafe nearby and a car park.

It's a shame so much of the park was neglected over the years - being situated at the wrong end of Bromley borough didn't help - but in the fading light of a winter afternoon it does recreate a quite magical sense of a primeval landscape. Much better than Jurassic Park , in my opinion.

You can download an audiotrail on your mobile to listen to when you visit

2011-01-06T11:36:00.014Z

Feydeau's A Flea in Her Ear at the Old Vic

Feydeau's influence on English sitcom was beautifully illustrated when happy chance brought us home from A Flea in Her Ear to an episode of Fawlty Towers on TV. It was the one where Basil skips in and out of bedrooms in the eponymous hotel, trying to catch out a young musician he suspects (rightly) of hiding a girl in his room. A middle aged psychiatrist and his wife, and a nubile blonde in a bright green T-shirt who occupy adjoining rooms become involved, as the rock star gets the better of Basil and Basil dodges an increasingly exasperated Sybil. Like the play we'd just seen it all depends on miscommunication and split-second timing, doors opening, people appearing then disappearing and the invention of impromptu alibis -such as Basil's 'testing' surfaces for damp, even when he's inside a wardrobe or peering through a window. As the psychiatrist remarks, 'Enough material for a whole case conference'.

Evasions and misunderstandings surrounding illicit sex are exactly what made Feydeau's farces so popular in Paris in the 1920s and which barred them from 'No Sex please, we're British' stages until 1968 and the lifting of the Lord Chamberlain's ban on risque drama.

In Paris, the elegant Raymonde Chandebise confides to her best friend Lucienne that her husband, an otherwise hidebound insurance agent, is being unfaithful. She suspects him of conducting liaisons at the infamous Coq D'or, a high-class brothel. Lucienne agrees to make a clandestine assignation by letter, so the truth can be uncovered.

Somehow, the whole household, including friends and servants, become involved in an increasingly tangled plot which plays out at the Coq D'Or. It doesn't help that the brothel bellboy is a dead ringer for Mr Chandebise, who goes along out of curiosity. Poche the bellboy happens to be a masochist and his employer an ex-military sadist who obliges by kicking him round the room whenever they meet. To add to the high jinks, Lucienne's husband is an insanely jealous Spaniard and another customer is a Prussian who thinks every woman he meets is a prostitute sent to attend to him.

Mayhem on this scale requires skilled direction and spit-second timing, here marvellously achieved by Richard Eyres and his team. It was a disappointment that Tom Hollander was unwell on the night we attended, but Greg Baldock was convincing in the demanding roles of Chandebise and Poche. As in Shakepeare's identical twins comedies, much of the humour not only depends on mistaken identity but in this case one character following almost on the heels of the other. Over-the-top playing by beautifully coordinated Freddie Fox made the most of the thankless role of a young man with a speech impediment and William Findley was funny as the fiery pistol-waving Spaniard, although comic foreigners and disability as comedy date the play to some extent.

The costumes were well-designed considering the number of quick changes and rapid movements required. The brothel entrance hall and stairway was a masterpiece of mock Art-Nouveau, all elongated trunks and tendrils, suggestive of a gilded swamp. The programme was excellent, including a history of the Belle Epoque era and a pocket biography of Feydeau and farce as well as an article on sorely-missed John Mortimer, whose translation of the play was presented in the National Theatre in 1966.

I wouldn't recommend seat L26 in the stalls at the Old Vic when you're sitting behind a man who looks like Father Ted with a fuzzier haircut. Some of the early speeches were lost on me, only partly because of the quick-fire delivery, which takes a little getting used to. My companion and I agreed that if we get another chance to see this very marvellous play we'll be very happy to go along a second time.

2010-12-31T17:06:00.020Z

The London Transport Museum at Covent Garden

Buying Christmas and birthday presents is made easier for Londoners, I think.

I once found a good present for someone who'd recently bought a small house in France. His hobby was restoring wooden cases such as those found on old clocks. The present was an old box containing a wine thermometer and a scale to show the temperatures at which different French wines should be drunk. I paid £2 in a charity shop for it.

This year I bought a '3D Sudoku', which looked a bit like a giant Rubiks cube, for only 50p. The blocks were held together by magnets. It was still in its clear plastic case and perfect for another friend who's mathematically inclined.

At some stage, though, you have to brace yourself to part with real money,apart from that for the grandchildren, of course, who are easy in that regard. All you have to do is fold their presents in with Xmas cards and wish you'd spent less on yourself over the year (like the laptop I had to buy in August)

It's presents for friends that require some thought, that should suit their hobbies and interests and not be too expensive. The trouble with John Lewis is it's full of overpriced and rather impersonal objects.

That's where specialist museum shops come in. We are so lucky to live in London where there's a museum with its attached mini-emporium, to cater for every taste, from war memorabilia to music, from fans to football. You'd have to visit my home town of Preston for the National Football Museum, but there are museums in London for all kinds of sports, notably tennis at Wimbledon and rugby in Twickenham.

A fellow art-lover gives me a diary from the National Gallery shop every year - it cheers me to open the week-to-view with a Turner seascape opposite. We usually buy presents for a pal who likes sailing at the National Maritime Museum and National Trust Houses in London and elsewhere are great for gardening gifts with a patriotic twist.

We didn't have to scratch our heads for long to choose something for a transport-loving pal who lives on the Sussex coast. I don't mean he's like me and just likes riding about on buses and trains, though he does that, too. I mean he's interested in the history of transportation, particularly steam engines and anything associated with old trains.

The shop attached to the London Transport Museum in Covent Garden exceeded expectations. On two floors, the range of good is huge, from aprons printed with tube maps and sound recordings of trains arriving at mainline stations to pouffes upholstered in the multicoloured moquettes sported by seats in commuter trains. I must say, it's hard to imagine anyone wanting to be reminded of that, though.

You don't have to pay to go into museum shops and cafes. The cafe in the Transport museum is on the first floor, and rather meagrely appointed because so much space is given over to the products for sale. But there's a great view of shoppers below as well as the lights of Covent Garden outside. The shortbread is buttery and crisp, at £2 for a large piece and the same for a pot of tea.

Mostly, though, it has a great collection of books. We found a little volume called 'Disused stations of Sussex' which had lots of black and white photos. Since our friend is a native of those parts, we were sure he'd be delighted -which he was.

2010-12-26T20:15:00.008Z

The Jersey Boys at The Prince Edward Theatre.

The Jersey Boys makes for a very enjoyable theatre experience; there are no musical 'duds' or weak scenes in this slice of American pop history. An opening version of 'Oh What a Night' (Ces soirees-la) in French underlines the international appeal of the musical group, The Four Seasons, at the height of their fame.

Second generation Italian immigrants from New Jersey, Frankie Valli, Bob Gaudio, Tommy DeVito and Nack Massi formed the The Four Seasons and achieved hits with 'Sherry', 'Earth Angel' 'Walk like a Man', Big Girls Don't Cry' and 'Let's Hang On (to What We've Got) and others in the late fifties/ early sixties.

'I never heard a voice like Frankie Valli's', says Bob Claudio. That spine-tingling voice is the secret of the group's success, backed up by the close harmony of a strong instrumental trio of guitars and percussion, here very accurately reproduced by an English cast. Claudio seems to have been spot-on in judging the tastes of the record-buying public.

The musical traces the history of the group, allowing each member to tell his version, starting with the early days of petty street crime , when Frankie escaped jail only because he was underage when arrested for driving a getaway car. Internecine face-offs and the fissures in family life caused by months on tour punctuate the songs, material that's familiar from Hollywood biopics, here more relevant because of the grounding in a harsh social context.

As with many modern musicals, the set is minimal -a metal bridge that recalls the prison house of the early scene and turns into a walkway for the singers at the height of their fame. It means there's a reliance on lighting which consistently meets the challenge. It includes a spectacularly dazzling performance seen from a backstage viewpoint at the end of the first act, literally demonstrating the audience acclaim the group achieved at that time.

Ryan Molloy as Frankie received an Olivier nomination for Best Actor and won the 'What's on Stage' People's Choice Award for Best Actor in a Musical. So good are the supports, it's a wonder he's not overshadowed. Bob Gaudio as the composer bowled over by Frankie's voice brings a quiet confidence to the role of a man who has found the perfect medium to deliver his talent.Jon Boydon as Tommy de Vito impresses as a swaggering quick-decision man-in-charge. My personal favourite is Nick Massi, the oddball fall-guy of group, played by Eugene McCoy in a performance that reminded me of 'Trigger' in Only Fools and Horses. A welcome comic cameo, deferential among the divas, was provided by Jye Frasca as Joe Pesci, the man responsible for introducing the early group to Bob Claudio.

I'd recommend this if, like me, you'll recognise the musical background to your teenage years or if you want to learn more about a time and place that produced such an amazing amount of musical talent. Or if you just enjoy a good musical.

2010-11-10T11:31:00.016Z

Not Very Satisfactory: An Ideal Husband by Oscar Wilde at the Vaudeville Theatre

Wilde's The Importance of Being Earnest is one of my favourite plays - the aristos are ridiculed in the best English literary tradition. But watching An Ideal Husband made me sympathise with Lady Bracknell's horror of babies in handbags - not because it smacks of 'the worst excesses of the French Revolution', but because it glosses political corruption, as 'youthful folly'.

London in 1891: Sir Robert Chiltern MP, who made a fortune selling privileged information when he was young, is being blackmailed by Mrs Cheveley, a woman in possession of a letter that proves his guilt. If his high-minded wife finds out she'll divorce him and he'll lose his Under-secretary post.

Set in the opulent gold-walled, marble-floored 'Octagon Room' in Sir Robert's house in Grosvenor Street and the stylish Curzon Street home of his dandyfied pal Viscount Goring, the design by Stephen Bromson Lewis is top-notch. The costumes are the best I've ever seen.

The pace is slow in the first half, where supper party guests lounge about in elegant clothes and complain of boredom, in slowly-delivered aphorisms: 'Questions are never indiscreet, but answers often are', 'One should always play fairly when one has the winning hand' and 'To love oneself is the start of a lifelong romance'

The second half is more invigorating, with unexpected visitors, mysterious letters and concealed eavesdroppers. The tainted Lord should get his come-uppance, but alas it's a case of art mirroring life. Oscar Wilde forgets his own definition of fiction, which demands that the good are rewarded and the wicked are punished.

The acting is good, especially by Caroline Blakiston as waspish dowager Lady Markby who might be Lady Bracknell's sharper-elbowed sister, and Samantha Bond as the beautiful worldly blackmailer who wants wants to be restored to fashionable society. Elliot Cowan as Goring had the best lines as the author's mouthpiece, as well as the most flamboyant suit.

2010-11-08T10:40:00.006Z

The Country Girl by Clifford Odets at Apollo Theatre

My hopes for this play were mostly fulfilled.

I love to see a good solid classic play, especially when I don't know the plot. Clifford Odets' name crops up in association with Arthur Miller, whose All my Sons, starring David David Suchet and Zoe Wanamaker, I saw a few weeks back. I'd read he was a contemporary of Miller's, closer to him in tone and style than lightweight Neil Simon, whose Prisoner of Second Avenue , with Jeff Goldblum, I'd only half liked recently.

I've long been a fan of Martin Shaw's, not because of the TV series Judge Deeds which I haven't seen, but his wonderful performance as Macduff in the Polanski-directed film, Macbeth.

The plot is fairly straightfoward: In 1950 alcoholic actor Frank Elgin (Martin Shaw) is all washed up. Young director Bernie Dodd(Mark Letheren) remembers Frank at the height of his powers and wants him to lead a new play he's taking to New York. Despite producer Phil Cook (Nicholas Day)'s doubts Frank is persuaded to take the part, but insists his wife Georgie(Jane Semour) stays to support him for the trial-run in Boston. The action mainly takes place backstage at the two theatres where Georgie and Bernie are at odds about who exactly is pulling Frank's strings. In fact, Bernie accuses Georgie of 'riding him like a broomstick'. How soon will Frank fall off the waggon?

All-round the acting was very good, with two strong leads. This is the third time I've seen Jenny Seagrove in this year, once in Bedroom Farce and in A Daughter's a Daughter, the latter allowing her to show her versatility in a role where she transforms from dowdy wartime mother to selfish Honeysuckle Weekes in the first half to brittle partygoer in the the second. Here she's just dour and long-suffering, all on one note.

Maybe that' why I didn't like it. The play also dwelt too much on the theme of the wife sacrificing her own happiness for the sake of her husband.So it seemed a bit dated.

2010-10-12T15:23:00.014+01:00

Fond Memories :Krapps Last Tape by Samuel Beckett at the Duchess Theatre

Every year on his birthday Krapp, now 69 and an unsuccessful author, makes a voice tape recalling highlights of the previous year. A scruffy alcoholic ('1700 hours on licensed premises') he's enjoyed a string of relationships with women and replays a tape made thirty years earlier, describing a sexual encounter in a boat. His monologue, punctuated by fits of anger and drinking, expresses regret for a 'misspent' life devoted to words. As he listens to his early voice he says it's 'hard to believe I was ever as bad as that.'

Michael Gambon is a perfect choice for this play, which has long stretches of stage 'business' while Krapp shambles about the stage eating bananas, absent at intervals when liquid being poured into a glass sounds offstage, opening and shutting drawers and messing about with spools of tape. Gambon's slow gestures and immobile face, the mouth almost permanently agape in a surprised O, his wild hair sticking out above raddled cheeks, presents a touching portrait of disillusioned old age. The sudden rages which scatter boxes and tapes are all the more striking because Gambon is a big man.

At 50 minutes with no supporting work - Beckett's shorter plays are often performed in pairs - this would seem poor value for anyone paying full-price for their seat. On the other hand, Michael Gambon's performance on a stage minimally furnishes with a table and chair under a single spotlight, is remarkable.

As a rule I don't rub shoulders with the famous, or even the moderately well-known. But I do remember a time when Michael Gambon bought me a pint. in the late 1970s I directed annual musicals at a girls' school in Camberwell - joint sixth-form productions with Archbishop Tennyson's school for boys at The Oval. Gambon's son played in the orchestra - I think it was trumpet. Maybe it was Gilbert & Sullivan, the deputy head's favourite, or Oklahomah, which I was allowed to direct in my final year at the school.

I crossed Camberwell New Road to the pub after the last performance, was warmly greeted and congratulated by the great actor and asked what I'd like to drink.

It's something I've been reminded of every time I've seen him in a stage production, from Shakespeare to Alan Aykbourn. Most recently he's appeared in four Harry Potter films.

For me his most memorable performance was in the title role of Dennis Potter's The Singing Detective on TV. His nervous anticipatory monologue then, as 'nurse' Joanne Whalley massaged cream into his psoriatic skin, contrasts with the poignant regret of the current performance. Gambon has the great classic actor's gift of conveying complex emotions expressed in poetic language.

2010-09-15T15:34:00.007+01:00

All My Sons at the Apollo Theatre, Shaftesbury Avenue

Although this is not Arthur Miller's masterpiece ('Death of Salesman' is better) I can't imagine a more successful revival. A strong cast, Howard Davies'direction and William Dudley's design are all of a very high standard.

The magificent set includes the complete facade of a southern mansion complete with verandah, establishing a 'Gone With Wind' atmosphere. Only the presence of a 'yard' with furniture and picket fence tells you it's no plantation but the home of a successful businessman

A fringe of overhanging boughs occupies the width of the stage front. They sway in the wind and lightning of the first scene, with it's final symbolic crack that fells a tree. It's the most startling opening sequence I've seen. The ensuing drama slowly unfolds to reveal a message about personal actions and public responsibility. It's unfortunately sometimes swamped by mystery, melodrama and extraneous characters.

The action takes place in 1947. David Suchet plays factory-owner Joe Keller, who has prospered from the wartime manufacture of aircraft parts. He lives in comfortable retirement with his wife Kate, poignantly played by Zoe Wanamaker.

Their fighter-pilot son Larry was killed in the war. Kate still believes her son is alive, although he was reported missing three years ago. A family crisis looms as Chris and Ann, Larry's ex-fiancee, played by Jemima Rooper, reveal their plans to marry.

Although presenting a jovial face to his neighbours and to his visiting son Chris (Stephen Campbell Moore) Joe has a shameful secret. He caused the deaths of young men by allowing a batch of defective aircraft parts to leave the factory. Although he was responsible for the decision his partner was blamed and imprisoned.

The play highlights the cost when individual profit is proritised over the common good. Joe's excuse is that it was done 'for his family'; a recall would have meant ruin. The resulting deaths, which may have included that of his own son, remain on his conscience. His deluded wife Kate has carried the secret less well and is treated warily by her family.

Unlike Willie Loman, the common-man hero of 'Death of Salesman', Joe is not a passive victim and dupe of the American system. He is active collaborator signalled by his name. It needs only one letter of the name to be changed to reveal his true nature.

An overlit set and forced bonhomie of the characters creates a growing tension. It makes the audience feel the facade of deceit will crack at any moment, like the tree in the opening sequence. It says much for the powerful acting ability of David Suchet, beautifully supported by the cast, that he is able to make the audience empathise with a character who is so culpably weak. In the final moving scene the audience feels as much for Joe as for his wife.

2010-09-07T12:02:00.022+01:00

Tangled Wood Tales: Into the Woods at Regent's Park Open Air Theatre

Going to Regent's Park Theatre gives me an insight into the days when attending plays, and especially operas, was nothing to do with the performances. Then, showing off one's clothes and greeting friends, enjoying the glamour of gilded boxes and velvet curtains was the point.

Like most people I go swaddled against the weather, but there's always a smattering of debs in sandals with swains and picnic baskets. I don't expect to see anyone I know. It's not so much the fairy lights swathing the bar area as the natural setting that gives a sense of occasion - the way the trees sway and birds swoop across the stage or call from the foliage at inappropriate moments. Watching the audience climb giddy heights and improvise sun hats or snuggle into blankets is half the point.

So I didn't mind that Sondheim's musical was a disappointment. The programme tells me that he wrote the lyrics for West Side Story, a musical I saw when it was first staged in London and which set the standard, for me at least, for musicals I've seen since. There's a the same cleverness in the lyrics, delivered in recitative style. but none of the power of songs like 'Tonight, Tonight', 'Maria' or 'America'

I'm not keen on adapted fairy tales, although here they are ingeniously woven together to illustrate a single theme: that individual quests are realisable only with the help of others

The first half's entertaining, with archetypes enlivened, such as a greedy Red Riding Hood and two campy Lawrence Llewlwllyn-Bowen lookalike princes. Cinderella, ugly sisters, a spendidly wicked witch and a Rapunzel, Jack and his cow and a baker and wife wanting a baby ring the changes. A boy in school uniform frames the action but his role is obscure.

The costumes and stage design, by Soutra Gilmour very good, as are the cast, with Hannah Waddingham as a charismatic witch.

The second half would hardly matter except they all have to band together to defeat a giant, brilliantly staged as hands and a head appearing from the trees heralded by ground-shaking footsteps. What a good idea to have it 'voiced' by Judi Dench!

The giant, and the scene where Red Riding Hood and her grandmother are cut from the wolf's stomach are the highlights of an otherwise mediocre musical. But even a so-so play here can be as pleasant as a West End hit!

2010-08-23T15:40:00.023+01:00

On the Dark Side : The Tempest and As you Like It at The Old Vic

Two alternating Shakespeare plays, both directed by Sam Mendes at The Old Vic, brought out clear similarities of theme. Sadly, the productions emphasised darker aspects, at the expense of the lyrical and comic, to the detriment of both.

The Tempest is the more familiar to me. It's one of the 'late' plays, with a main character, the magician Prospero, apparently voicing Shakespeare's farewell to the theatre in his final speech beginning :

'This rough magic I here abjure...'

Prospero, a usurped and exiled Duke, has raised his daughter Miranda on a remote island with its own magical atmosphere. With his spirit helper Ariel he conjures up a tempest and a shipwreck. The courtly group of castaways includes Ferdinand, a suitable husband for Miranda. The island's other inhabitants are an old witch (not seen) and her misshapen offspring Caliban who is a double threat, both to Miranda's honour (he has tried to rape her in the past) and to Prospero's command. He tries to recruit two of the new castaways as support in plot to oust his master but is foiled partly through the intervention of Ariel, who hopes to be freed.

Much of the darkness derived from emphasising the colonial aspects -the enslavement of Caliban and Ariel. In addition, there's the sadness of the ageing tyrant who must concede place to the younger generation, and the presence among the group of his evil brother who has usurped his Dukedom , but there's also much light, and humour in Songs like 'Full Fathom Five' and the innocence that gives rise to Miranda's :

'O Brave New World, that has such people in it...'

as well as some of the descriptions of an isle 'full of music'

Shakespeare's crowd-pleaser As You Like it was given something of the same treatment, with a Wintery rustic set that only turns Spring-like towards the end.

In this play, too, there's a Duke usurped and a brother Duke exiled, this time to the (probably mythical) Forest of Arden. Rosalind, the usurped Duke's daughter, wanders about disguised as a boy, accompanied by her friend Celia, and encounters Orlando, who fell in love with her and she him when she was in female dress at court. The plot is loose, but rustic lovers in the forest add to the comedy, songs lend an air of festivity and there are no fewer than four weddings at the end. The play also contains Shakespeare's famous 'seven ages of man' speech, beginning:

'All the world's a stage,
And all the men and women merely players'

The plays are two halves of a scheme called The Bridge Project, aimed at combining American and English actors and taking them on tour to Europe and Singapore. The final venue is The Old Vic, revamped under Kevin Spacey.

The plays were well-acted and directed, despite the overly-sombre presentation. The American actors seemed ill-at-ease with the lines,with the exception of Ron Cepas Jones, who played Caliban in The Tempest and a minor role in As You Like It. This arrangement worked well for other actors too, although Stephen Dillane made a better stab at the melancholy Jacques than the more magisterial presence required for Prospero.

Thomas Sodaski was excellent as Stephano the Drunken Butler and good as Touchstone. Christian Camargo was a plausibly lovestruck Orlando, but whey-faced and lacklustre as Ariel. Clear-voiced Juliet Rylance seemed a little old for Miranda, but was excellent in the much meatier role of Rosalind.

2010-08-12T10:46:00.015+01:00

The Comedy of Errors at Regents Park

The last really funny performance of this play I saw was at The Open Air Theatre some years ago, so I went with high hopes.

The complicated plot involves two sets of identical twins separated in a shipwreck, with one pair arriving twenty years later in the town, Ephesus, where the other pair live. The master-and-servant duos wander about misleading the townsfolk and one another. To add to the confusion, the servant twins are both called Dromio and the master twins are both Antipholus. Their father is coincidentally awaiting execution for the offence of being an illegal immigrant.

Shakespeare played this mistaken-twins card most effectively to my mind in Twelfth Night where there's the added frisson of Viola, disguised in men's clothes, causing the woman she woos on behalf of her employer to fall in love with her.

Unfortunately, double the twins doesn't mean double the fun. The Comedy of Errors belongs to the same, tedious, word-play stage of the bard's development as Love's Labours Lost, in which I had the misfortune to play 'Costard, a clown' in a school performance. Since that painful time I've been aware that tastes in comic banter have changed a lot since an audience fell about at the idea that 'lying' could have two meanings.

One of the drawbacks of The Comedy of Errors is is the long exposition at the start to explain how the twins became masters and servants in the first place. The description of the storm is good, but goes on too long.

Delivered with some inventive slapstick the misunderstandings can be funny. Here it was often just frantic, but the stylish presentation helped make up for it.

Ephesus tranformed into a 1940s Casablanca complete with neon night-club and a jazz-band, a beach scene, a gorilla and a Sally Bowles style torch singer in suspenders livened it up. The inclusion of some non-Shakespearian songs, particularly At Long Last Love also helped the medicine, i.e.scampering and bantering, go down. That it did is thanks mainly to designer Gideon Davey and musical director Paul Frankish

2010-07-20T13:31:00.024+01:00

Sun,sand and Oyster Fishing: Sargent and the Sea at the Royal Academy

This small exhibition in the RA's Sackler wing, a collection of paintings by John Singer Sargent RA (1856-1925), is as refreshing as a trip to the seaside.

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'En Route pour la Peche' 1878, (detail above) shows Sargent's distinctive brushwork, and his typically romantic treatment of women and children.It's a striking contrast with Van Gogh's earthy sketches of peasants shown here recently.

Portraits are claimed as Sargent's forte, but there were few enough of them in the recent RA 'Emperors and Citizens' show, lost as they were among flounces and fancies of the aristos and royals.

So it's good to see another side to his talent. Turner's influence is very evident.

The painter led a peripatetic life, thanks to rich mother with itchy feet and a love of Europe. Although born in America, he was whisked away as an infant, and didn't return until he was twenty.

Locations range from the coasts of Normandy and Brittany to Mediterranean ports: Nice, Marseilles and Naples, then on to Venice an Capri. The paintings figure all the paraphernalia of boats as well as fisherfolk, sailors and holiday bathers,

It's not so surprising, in an era of steamships and cruise liners, that his early efforts at draughtsmanship included seascapes. He had filled thirteen sketchbooks by the time he got to Paris when he was eighteen, where he studied at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts and then joined a studio.

The painting Neopolitan Children Bathing 1879 perhaps the most startlng, as well as the most charming picture in the collection.

2010-07-11T14:47:00.011+01:00

Funny in parts: Neil Simon's The Prisoner of Second Avenue at the Vaudeville Theatre

There's plenty in Neil Simon's play to chime with big-city dwellers and fans of with Woody Allen's films, replete with funny one-liners, and a hopeless shmuck in the lead. It's Death of a Salesman territory without Arthur Miller's gift for social analysis, or Alan Ayckbourn's plays transported to New York without the experimental approach to drama. Neil Simon's hero is not so much a victim of a situation as a whinger whose life fails to match his over-inflated hopes.

The play opens in Mel and Edna Edison's fourteenth floor New York apartment at 2am. Mel's insomnia, he says, derives from the gross inconvenience of big-city life: noisy neighbours, the smell funnelling up from the street and slipshod plumbing that causes the toilet cistern to run incessantly and the air-con not to function at all. His wife's role at this point is to act as a sounding board for his complaints and suggest he calm down and take some Valium. Along with psychotherapy and alcohol, according to Mel, they've been tried and failed. That there's something else bothering him is signalled by a plaintive: 'I don't know who I am any more'.

Next the apartment is burgled. 'You think they took the ordinary stuff and left the Chivas Regal?' says an exasperated Edna as Mel, as usual, is slow to come to terms. It turnns out the reason Mel couldn't sleep is he has lost his job to financial recession.

It's about here you recognise the parallel with modern times, the reason for reviving the play.The script, in the hands of a better playwright, (Miller, for instnace) would analyse and offer insights. But it doesn't. This isn't about how capitalism betrays then gobbles up the 'little man'; it's about how the family rally round to bail him out. Apart from a minor niggle about a accepting money from your financially more successful brother, it's problem solved.

The actors do their best with the superficially amusing dialogue. Jeff Goldblum is watchable but miscast, too rangy and goggle-eyed for the part of the put-upon Mel. (Although perfect as mad scientists in The Fly and Jurassic Park) Mercedes Ruehl's whiny Bronx accent reminded me of Marge Simpson; her character's saint-like patience irritated me, too. I kept wanting her to punch her whining partner. The repeated slapstick episode where the upstairs neighbour throws a bucket of cold water over him had the audience laughing a tad too cruelly, I thought.They were as fed up with him as I was.

The direction was a bit slow in parts, but I saw a preview. The set wasn't very good; the burgled apartment should have been much more denuded of possessions. I hardly noticed the TV and Hifi were missing.

Parallels with current concerns weren't clear. Maybe brother Harry (Linal Haft) and his thrifty sisters represent the Big Society that will rescue us all from market forces and that's the message we should take away. I didn't find it very likely or convincing.

2010-07-02T09:36:00.012+01:00

Telling instead of Showing:The Phoenician Women at Theatro Technis

In fifth-century Greece, two brothers prepare to fight for sovereignty over 'Seven-gated Thebes'.Polynices has been brought an army from Argos, where he's lived for years in exile. He challenges Eteocles, who became ruler after their father Oedipus went mad and blinded himself. Having agreed at the time that they would take turns to reign for alternating years, Eteocles has reneged. Now Polynices threatens to destroy his native city unless Eteocles will back down. Their mother Jocasta enlists the help of Antigone, their beautiful sister, to make them see sense and not destroy Thebes.

The play was written by Euripides. It was a reminder of how Greek Tragedy achieved its so-called 'cathartic' effect,i.e. put the audience through the wringer, by imposing strict rules or 'unities' on the form of the play. The action must happen within 24 hours, which sets a pace as demanding as any modern thriller. Unity of theme demands the story concern an individual or small group, here the royal house of Thebes, concerned with one big issue,in this case patriotism.

The main strength, though, derives from the rule about unity of place, or having to stick to one location.

To describe a modern play as 'wordy' is to be critical, but it's the main component of Greek tragedy. Jocasta can plead with her sons within the palace grounds, but she has to fill in the backstory in a monologue, but the battle and its aftermath must be reported. It's a strangely hypnotic and compelling method that that requires a strong script and good actors. Fortunately this production had both - and all within a friendly fringe venue three minutes walk from Morning Crescent tube station.

2010-06-25T12:17:00.011+01:00

Full Monty at the British Library

'Are these lockers safe?' an American woman asked me. 'They used to have guards'.

I directed her to the counter-service where you hand over your bags and coats, as in a museum. Using the locker room means you don't have to queue at the desk and you can access the locker easily all day. 'Yes, but are the guards to be trusted?'

I supposed it's marginally safer to hand in bags at the counter, although thieves would have to be very nifty to jemmy one of the lockers open, given the constant traffic. Since free Wifi and chair-desks in the public areas were installed it's very busy.

The forecast of high temperatures this week was my cue to spend a couple of days in the British Library. I'm lucky because I can travel easily from Lewisham to St Pancras, changing at London Bridge onto the highly superior trains that go to Bedford. It's a shame that leg of the journey is so short, especially as it includes a free copy of The Times.

I wasn't tempted to spend time in the courtyard but the fine weather makes for a lively scene, especially since they opened the cafe. Given my heat intolerance, and the need to do some background research for a short story, I headed for a nice cool reading room.

At lunchtime I like Chop Chop on the opposite side of Euston Road, past St Pancras Station. Clean, bright and air-conditioned, it offers main courses such as chicken with chilli and rice for only £3.30. An added bonus for me is listening to Chinese teenagers talking in Mandarin.

After lunch on Wednesday, I visited this small but beautifully presented exhibition about Spanish American Independence 1810-1860. It's on the first floor, and really helpful since I've begun to read Latin American short stories. Mostly set in turbulent times, they have lots of historical references. I think this exhibition deserves a blog of its own, so I'll do that later.

My cup was really running over on Wednesday, if you'll forgive the pun. I left the library at 4pm and crossed to the pub opposite to catch the exciting second half of the England v Slovenia match. Excellent atmosphere and I got a good seat in front of the big screen. It made such a difference, watching with a group of enthusiastic supporters I'm wondering whether to go there again for the England v Germany match.

Might visit the library again, as its open on Sundays.

2010-06-16T11:26:00.004+01:00

Not Much of a Melting Pot: The Crucible at Regent's Park Open Air Theatre

The Crucible's never been one of my favourite plays and I avoided teaching it as an A-Level set text. But the offer of cheap tickets and a favourite venue- The Regents Park Open Air Theatre - convinced me to go along. I'm glad did.

Arthur Miller's play, inspired by Massachusetts witch-hunts in 1697,felt surprisingly at home. At an 8pm start, birdsong and a balmy June evening made a pleasant backdrop to the rural setting. By the end, huge trees, visible only in inky silhouette, helped create a mood of claustrophobic menace.

Miller found parallels between this story and the purges of the American entertainment industry in the late 1940s/early 1950s, when the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC) interrogated writers and directors. Fuelled by a frenzy of anti-Communist sentiment and the fear of conspiracy, investigators threatened suspected left-wing sympathisers with imprisonment or blacklisting. Immunity could be achieved by implicating others.

The play's theme of personal integrity versus a dogmatic regime is seen to be of universal relevance, which makes it popular. Despite the supposed recognition in places like post-Mao China, it has always seemed to me a particularly American play.

The production design is simple - a tilted house-facade provided trapdoors through which characters appeared as if at times from some infernal depths. The grassy area around the stage was often filled with bonnetted women murmuring and gasping as events unfolded. Emma Cuniffe was strong as the wife of John Proctor, the flawed hero who makes a stand against the religious bigotry of the time. Patrick O'Kane attracted sympathy as the man broken by an almost impossible choice, and the ensemble playing was adequate. It's unfortunate that the individuality of the characters isn't sufficiently realised.

2010-05-24T12:47:00.008+01:00

Carmen at the O2

The passionate and beautiful Carmen, a gypsy factory worker, attracts rival lovers: soldier Don Jose and Escamillo, a bull-fighter. Initially faithful to the worthy Don Alonso, who for her sake deserts his post, Carmen succumbs to the local hero’s flashy charms. This being nineteenth century Seville,revenge ensues.

Christina Nassif in the skirt-swishing lead role seemed at times lost among the 100-strong cast and her voice lacked distinction. Elizabeth Atherton was outstanding as Micaela, the girl-next-door admirer of Don Jose. With mousy plaited hair and dull clothes, her subdued gestures and posture held attention and earned her the loudest final applause. Kevin Greenlaw was handsome in the fairly slight role of Escamillo and John Hudson was a stocky and sympathetic Don Jose, also cheered.

This was the very first opera to be staged at the O2 Arena, previously known as the Millennium Dome, normally hosting sell-put pop concerts. When I did presentationd to Travel and Tourism students in the run up to 2000, I explained the benefits to the local environment and transport infrastructure, in addition to providing a 'heritage' structure funded by lottery proceeds. When the right wing press bundled it with New Labour as a target any chance of a government-funded conversion was lost. The Dome was rescued from becoming a giant casino but it’s ironic that a project built with workers’ money now profits a multi-million global company.

A cross between a circus tent and an aircraft hangar, the best thing about the O2 Arena is its position, on a promontory jutting into the Thames. The reclamation of polluted land and its relative isolation from residential housing were factors that influenced the choice of the location for the Millennium legacy. Inside, it’s so big that that I doubt even binoculars would help identify the singers in the crowd scenes. It does allow, however, for the hugely ambitious stage for Carmen, an elongated serpent with two bulges in the middle.

One end of the giant S curled round the London Philharmonic Orchestra, doing full justice under conductor Gareth Hancock, to Bizet’ score. It excelled both in rousing set-pieces like ‘Toreador’ and in more subdued solo and duets between the principals. The space at the opposite end was by turns a tobacco factory, a night encampment and a bullring. The raised plane of the giant S in its wider centre served as the town square at noon, a place for lunch-break flirtation, and then a street café lit by strings of coloured bulbs for sultry evening trysts and knife fights. The snaking platform, aided by Andrew Bridge’s moody lighting design, was by turns a cat walk for factory girls, a dusty road for marching soldiers and a triumphal route for a procession that included fire eaters and somersaulting tumblers.

The programme was well worth the £6 price tag and included a plot synopsis and biography of Bizet, as well as articles on bull-fighting and the rise of the taste for verismo in operatic works. It is perhaps the latter that makes Carmen the most popular and most frequently performed opera. David Rogers contributed an interesting explanation for his design choices, in particular the death motifs celebrated in Spanish culture.

2010-05-13T13:16:00.000+01:00

Enron at the Noel Coward Theatre

‘Imagine if the belief that a plane could fly was the only thing that was keeping it in the air’.

Lucy Prebble’s play explores what happened in 1991 when an American energy supply corporation, apparently worth billions on paper, crashed with massive debts. Recent financial meltdown in some UK fiancial companies adds topical resonance.

Enron, with co-operation from President Bushes, Snr and George W, made huge profits selling energy in a deregulated market and then, when things began to go wrong, two employees invented cover-up schemes to fool auditors, shareholders and fellow workers. When the fraud came to light, the main victims were the workers, who lost pensions and investments to the tune of $1.32 billion when the company went bankrupt. The two men responsible tried to bail out in advance but were caught and faced hefty jail sentences.

It wasn’t just down to two men, though: ‘nobody who was supposed to say no said no. They all took their share of money from the fraud and put it in their pockets.’

Lucy Prebbles’s witty dialogue conveys the fatal atmosphere of corporate camaraderie while a clever plot shows a smug conspiracy of greed escalating towards disaster.

The triumph of the production is that an essentially boring topic like corporate procedure is made to seem intriguing and even exciting. It’s like ‘Yes, Minister’, transferred to Canary Wharf and jazzed up with music and dancing.

It’s all delivered with panache by a group called Headlong Theatre. The cast has changed from the original Chichester Theatre and Royal Court Theatre production but competently deliver a mix of secret top-level meetings dripping chicanery, surreal encounters and exuberant ensemble scenes.

The play’s big success is Anthony Ward’s design, with its multimedia, multi-level impact and the superbly orchestrated lighting effects by Mark Henderson. Brisk scene run-ons under Rupert Goold’s direction and some clever choreography combine with fantastic escapades where characters scuttle about in giant animal heads. Office clones with laptops are drilled to deliver numbers with a precision that echoes Busby Berkeley musicals or Fritz Lang’s classic 1927 film, ‘Metropolis’, about workers dehumanised by capitalism, all down to the troupe’s choreographer Ewan Wardrop.

So I’d say go, to experience a truly theatrical event, but read the programme first. As well as background to the story, it has a glossary that includes definitions, from the straightforward: ‘insider trading’,’ ‘hedging’ and ‘asset’ to the more esoteric: ‘Kool-Aid’, ‘Black Box’ and ‘SEC’

Enron at the Noel Coward Theatre : http://www.noel-coward-theatre.com/

2010-05-05T19:03:00.000+01:00

'Hair' at the Gieldgud Theatre.

‘I can’t understand the words’, said my companion, halfway through a frenetic matinee at The Gielgud Theatre last week. The programme described the show as 'an ecstatic rock musical'. We were enjoying an interval respite from the noise and eating frozen yogurt in Berwick Street.

‘It’s not Andrew Lloyd Webber. The words don’t matter.’

Well, the words didn’t matter to whoever rehearsed the show's chorus – or ‘Tribe’, as they are called in the programme. The solos, mostly shrieked, weren’t much better. Of the 40 songs only two are still recognised - ‘Aquarius’, which never made much sense and ‘I got my Life’, ruined by association with TV Yogurt ads. The best song, and the only one where you can make out the lyrics, was written by Shakespeare, as a speech called ‘What a piece of work is man.’, here converted into a decent anti-war ballad.

This was almost the only genuinely moving part of the show, in contrast with the ear-splitting delivery of the rest. The young cast are unmistakably enthusiastic. There was a quite a bit of invasion of the audience, of the kind that makes you glad you didn’t sit too near the front. People around me were good-natured but nervous.

Unlike my companion I was happy enough to identify a parade of sixties themes: free love, pot smoking, racial prejudice, male display, anticommunism, street protests, the atom bomb, Eastern religions and the rejection of education and domesticity. A story of sorts emerged: a young man, his best pal and their girl friends drop out of middle class suburban lifestyles to live with a group similarly rebellious young people. Then one of them is drafted and sent to Vietnam, which brings everything to an end.

‘Hair’ seemed irrelevant here even when it first arrived from Broadway, in 1968. The pill had popularised unmarried sex in the early sixties in England. Although we might deplore the war in Vietnam: ' white people sending black people to fight yellow people for those who stole it from the red people’, as one of the characters puts it, nobody mentioned a ‘special relationship’ back then. The show’s big draw was nudity onstage, recently allowed by the abolition of the Lord Chamerlain's role in censoring theatre.

Rado and Ragni's show was a hit in London then; 'Time Out' named it last week as London's top musical. I didn't see it first time round, so it was a good opportunity, being tied up at the time with amateur drama and motherhood in Penge, so this seemed a good opportunity to see what I'd been missing.

The programme says that this version, which is not the first revival, has been updated, but unless you remember the original it’s not always clear where. There’s an 'ad-lib' stand-up comedy at the beginning performed by one of the characters, and ‘contemporary’ references, such as Roman Polanski’s name called out at random moments. Comedy scenes, like the one with the hero’s stereotyped suburban parents and another with a conventional middle aged couple apparently plucked from the audience were so inept as to be embarrassing. They were not so annoying, however, as the audience ‘plants’ who made their raucous presence felt in the second half and who led the orchestrated ‘standing ovation’.

The single funny line is made by the hero’s father. When his son expresses the wish for a change of nationality, in a song called ‘Manchester, England’, he says, ‘Face it, you’re Polish!’.

For all the supposed boldness of songs like ‘Sodomy’ which nowadays sounds just like a childish list of rude words, nudity is underplayed, making a brief appearance just before the interval. The cast move towards the back of the stage, the lights are lowered and they drift off to reappear and stand without clothes. It’s like an old-fashioned Music Hall tableau, all done in the best possible taste.

‘Hair’ reminds me of all those ‘I love you, Dad’ scenes in American movies. As we sneaked out of the theatre, not tempted to join the cast onstage, I was feeling not so much ecstatic as old. In fact, I felt something like the Duchess of Malfi when the madmen ceased their torments. And I had to agree after all that we should at least have been able to understood the words.

'Hair' at The Gielgud Theatre: www.gielgud-theatre.com

2010-04-21T14:28:00.000+01:00

The Duchess of Malfi at the New Players Theatre

Circus as metaphor for John Webster's anarchic world has a lot going for it. Intrigue and deceit generate mental acrobatics on all sides. With five corpses piled onstage at the end and a lot of gruesome surprises on the way, the overheated tragedy is replete with spectacle. The Italian setting invites comparisons with Comedia del'Arte and designer J William Davis' set and costumes were convincing. Sadly, they detracted from the overall impact of the play.

I was lucky enough to see Judi Dench and Helen Mirren give powerful performances onstage in London.Both brought out the resonance of 'I am entering a wilderness' , as the heroine decides to defy her brother , and the dignity of 'I am the Duchess of Malfi still' when calumny follows.

I 'd been curious for a while about visiting this theatre under the arches near Charing Cross that's better known for late night risqué cabarets than classical plays.

In seventeenth century Milan the widowed Duchess of Malfi is forbidden to marry by her excitable brother Ferdinand. He engages the cynical Bosola, ‘the only court gall’ to keep an eye on her while he’s away. The Duchess is in love with one of the few good men around, Antonio. His status as a groom makes him a bad match, but they go through a form of secret marriage and have three children before Ferdinand finds out.

Webster’s image-filled language was as superb and arresting as ever, the lines echoing recent usages, such as ‘Cover her face, mine eyes dazzle. She died too young’. or ‘Pleasure of Life, what is it? Merely the good days of an ague’. Webster’s themes - high-level corruption and male oppression – also account for its continuing popularity. It was good to be reminded at the present time that: '‘A politician is the devil’s quilted anvil’.

At first, the spare big-top set, with hurdy gurdy music, actrobatic scurrying up ropes and twirling hoola hoops was a pleasing novelty. The play opened with a wrestling match and ribbon-like ropes were used by extras to scatter paper snowflakes on th e exiled lovers. As the programme made clear, the company, appropriately named Vaulting Ambtion', was well- trained in circus arts.

There were too many occasions, though, when the production was over-strained Although the circus performers were mainly distanced from the action, except for the successful 'mad torment' scene, the concept jarred, despite Dan Horrigan's brisk direction. Dressing Tilly Middleton, the Duchess, for instance, in a sequinned mini-dress and a pony-tail hair-style topped with a pink scrunchy made it hard to preserve any sense of dignity. Her performance came across as dispirited when it should have been tragic.

The acting, it must be said, was generally lack-lustre, but as there were only seventeen of us for the matinee in the tiny theatre, it was perhaps unsurprising. What should have been shocking parts of the play - the severed hand and the poisoned book, the murders and even the waxen show were all understated and lost impact

In the stock seventeeth century role of ‘malcontent’, James Sobol Kelly 's Bosola was good , as the servant whose unrewarded merit has made him turn to evil, akin to Shakespeare's Iago. Here he's working, at least initially, under orders from above.

One of the most puzzling moments is when the Duchess’s maid, Cariola, delivers a jazz chorus from half-way up a ladder. Stephanie Brittain's cabaret delivery was pleasant, but the choice of ‘Honeysuckle Rose’ pointless. It wasn’t as if it was designed to drown out the occasional sound of trains passing overhead. Another bizarre touch was the use of coathangers with small suits attached to represent the Duchess's doomed children. In another context it would have seemed inventive.Here it just added to the general clutter of a somewhat confusing the production.

2010-04-06T14:00:00.000+01:00

In Retro-respect: Alan Ayckbourn's Bedroom Farce at The Duke of York's

It's the 70s; Nick and Kate are throw a house-warming party. Nick's DIY ineptitude means shelves fall down and the walls are half-papered but nothing bothers this loved-up pair who run round hiding shoes for a laugh. Nick's slightly cross that Kate has invited Susannah and Trevor, whose marital spats are routinely played out in public. It's a shame that Jan, Trevor's ex, will be there too, on her own because husband Malcolm is in bed with a bad back. Meantime Trevor's elderly parents go out to celebrate their anniversary then settle down for a bedtime snack. Mayhem ensues and nobody gets much sleep.

I wonder what it must be like for people who didn't know the 70s to watch this play. True, people still struggle with flat-pack furniture, one target of Ayckbourn's soft-centred satire, and the English middle-class fear of rows is just as strong, but those coats-piled-on-bed parties are a distant memory. These days guests don't bother with coats, or leave them in the car.

As with most of Ayckbourn, the joy is in the play's inventive use of the stage and witty dialogue as well as the dovetailing of the three-stranded plot. When I first saw this in the 70s it seemed daring to set the action entirely in three contrasting bedrooms. Even now I seem to remember a revolving stage for the first London production. At the Duke of York's it's all done with lights.

With Peter Hall directing, this entertaining tranfer from Kingston Rose Theatre was slick but not quite settled in on the night I attended. The younger couples seem a tad dated, the silly newly-weds like the Catherine Tate couple who laugh like drains when they get out of the lift at the wrong floor. Kate (Finty Williams) is bouncy and Nick (Tony Gardener) not quite hapless enough.Slipped-disc Malcolm (Daniel Betts) does a great slow-motion fall out of bed when he drops his book, and Jan (Sara Crowe) deftly portrays the wife whose patience is wearing thin.

My favourites, then as now, are parents Delia (Jenny Seagrove) and Ernest (David Horovitch) the actors as comfortable on stage as they are with their stereotype middle class marriage, mildly amused that eating pilchards in bed makes it 'smell like a fishing boat.'

It's not one of Ayckbourn's funniest plays, having the hall-mark surface frivolity without the dark undertones of later works, such as 'Woman in Mind' seen in the West End last year. It still slips down like a smooth Amontillado. I imagine it would chime more with a posh suburban audience than the West End one, but there's still a lot to like. Especially if you remember the 70s.

2010-03-15T18:50:00.000Z

Churchill’s studio at Chartwell.

‘And the moon shines bright on Charlie Chaplin
His boots are cracking for t' want of blacking
And his old fusty coat is wanting mending
Until they send him to the Dardanelles’

In 1915, when this sang mildly satirical ditty was first heard, Sir Winston Churchill took up painting.

His wife, Clementine, did all she could to encourage Winston’s new hobby. He’d suffered from depression for years and the failure of the Dardanelles campaign, for which he was blamed, was a time of national mourning. She even called on artist and family friend Sir John Lavery to help the great man. Given his well-known irascibility, that must have taken courage. Churchill apparently ignored advice to tone down his hues.

After a false start with water colours, he completed over 500 oil paintings over his lifetime. About 350 are still at his country house, Chartwell, now owned by the National Trust, some in the house itself but most in the studio he had built in the grounds.

Last Sunday’s Spring-like weather made the prospect of hour’s drive from South London through Kent very tempting. It would have been an hour, if we hadn’t been diverted round Sundridge.

Mothers’ Day coincided with Chartwell’s opening for the Trust’s 2010 season, so I shouldn’t have been surprised that parked cars spread into a reserve field and the restaurant had run out of chicken cobbler. It, crowded, noisy, messy and overrun with children. We wished we’d stopped at one of the pubs in Brasted instead.

I’d enjoyed previous visits to the house, full of Churchill memorabilia and an exhibition about his military achievements. Today I wanted to see the paintings and we were just in time to catch a three o’clock introductory talk.

Churchill made no claims for the quality of what he called his ‘daubs’ and it’s just as well. Possibly the best ones are in private collections elsewhere, and a couple in the National Gallery were mentioned. The paintings are mainly landscapes – scenes from the Kentish Weald farm where Churchill lived before moving to Chartwell and the grounds near the house itself. The majority showed French, Italian and Moroccan locations he visited on holidays and campaigns.

Interesting as the domestic interiors and the paintings are, the real star of the show is the Kentish landscape surrounding the house, situated on a small promontory overlooking a valley. Ponds, for swimming and fishing, border the sloping lawns, beyond which fields merge with wooded hillsides, resembling pastel sketches in subtle greys, reddish browns and soft purple. The spears of daffodils, bright green among the bracken and rocks near the house, contrasted with the dead ribs of giant ochre leaves in a huge patch of rhubarb-like plants near the house.

‘A day away from Chartwell is a day wasted’, Churchill said. The peace and stillness here must have helped him forget the turmoil of war that haunted him. It’s certainly a place to inspire a budding artist as well lift the spirits of visitors.

About the National Trust: www.nationaltrust.org.uk

2010-02-23T14:27:00.000Z

Heldenplatz by Thomas Bernhard

In no-choice economy class at the Arcola an empty adjacent seat is almost a necessity, so being told to close gaps for a full house wasn’t good news. It’s a tribute to Thomas Bernhard’s prose that the first half, despite its 85 minute length, keeps the audience spellbound.

Set during a right-wing resurgence in 1988 Vienna, the play’s contemporary relevance is very evident under Annie Castledine and Annabel Arden’s crisp direction
The linear lay-out loses some of the studio’s intimacy but it’s integral to the design of the scenes: servants’ quarters in a bleak apartment, a graveside disquisition and family gathering for a last supper. Rectangles are the play’s central motif, from the refugee suitcases in the ghostly prologue to the formal dining table at the end, when the final word is left to the Heldenplatz itself.

Major themes emerge in three scenes. The first is haunted by the presence of the recently deceased Professor Schuster, who has committed suicide by throwing himself from the window of the flat into the square. He is present both in his housekeeper’s eerie near-monologue, adoringly recalling his cold persona – a striking performance by the suitably bony Barbara Marten - and in the heap of identical black brogues that Hannah Boyde, as a fearful maid, is cleaning. His spirit seems to inhabit the wintry rays that pierce the fateful window.

As the Professor’s daughter, a strident Jane Maud, and his mordantly witty brother Joseph, played by Clive Mendus, talk at the graveside, the focus shifts. ‘My brother committed suicide; I went to Neuehaus’, says the arthritic Joseph. The merits of survival tactics adopted by remaining family members are considered – a vital issue for Jews in a society where anti-Semitism is rife. Bernhard’s portrayal of Austria damaged his reputation as a dramatist.

In the final scene family members wait for the wife whose sanity is on a knife edge, apparently only maintained in an absence from Vienna. Has the housekeeper, her implied though never recognised rival, orchestrated the situation? The gaunt Petra Markham makes a suitably tragic partner for the Professor whose ghost haunts the play and her final collapse to the resounding 'Sieg Heils' from the square makes real the suffering that motivated the Professor’s suicide.

http://uk.search.yahoo.com/search?ei=utf-8&fr=slv8-frz6&p=Heldenplatz

2010-02-15T21:03:00.000Z

How Would a Robot Read a Novel?

Even if the prospect of a free Literary Festival in London, followed by a drinks reception at the inaugural talk, hadn’t been enough, how could I resist the title? Might it signal the end of reading, like an expansion ad infinitum of The Readers’ Digest?

LSE Alumni clearly don’t swell the noble (i.e. poorly paying) professions. The New Academic Building in Kingsway is a palace of blond-wood, steel and plate glass. Surely the Champagne quality would match it.

‘Don’t leave any gaps! We’re expecting a full house!’ Marshalled by redshirts with military haircuts into the Sheikh Zayed Theatre, the docile booklovers fill up rows from the front, like Saturday morning picturegoers.

LSE was founded, apparently by George Bernard Shaw. This second annual festival, said stand-in chairman Tom Chapman was, ‘a return to the LSE’s roots’ and great results were expected. After the 2009 event then-Chairman David Hare went out and wrote ‘The Power of Yes’, now showing at the National Theatre (The Time Out critic says it sounds like a two-hour lecture, perhaps not so surprising)

The talk title should have read ‘What Happens When a Computer Programme Reads a Novel?’ or ‘What Do Social Scientists Look for in Novels?’

First, a social psychologist, a literary theorist and a novelist take turns to present a huge screen of colour-coded pie-charts (although novelist Robert Hudson refuses.) A text-analysing programme called Alceste had been fed novels like Moby Dick and The Da Vinci Code.

Alceste can’t read the text, only recognise ‘co-occurrences’ and tabulate frequencies of appearance, hence the pie charts. These show the percentage of religion-related topics in Dan Brown’s best seller or ditto whaling in Melville’s epic. I was waiting for the interesting part, but it didn’t happen, except when audience questions strayed into literary territory.

Novelist Robert Hudson approved the findings for his own novel. ‘The Kilburn Social Club’ was 50% about relationships, Alceste said, which might be expected from the title, although he feared it might come up with ‘football’. Considering the book cover shows a of a football pitch (it was on sale in the foyer) and blurb mentions a young woman who inherits a football club it just goes to show that Alceste could be a handy corrective tool for readers. Even so, the ‘co-occurrences’ needed interpretation, which was subjective.

To me Alceste’s major,even fatal, short-coming was that it couldn’t say whether a book was any good. There’s only one way to do that:just carry on reading for oneself. Phew! And the Champagne was excellent.

2010-02-08T14:54:00.000Z

A Bibulous Tour of Belgravia

Declared fit after being confined to barracks for three weeks by a troublesome cough, I was more than ready to join friend and Westminster guide Joanna on what she called a 'bibulous tour', in other words a pub walk, in Belgravia. I thought it might be useful to know about some backstreet inns for the times when I'm stuck in the West End wondering where to get a drink and a sit-down.

It wasn't all pubs, though. Joanna stopped from time to time and supplied her group of eight walkers with interesting historical asides (and current house prices) relevant to the mews, churches and sidestreets around Eaton Square.

We learned, for instance, about the fortuitous marriage of Sir Robert Grosvenor, Marquess of Westminster. His twelve-year-old bride was heiress to an area known as 'Five Fields' which included most of Mayfair. His statue has him with a foot placed on a milestone as reminder that his family seat was 197 miles away in Cheshire. Talbot dogs that flank the great man appear on his family escutcheon and were familiar from the pottery versions I'd seen on sideboards. They remain as sad reminders of a breed now extinct.

There were more than pubs on the walk, and Joanna stopped in front of the house where Ian Fleming once lived, as a blue plaque denotes. On the way to the first pub I talked to a lively young woman who runs a business based on food-and-wine-tasting events.

The Star Tavern was the first pub, its interior both spacious and welcoming with a real coal fire blazing away in the grate. The only disappointment was the lack of hot drinks. 'We have no facilities'. Just in time, I stopped the barman from adding ice to my tomato juice. I noted the pub does Sunday roasts at a reasonable £7.95, so I think it'll be suitable for celebrating R's birthday next month.

The Nag's Head was tiny, with a two-foot high bar in the front parlour and a tiny space with barrels for tables at the back. Here the bartender was heard to remark to someone asking for tea 'We're running a pub, not a cafe', which saved me the bother of a query. I didn't have a drink at all there, but chatted to a woman who was trying to persuade Joanna to do a city walk for her customers interested in Maritime trade.

The best was saved 'til last - a pub that looked straight out of toytown, with a bright blue facade and a red senty box outside. Not only did this delightful pub serve hot drinks but the coffee came in a cafetiere with instructions to wait three minutes for it to brew. Now how could pouring boiling water on coffee grounds be too much trouble at the other places?

Here I talked to Tony, like myself a keen supporter of 'Liars League', a bi-monthly pub meeting where actors read out short stories, the best of entries submitted under a different theme each week. There was plenty of reading matter scattered about, including a magazine called The Belgravia, and an intriguing back room with pictures and banknotes pinned to the ceiling.

So now I'm all set to impress family and friends with my knowledge of Belgravia pubs. Thanks, Joanna.

The Star Tavern:

www.fancyapint.com/pubs/pub933.php

The Nag's Head:
http://www.fancyapint.com/pubs/pub385.php

The Grenadier:
http://www.fancyapint.com/pubs/pub384.php

Food and Drink Experiences:
http://www.tastour.co.uk

Joanna's Westminster Walks:
http://westminsterwalking.blogspot.com/

Liar's League:

liarsleague.typepad.com

2010-02-03T15:23:00.000Z

For A' That an A' That...

I wasn't well enough to go out on Burns Night, and it occurred to me too late I could cook my own 'neeps and tatties' and buy in a haggis from Tesco- not that it would be the same, and the friend with whom I usually celebrate was also suffering from a cold. Now she's 80 years old, it's the sort of thing that keeps her indoors on a January night.

For my own celebration I re-read some of Robert Burns's poems in a handy booklet given away free by the Guardian, part of their series of 'Romantic Poets'.

It was an extra bonus when C sent me a set of commemorative stamps. Her local Post Office still had some left over from the 250th anniversary

There's a special meaning for my friend and ex-colleague, married to a Scotsman until she was widowed ten years ago. He proposed at Loch Lomond when she was a student teacher from France. Like her a lifelong left-winger, he was a great admirer of Burns's humanitarian sentiments.

The poem I read out at his funeral was not included in the Guardian selection, probably because it was political rather than romantic, although for him the two often went together. It's an expression of his belief that wealth, fine clothes and position are not what make a person human acccording to his definition. The last verse of 'For a' that an' a' that' is curiously optimistic about the ability of men to recognise their common humanity and seems very apt for modern times. One can't help hoping it's prophetic:

Then let us pray that come it may,
(As come it will for a' that,)
That Sense and Worth, o'er a' the earth,
Shall bear the gree, an' a' that.
For a' that, an' a' that,
It's coming yet for a' that,
That Man to Man, the world o'er,
Shall brothers be for a' that.

2010-01-24T13:41:00.000Z

'Six Degrees of Separation' at the Old Vic

‘It all depends on the production’, said the programme seller when I expressed my dismay. Gone was the lovely theatre-in-the-round space created for the performances of Alan Aykbourne’s Norman Conquest trilogy, still in place for ‘Complicit’, starring Richard Dreyfuss. In its place was an awkward three-tiered horseshoe.

A recent TV advert for American Airlines shows the theatre’s artistic director Kevin Spacey in what I assumed was a pre-conversion Old Vic. Cooing about how he appreciated good service his onscreen persona transferred from the dress circle to his seat in AA business class (Currently to be see in the new George Clooney ‘comedy’ ‘Up in the Air, in case you didn’t catch Spacey) I wish I could say the same about my own experience at last Thursday’s matinee for ‘Six Degrees of Separation’.

Instead, my seat on the right hand leg gave me an excellent view of the audience on the opposite side. To see the stage I had to turn through ninety degrees. I wasn’t too far from a kind of a red-coloured bowl sliced down the middle, which was to be the acting space. Maybe the symbolism was apt to suggest the cosseted world of the Manhattan art-dealing protagonists in their apartment high above Central Park. It did nothing at all for the sound, which seemed to be absorbed by the walls, but then I was hardly giving it both ears, skewed round as I was.

I’d seen the 1993 film of the same name, and remembered it as a chatty but intriguing piece. The ‘six degrees’ of the title, refers to the notion of the interconnection of everybody through six steps of acquaintance, like a giant facebook matrix. Based on the true story of a con man, also suggests the rich easy prey to those who’d take advantage of their gullibility.

A young man (Obi Abili) turns up at the apartment claiming to know their children at Harvard. He certainly seems familiar with the details of their lives. Further he says he’s Sydney Poitier’s son so can get them into the movies. The Kittredge’s (Anthony Head and Lesley Manville) fall for his story and they are not the only ones.

Slick direction and acting carries John Guare’s clever critique of several targets: the commoditisation of art (there’s a huge Kandinsky on display throughout) the ingratitude of pampered offspring, contemporary celebrity-worship and how privileged guilt makes the rich vulnerable to scams.

It's enjoyable and witty enough if you haven't seen the film, which is better. Just make sure your seat points towards the stage.

http://www.oldvictheatre.com/whatson.php?id=56

2010-01-17T16:04:00.001Z

Literary Listings

Faced with a nine hour wait at frozen Gatwick, I was glad of Writing Magazine in my hand luggage. Time to peruse fifteen pages about Book Festivals and Writing courses on offer in 2010.

My Fantasy Holiday Programme consists of alternating Book and Film Festivals. Sometimes I’m lucky enough to be in a city when a film festival’s on, but in fact I find the October London FF is more than enough. I always end up too traumatised to ever want to see a screen again. It once took a week to wear off.

A first glance at the magazine discounts some of the literary events straight away – too far, too posh, too expensive, and too crowded. I don’t want a gala dinner. I don’t want to hear the Dowager Duchess of Devonshire talking to David Blunkett. Too many places feature Margaret Drabble and/or Gervase Phinn. The dedicated-to-one author ones look attractive, and likely to attract enthusiasts instead of poseurs – Dickens at Broadstairs, Grahame Greene at Berkhamstead, My top favourite would be the Harrogate Crimewriting Festival, except it’s in one (at least) of the discounted categories .

The separate list of courses and workshops is even fancier. People would get on my nerves, so anything residential is out. If I want to walk between writing sessions or retreat to the Tuscan hills I can arrange it myself. I’d rather hire a caravan in Whitstable. Hot weather and scenery give me writers’ block.

So maybe it’ll be a case of one-off events at the LRB bookshop again. Hilary Mantel on the eve of winning the Booker Prize, AS Byatt being taught how to suck eggs by some whippersnapper, Ma Jian reading from Beijing Coma – all memorable in 2009.

But what’s this? An email on my return, telling me about a free Literary Festival in London, with top-flight authors and fascinating topics, ie 'How would a Robot Read a Novel?'

It's the Space For Though Literary Festival, at the LSE. Well, that’s made my mind up. And it’s even happening soon, in February.

http://www.lse.ac.uk/collections/spaceForThought/

2010-01-04T10:13:00.000Z

A Daughter's a Daughter, at the Trafalgar Studios

'Aarghh! Not Agatha Christie!' was R's reaction, when I told him I'd been offered tickets for a new play at the Trafalgar Studios, 'A Daughter's a Daughter'. It seemed to me a perfect Christmas Eve treat, especially since it had such good reviews.

I know what he objected to about Christie's work, because he's told me before - the upper-class milieu, cardboard characters and stilted dialogue. I couldn't drag him to 'The Mousetrap' when my sister visited from Australia.

When Sarah Prentice, Honeysuckle Weeks returns from overseas military service in November 1945 it’s just in time to scotch her mother Ann’s plans to re-marry. ‘I hate change’ she declares, moving the furniture that has been changed round in her absence. Not to give away the plot, the rest of the play revolves round the consequences of her selfishness and her mother’s wish to please.

This play was first written under Agatha Christie's pseudonym Mary Westcott, and opened for just one week at Bath Theatre Royal in July 1956.

As the premise is somewhat dated, interest centres round the recreation of a social milieu and its customs. Apart from the single set, there’s much in common with the TV ‘Poirot’ series as well as ‘Foyle’s War’, in which Honeysuckle Weeks starred as a war-time chauffeur. Her Roedean accent and manner limits her range but the part of the spoilt upper-class daughter suits her well. Jenny Seagrove is superbly moving in the more challenging role of the mother.

The single drawing-room set, with paintings reflecting changes in taste from 1945 to 1949, works very well, as do the costumes and hair styles. While the mother’s suitor is made sympathetic by Simon Dutton, the minor characters jar, including the ‘stock’ female family retailer and the straight-talking titled family friend, reminders of Christie’s penchant for caricature. The clichéd dialogue works well enough in a context where the characters' social conditioning constrains their ability to express themselves.

The talk of cocktails parties, the quaffing of gin and disdain for employment is a long way from the world of post-war rationing and making do, but reflects Christie's own social circle. Despite the lack of wit, it’s closer to the writings of Terrence Rattigan and Somerset Maugham than to the style usually associated with the ‘Queen of Crime’.

For these reasons and because the ‘arena’ style venue is particularly suited to psychological drama, the play works surprisingly well. Even R admitted he’d been wrong to dismiss out of hand a play that offered pleasant, if undemanding, Christmas entertainment.

http://londontheatredirect.com/asp/DaughtersADaughterA.htm

2009-12-31T15:51:00.000Z

Recycling Christmas at Luis Casado School, Corrales del Vino

Should auld acquaintance be forgot
And never brought to mind?
Should auld acquantance be forgot,
And days of auld lang syne?

For auld lang syne, m'dears,
For auld lang syne,
We'll tak a cup o' kindness yet,

For the sake of auld lang syne.

(Robert Burns)

Happy New Year to the children and staff of Luis Casado School, all my new friends in Zamora, volunteer teachers in Castile-y-Leon, friends and family everywhere.

2009-12-27T10:46:00.000Z

Workaday Carols

St Dunstan's, situated where the Strand becomes Fleet Street, survived the Great Fire of London. Forty Westminster choristers were roused to throw water on the flames when they came to within three doors of the church.

Originally built between 988 and 1070 AD, centuries of wear and tear led to extensive reparations in 1831.

You could be forgiven for walking past the narrow facade and doorway without noticing it, unless you happened to look up at the splendid tower, rebuilt after the original was damaged by German bombs in 1944.

Although outwardly Neo-Gothic, an octagonal space inside lined in dark wood, like the dining hall of an Elizabethan manor, embraces a short aisle and

seating. The traditional pews are accessed by small end-doors with brass latches. The pulpit, raised to the right of the pews, has an attractive overhead canopy.

Once again, friend and Westminster Guide J. was the source of information about a lunchtime carol service on the 22nd, although I'd also attended one of the regular midweek concerts, timed to fit the lunch hours of local office workers.

The service was much more traditional than the one at St Pauls of the week before. No poems, but readings from an older version of the gospels had the virtue of decorous language that was also clearly understood. A contemporary note was struck when Rev William Gulliford drew parallels between the Christmas story and the plot of a film currently showing in London: 'Where the Wild Things Are'. Both, he said, involved' a malevolent Empire, cynical Kings and dark things lurking'.

Hymns were traditional, and included my favourite', We Three Kings of Orient Are', as well as a sonorous arrangement of the medieval 'Adam lay ybounden'. From this, and the vibrancy of the descants in the other hymns, I suspected that they were professionals. Sure enough, J. enquired and confirmed, they were a group called Chantage.

Here were no stewards in official coats, but clergy and lay helpers to point the way to 'seasonal' refreshments', laid out on tables in an area to the side. . Of course, it's easier to offer hospitality of this kind in a church with a small congregation, and most of these were hurrying back to work.

The fact that St Dunstan's is a 'Guild Church' intrigued me, as a native of Preston, which celebrates a 'Guild Merchant' or trades festival once every 22 years. It reflects the church's particular ministry to the daytime working population around Fleet Street, hence the lunchtime concerts lasting 45 minutes, when workers are welcome to eat their sandwiches. On this occasion J had time to sample Christmas cake and wine before returning to her office in nearby Fetter Lane.

J's blog about Westminster and her walks:http://westminsterwalking.blogspot.com/

2009-12-18T17:39:00.000Z

A Curate's Egg

' The readings seem shorter than usual', said J. We were at at the annual Carol Service at St Pauls on Tuesday. Except it wasn't a Carol Service, it was 'A Celebration of Christmas', and some of the reading were poems.

J had tipped us off about the event, but been detained at work. I had to talk my way past the stewards to retrieve her from the throng of 2,000 or so who were turned away. 'It wasn't like this last year', she commented.

The programme was odd mix. Instead of familiar biblical extracts recounting the annunciation, the rejection at the inn, the wrapping in swathing bands, visitations by angels, shepherds and wise men, we had Laurie Lee and Betjeman. Sadly, the modernised bible readings that were retained sounded like clumsy literal translations - the poetic -sounding swathing bands became mere 'strips of cloth'. Some bits struck a discordantly merry note: 'The Night Before Christmas' , an extract from 'Shirley Valentine' and the choir finale,' We Wish You a Merry Christmas'.

There was a good line-up of professionals for the readings: Sinead Cusack, Penelope Wilton and Toby Stephens. Sitting towards the back, I couldn't see them. There were whole sections at the front reserved for the special people, should they are to attend. Not a good idea to declare no room for those waiting in the cold when some couldn't be bothered to arrive on time.

The amplification was excellent. The choirmaster stuck out for more traditional carols, inserting the odd medieval madrigal - 'Lullay my Liking'- and even Latinate hymns scattered among classics like 'Hark the Herald'. No wonder the four little boys in front of me, like four miniature Boris Johnsons, wriggled and giggled.

I admired the way dimmers on the candelabrae continually varied the lighting between nave and altar area and pulpit, emphasising different performance areas. We always knew when it was our turn to sing and when the choir's. That was a good touch

Perhaps it was the lighting, continually casting different shadows and emphasizing harmony of sculpted stone, arches and cupolas under the great dome that made me realise what a wonderful building this was. It made me aware of the contrast with Spanish churches Whereas in the Spanish churches it's the artefacts - statuary and paintings and set-piece depictions, that caught the eye, with richness of texture and representaton, in St Pauls it's the architecture of the church itself that impresses.

So not one thing or the other, but very enjoyable. Next year I'll get there even earlier.

2009-12-16T18:07:00.000Z

Santa's Mushroom Village

'Er, well, it's a kind of hole in a rock, perhaps all covered in snow'.

Last week I'd met with puzzled faces and blank stares from the Spanish teachers in Zamora. They'd enjoyed my Christmas Quiz, but were stumped by the question: 'Where does Santa live?'

Was it in:

a) a cabin

b) a chimney

c) a grotto

My Oxford Dictionary Thesaurus says a grotto is ' a picturesque cave' and I recall they were popular as writers' retreats in the eighteenth century. Alexander Pope had one in the garden of his house in Twickenham. The local History Museum and Art Gallery in Blackheath, a converted convent, had one too. Maybe it's iconic, associated with Lourdes and other places where the Blessed Virgin appeared. I've always hankered after a grotto, although I'd settle for a caravan at Whitstable.

So I was dismay to see that the Lewisham Santa doesn't have a grotto; he has a Mushroom Village. Why a mushroom village? It's not very Christmassy, and not even a very accurate description, as the 'mushrooms' are toadstools. Maybe it's an obscure advertising ploy thought up by the market traders.

At least the live elf was authentic- when she saw me wielding a camera she leapt down the path and said it would cost me £1 to take her photograph! I suppose it's all in a good cause if the money really does go to the hospice, but I do like a nice grotto at Christmas

2009-12-04T08:45:00.000Z

Must be Santa

It´s almost the end of my stay in Zamora, and the man from the Junta was expected. Headmaster José Eladio said the Education Minister would visit village schools across the province, to see teacher volunteers. I was bracing myself; less formal than the greeting ceremony at the ‘monasterio’ in Valladolid, but I expected a speech.

In fact, José Ignacio Rodríguez Aguado (great names here), the ‘Jefe del Servicio de Innovación Educativa (great titles, too) arrived during my final session with the teachers. I’d been happy to swap a day at the school each week for a two hour oral English ´seminario´ with teachers in Zamora. I really enjoyed the sessions and it was a welcome change to teach adults with a good level of English.

Nice Victoria, the local 'Jefa´in charge of the Zamora programme, arrived too, with Jose Eladio. When the visitors came in we’d already sung a song :

‘Who’s got a beard that’s long and white?’
‘Santa’s got a beard that’s long and white.’
‘Who comes around on a special night?’
‘Santa comes around on a special night.’

Special night; beard that’s white …

Must be Santa, must be Santa,Must be Santa, Santa Claus.

José Ignacio didn’t have a beard, and it was me that made the speech, prompted by his question,’ How have you found the experience of teaching in one of Castile’s bi-lingual schools?’ To my surprise, I made some sensible comments and give a summary of the highlights. I expect keeping a blog helped - and the Cava.

Planned activities, comparing Christmas menus and playing Snakes and Ladders ‘- resources replenished courtesy of Roy – had to be shelved.

But we’d made a start on Cava and cake supplied by the teachers. The latter was a traditional Three Kings Cake with hidden treasures. If you chanced on one of two little mannequins it´s a year’s good luck, but if you get the ‘bean’ you’re supposed to pay for next year’s celebration. Poor Maria Jose was the unlucky one.

I won’t be there, but I think I’ll come back for the other ‘Santa’ time, - Semana Santa, at Easter.

2009-11-30T09:40:00.001Z

Carrie´s Visit to Zamora

Altogether, there are sixteen of us volunteer retired teachers and we´ve been posted to ´bi-lingual´village schools all over the Northern province of Castile and Leon . The schools are near the historic cities of Spain´s largest province: Burgos: Valladolid, Avila, Soria, Segovia, Palencia, Leon, Salamanca and Zamora. I really enjoyed the weekend when Carrie stayed with me in Zamora. She´s a Canadian with a warm personality and an interesting background, staying in Salamanca, only an hour by bus from Zamora.

We were blessed with a fine Sunday morning for a walk by the River Duero. In the background, the ´romanico´Puente de la Piedra´

By yet another of the coincidences that have happened since I arrrived in Spain, Carrie´s 'host' English teacher , Belen, has a connection with me. We´d never met, but we´ve exchanged homes.

For some years Roy and I did home-swaps via an Internet company, and once went to stay in Salamanca for a week. By chance, she saw my name on an email I sent to Carrie and said ´I know that person´.

So she proposed coming to collect Carrie to drive her back on Sunday and I reserved a table for us at one of the restaurants that Olga recommended. It was ´Sancho 2´, is in a small park in Zamora. The food and company were excellent.

2009-11-25T13:02:00.000Z

Concert For St Cecilia It`s too complicated for me to tell you where the conservatory is`, said music teacher Lidia. 'I will drive you there.' I was glad of this, as although I was keen to attend the students' concert, the temperature in Zamora had suddenly dropped. It was a foggy 1 degree in the morning and never rose above 5 that day.

Fortunately, Lidia´s flat is across the street from mine, which makes it convenient for her to drive me to Corrales three times a week. Her duties take her to other villages on Tuesdays and Thursdays.

Lidia plays the violincello, as it´s called here. Last week she took the 'cello to the school. The children were still enthusiastic following the visit to a special concert in Vallalodid, so she wanted them to see the 'cello close up. She was feeling nervous about it, though. ´Did they damage it?´I asked her on the way home. No, she said, but she´d misjudged the width of a doorway and managed to break a string all by herself!

The music conservatory in Zamora is housed in what was once an orphanage, and I suppose the concert hall must have been the chapel. It was certainly well supplied with the gilded grotto-like structures called 'retablos'.

This concert had just the kind of informal atmosphere I enjoy, with a good turn-out of relatives, and all the pieces were short, so no strain on the attention. Naturally, guitars featured prominently, fifteen all at once for once piece. fMy favourite was the Villa Lobos solo, though, and I was moved to tears by the concentration of the fourteen year old performer.

Even though I was driven there and back I wore my red coat for the first time. It´s milder now, and I´m back to my padded vest, or flak jacket as Roy calls it. So my musical education continues.

2009-11-17T12:57:00.000Z

Ready to Fly

It´s not unusual to see storks in the centre of Zamora. I could hardly believe it, all the same, when I first saw one pass overhead. It was warm enough, then, to sit in the Plaza Mayor and drink gin-tonic, Spanish size.

Sweeping over distant rooftops with legs and necks outstretched they circle like low-flying aircraft, then suddenly appear overhead, casting a shadow. The separated black wing feathers are clearly visible.

Yesterday they were unusually numerous, seven or eight circling all at once. Even the locals stood with faces upturned as I made my way to the library at 6pm. The birds not on the wing were perched on nests around the Plaza Mayor , or standing on chimneys, looking as if they might launch themselves any minute.

When I left the library an hour later it was dark and there was heaviest rainfall I´ve ever seen here . When I mentioned the birds´ unusual behaviour to Olga this morning she suggested they were getting ready to fly South. Like me, they know it´s almost time to go, but they´re savouring their final days in Zamora.

2009-11-17T09:43:00.001Z

Hasta Luego

I thought Roy would miss his cronies, not to mention his bridge games, if he stayed too long in Zamora. So I suggested two visits instead of one; stay a week, return to London for two and join me for the final ten days. I even managed to book us on the same return flight.

On Sunday, though, when was in the kitchen consulting the Madrid Metro map, two weeks alone seemed a long stretch. And it meant four journeys for him instead of two.

Going by his postcards, what Roy most liked about Zamora was the food and drink. On every card he mentioned a three-course ‘menu del dia’ at 8 Euros, including half a bottle of wine. I joined him on his exploration of the town on two days but the rest of the time I was in school. My favourite time was a stroll by the lovely River Duero on his first day here.

It was almost like being back home when we visited the Zamora´Multicine´- excpet that all the films are dubbed into Spanish. As the one we saw was ´2012´, it didn´t really matter. It would have been bottom of my list in London, and even here all the mayhem palled after the first hour, but we enjoyed it.

I don´t think Roy was at all interested in going to the circus, but I caught this shot of him him standing next to poster. I have to be sneaky because he thinks I´m a pest with my camera.

For me it´s eyes down for a final three weeks, but the last two will be lightened by his return. Then, when we get back to London, I´ll make reparations by being a top-notch stay-at-home wife.

2009-11-10T08:51:00.003Z

Fruits of the Earth

‘Old people can make ink from those –what do you call them?’ Jose Eladio the headmaster pointed to some strange-looking fungus growing under a tree. In front of the school, one or two trees of the pine variety are confined to square patches of earth. Spindly toadstools with frilly black edges had sprung up beside them.

The growth and harvesting of plants is something I’d been aware of in China, where Í´d watched farmers on the hillside opposite my flat. This had been forgotten in London, near a market supplying exotic fruit and veg from across the world and a supermarket full of canned and frozen goods. I was reminded, now, that plants are also a source of dyes and inks.

‘This time of year they also gather the kind you can eat’, said Jose Eladio. He added that the local people went out to collect them when certain weather conditions prevailed, such as showers followed by sun, to sell later. ‘Twelve Euros a kilo. It’s money for free!’

Next day a notice outside an upmarket restaurant in the historic centre advertised a week of speciality mushroom-based menus.

On Friday I took part in a harvest myself, ‘Come, Sheila’, Jose Eladio announced at break time. ‘We’re going to take the olives from the school tree.’

Some days before I´d been given a tour of an area the size and shape of a city allotment, not at its best in early November. Three large cabbages grew in an otherwise bare middle part. Some rosemary and other hardy herbs and thin trees grew around the perimeter. Conditions here don’t encourage luxuriant growth.

Between the silver and light green leaves of the olive tree, though, shiny oval black berries were clearly visible. A single pupil-volunteer held a plastic bag and helped the teachers pick, whilst his classmates played football. Here’s a young horticulturist-in-the making, perhaps.

The tree wasn’t big, and Jose Eladio could reach the highest berries.

I olove olives, so I tasted one I´d picked. I immediately hurriedly spat it out; it was horribly bitter bitter. The science teacher explained they’d need several days of soaking and changes of water to make them edible.

They’re now on the draining board in the staffroom, a timely reminder for a Londoner that olives don´t just come from tins.

2009-11-06T17:42:00.000Z

School Dinners

Here in Corrales the children are full of beans –literally. Today's treat is a Paella starter, with fish to follow, but I bet we'll see some beans tomorrow.

Lunch has three courses: a vegetable starter, which may be soup, green beans cooked with ham pieces or white beans with bits of chorizo, then almost always baked fish and lettuce, occasionally chicken or veal and lettuce, and bread. To finish, there’s fruit or yogurt.

The staff who eat at school, including me, have the same food. The children staying for lunch, who remain at school for afternoon activities, eat in a dining room. I usually go with Olga or another teacher to collect the teachers share from the kitchen. It comes back to the staffroom on a trolley.

Lunch is the time when I get to practise speaking Spanish, when I can get a word in, but there are usually no more than four of us. I still can’t understand much of what’s being said, except in a very general way. Teachers take it in turns to stay on each day and supervise the afternoon sessions.

Enough fuss has been made about English school dinners. Here it's more as I remember it back in the old days - except with more beans.

2009-10-29T10:18:00.001Z

Have you heard the Angels singing?

Lydia the music teacher tipped me off when she drove me to the village school in Corrales: sung music by Vivaldi and Purcell at the cathedral - by a group from London! She couldn’t attend herself. ‘It’s free, so arrive early to get a good seat’, she said.

It was the first time I’d seen the cathedral at night. The impressive dome dominated the skyline, and the interior was a vision of gilded splendour. On a previous visit I’d just wandered round a series of ante rooms, gawping at tapestries of the Siege of Troy, a massive Semana Santa procession platform, elaborately decorated silverware and paintings.

I needn’t have worried about a central position. The sponsors, Caja España, had provided monitor screens so the singers and players could be viewed in close-up – especially when the camera dwelt on a lively blonde first violinist and a handsome countertenor.

The strangest thing, for me, was the bars between the audience and performers – not light, decorative wrought iron, but heavy-duty ones that obscured the view. Some VIPs were allowed on the orchestra side.

While I waited I looked at the programme, with its alluring question on the cover: 'Have you heard the Angels sing?'. Inside was summary in Spanish of the lives of Purcell and Vivaldi, and the words in Spanish and English to the five settings of psalms by Purcell and then a Latin text for the Vivaldi ‘Dixit ….’ There was a short ‘sonata de trompeta’ between Purcell psalms. It was a hollow-sounding instrument of a dull copper colour, like an over-sized Victorian child’s toy.

The line-up for the moving Purcell psalms was a soprano, two counter-tenors and a tall baritone, with the occasional accompaniment from other singers. If there was one fault with the programme it didn’t have photos identifying individual performers, although Peter Pickett the conductor and founder of The New London Consort group was obvious. The concert was the first of four in cathedrals in Zamora, Valladolid, Leon and Palencia.

They saved the best ‘til last, and the Vivaldi, with everyone singing and playing together, was uplifting. Amid the applause that echoed round the roof, did I feel a hint of national pride? Or was it the angels singing?

2009-10-27T18:25:00.000Z

Playing up agains so I can't upload photos. Will have to wait until tomorrow, which is what worked last time.

2009-10-26T18:36:00.000Z

I can’t get no calefacción…

I’d been looking forward to Saturday 24th, the day the heating was to come on. Yesterday was a mild 14° but mornings are a bit chilly and one day last week it reached only 8°, even at mid-day.

The notice in the hallway was dated 2008, but José Eladio assured me it was because it was the same date every year.

I was surprised, then, when the radiators were hot on Friday 23rd, when I arrived home from school. Not for long and not all of them – the bedroom and hall ones remained cold and the knob to make them hotter was stuck. Best not force them, I thought, after my disaster with the ‘persiana’ last week: I tugged the cord too hard and the blind disappeared into the box over the window.

The heat must be on a trial run, in case adjustments were needed.

Then the same thing happened on the 24th. The radiators had been on for an hour when I left the flat at one and were cold when I got back at seven. Today they haven’t come on at all. There’s obviously someone at the remote control, working to a bonus.

José Eladio and Olga have been so kind to me I don’t want to raise a further problem. They went out of their way to help when I arrived – Olga offering a room in her lovely flat, with my own bathroom, at such short notice, and José Eladio ringing agencies trying to find a place within the Vaughantown budget. In the end he resorted to friends and relations. He even drove me round to view and it wasn’t his fault the first one was too big.

When I expressed my thanks he said, ‘It’s normal’.

Are all Spaniards so kind and helpful? I think maybe they are. ‘It’s the weather’, says Olga.

2009-10-24T14:07:00.000+01:00

Chance Encounter

I don’t believe in coincidences as a rule, but what happened last Sunday made me wonder.

I was attracted by the title of a book in the window of an upmarket souvenir shop: ‘Un sueño de Barro and Piedra’. The cover had a reproduction of a painting of a road leading into a village of red-roofed houses.

In the store, a woman was bustling among cheeses and wine and figurines. The book stood on a rack of photo guides to Zamora. I thought I’d better make sure I could read it, with some help from a dictionary.

It was a collection of short essays by Herminio Ramos Perez, born in a nearby village in 1925. An introduction described his career after his move to Zamora, where he became a respected teacher, writer and expert on ceramics and local history. He was elected as a councillor, and nicknamed ‘El Maestro’. An informer who reported his left-wing views to the school authorities cost him his job in the 70s, a serious setback because he had eight children.

At 6.5 Euros, with excellent line drawings of Zamora’s main buildings by the cover artist, it seemed a bargain. The shop-owner finished a phone call as I browsed among postcards and some boxes of biscuits baked by nuns in a local convent.

It was as I turned to leave that the owner became excited, calling out, ‘Eh! El Maestro! El Maestro!’ She pointed to a little old man in a suit, who was making his way slowly down the street, hesitating with each step and feeling the ground with a walking stick. I saw he resembled a small statue I’d seen someone drawing. I soon caught him up.

Somehow inspired, I stuttered in Spanish that I was a volunteer teacher. Would he sign the book I’d just bought? I could understand some of his reply. Corrales was near his own village, he said, and even told me how many hectares had been under wine cultivation in the past. He was sad to hear there are now only 57 children in the village school. He apologised for his poor eyesight and insisted on returning to the shop, where the owner’s son helped him up the step. He wrote a shaky inscription in the book.

After I told Olga about it next day, I could just about make out what she muttered in Spanish to a colleague: ‘Huh! How come I never met Hemingway in the street when leaving a bookshop in England?’

2009-10-21T08:42:00.000+01:00

Medieval Market

‘Don’t forget to go to the medieval market, said Olga. She was off to spend the weekend with friends in Galicia. It seems to be the vacation place of choice for Zamorans; it has a seaside.

It’s not surprising that Zamora, a town with so many twelfth century buildings, should celebrate the past, certainly there seem to be a lot of institutions dedicated to the study of ancient times. However, I was told this is the first ‘medieval market’. ‘People will be wearing disguises’ said Jose Eladio. Masquerades are a local enthusiasm, and he has his own costume for the Semana Santa procession. It's claimed to be the best in Sapin, and not only by Zamorans

The streets certainly looked the part - decked with banners and lined with stalls covered in brown material, I must say, seemed kitch, especially stalls selling jewellery and whimsical ceramics. A stall with Breton crépes and a man draped with a python seemed bizarre additions.

. However, the entertainments were good, with pipe and drum music to create an appropriate festive mood. Musicians accompanied a ‘dancing bear’ (a man in a costume) and a hawking demonstration where an eagle swooped from a tent canopy to a knight with a gauntlet.

‘Artisans’ were engaged in engaged in medieval trades, such as stone carving and embossing metal dishes using a hammer and nails, and there was a display of medieval stocks and instruments of torture with gruesome descriptions.

There were even games for children, such as this one where the aim was to raise a wooden disk by pulling ropes and not letting it slip through the holes.

The main attraction was an awning where people sat at tables and ate from wooden platters. Beside the spit with the roasting pig, an octopus was stewing in a vat, its tentacles breaking the surface of the reddish water. Smoke and the smell of roast pork filled the air. From a rectangle of counters, waiters in costumes served beer and food. Occasionally a server would shout ‘pulpo’ and chop fiercely at a tentacle cut from the mass. I ate a portion served on potatoes, accompanied by a caña of beer. Nothing medieval about the price, though -15 Euros.

2009-10-20T19:23:00.000+01:00

There seems to be something wrong and I can't load photos because the upload box isn't appearing. I'll try tomorrow to write about the Medieval Market. A bit of a nuisance as I came on purpose to the library. I hope the problem's only temporary. Maybe I'll put the photos on picasa.

2009-10-19T08:49:00.000+01:00

School Trip

‘Sheila, I have something to tell you. Friday a coach comes to the school and we all get on. Then we go for –what do you call that?

‘A school trip?’

Jose Eladro, as always, looks pleased to learn a new English expression.

It’s Wednesday, my first day at Collegio Luis Casado , and I’m to have Thursday off thanks to some exchange that hasn’t been organised. So it’s been a one-day week.

‘Oh, that’s good.Where are we going?’

‘We visit a place where residual water is made cleaner’

What a coincidence. Only last week we said farewell to our temporary lodger, Stan, water treatment engineer whose new job had been confirmed. He said one of the company’s works was in Castile-Leon.

It was a bit noisy on the coach. ‘Corrales is a ‘shouty’ village said Lydia, who’s been teaching four years.

‘It’s the weather!’ said Olga

The presentation is too technical for me, so I’m impressed by how attentive the children are.

The children shout with horror when we enter the indoor part of the plant, and come out again holding their noses. ‘It’s whiffy.’, laughs Olga. It’s another word I taught her when I heard the Spanish pronunciation of ‘Wifi’.

After, we go to a church in the town of Benavente, which is much more interesting – twelfth century, elaborate gilded set pieces inside. I tell Olga that they remind me of the Byzantium exhibition I saw in London, but she surprises me when she tells me she prefers plain churches. Where does she find them? Not in Zamora, that’s for sure.

2009-10-16T07:32:00.000+01:00

A Place of my Own

Tonight, at last, I'll unpack my suitcase.

Yesterday Jose Eladro, who 's unlike any headmaster I've ever met, took me to look at two flats in Zamora. The first, above a parade of shops near the station, was big, dark and dusty. I could soon become very depressed there, so I turned it down. That was a pity, because Jose Eladro's brother-in-law was the owner.

The second place, on the sixth floor near the river, overlooked a football pitch. There was only one bedroom, but a sofa bed in the living room should be OK for guests. It's not so near the historic centre, like Parador Olga, as I call the teacher's flat where I'm staying. But a stroll along the banks of the beautiful River Duermo will take me there in ten minutes. Alternatively, a walk down Santa Clara, the main street of the new town centre, leads to the old Plaza Mayor at the end.

The owner is an old colleague of Olga's. As Spaniards like to live near where they were born, there's an inevitable connection in small towns and cities.

I only realised this morning that I'd been so taken with the floor-to-ceiling window in the kitchen and the light, I hadn't even noticed whether there was a table in another room. The kitchen has only a breakfast bar, and I hope to do lots of writing in the flat, located in a street called Puerto Novo. 'A new door' said Olga, which sounds very auspicious

2009-10-15T11:27:00.000+01:00

Reception at Vallalodid

The room for the official reception at Vallalodid reminded me of the Painted Dining Hall at Greenwich Naval College. It was smaller and older - the tenth-century building had played various roles, including serving as a monastry and, much later, a twentieth century psychiatric unit. On Tuesday the Minister for Education in Castile-Leon greeted us volunteers for the 'bilingual schools' project.

We were fourteen - more or less. One at least was still tracking down luggage left in Atlanta, and I'm not sure everybody caught the early train from Madrid. On my left in this photo(I'm in the middle smiling at the camera) is the only other volunteer from England -we'd travelled together by metro to Madrid railway station - although there's a Scottish lady in there somewhere. The others are retired teachers from America, Canada and Australia. We met for the first time at a tapas reception the previous night in Madrid.

At the same reception I'd met Richard Vaughan, the founder of Vaughantown systems, a company which brings native English speakers to Spain. It was under their aegis that I'd done a week's volunteering in Extramadura in September 2008.

What a contrast between the grandiose ceremonials and my actual workplace. We've been assigned to small towns and village all over the Castile-Leon region, and this is the playground of Luis Casado primary school -57 pupils and 8 teachers - in Corrales del Vino, (pop. 1,000) a few miles from the ancient capital, Zamora. Lucky for me, the teachers live in the city and drive out to the school.

2009-10-07T11:38:00.000+01:00

Autre Pays...

'You've done what with the tram ticket?'

My son goes into the usual exasperated laugh and eye-rolling that's his stock response to much that I do.

I, meantime, am standing with said ticket, now black on the underside, in one hand. In the other dangles a tea-towel bearing a blurred black rectangle the exact size of the ticket.

'I told you not to do it!' He throws his hands up and pivots, eyes on the ceiling.

We are staying at D's flat in Brussels, where he's come to work in some vast financial corporation. As it's Friday he'd gone off on the tram to work, and I'd tidied up a bit. About half past ten he rang to ask if I'd found the ticket on the table:

'In case you want to go into the city. It has some credits and you feed it into a slot on the tram when you get on.'

Seemed reasonable, but where's the ticket? Ah, yes, there it is, all crumpled in the waste bin.

Instead of going into the city R and I spend the day recovering from Euro-lag - drinking coffee in the market square and being persuaded to spend £20 on 3 kilos of mussels which the stall-holder assured me would be barely enough for three people. Another mistake, going by the reaction when I told D over the phone. I was spared the eye-rolling on that one.

He more than made up for it when I showed him the bent ticket at the flat.

'Oh, you've buggered it, now. See what it says on the bottom - 'Ne pliez pas, SVP'?

'Never mind, I can iron it!'

Even R joins in the remonstrations on that one. 'Don't do that. I've got all the details and one or two others to return - they give out refunds. '

So I waited until their backs were turned and did the deed - resulting in the back of the ticket being transferred to the towel.

'What a scam! I bet they make a lot of money that way!'

So I'm glad to get back to London with my Freedom Pass and the trusty Oyster-swipe system.

2009-09-21T15:14:00.000+01:00

Prick Up Your Ears

At the Comedy Theatre, events leading to the death of playwright Joe Orton are given a new slant in this enthusiastically received play by Simon Brent. Clever casting and a change of emphasis suggest the tragedy resulted from professional rivalry rather than sexual jealousy.

The 1987 film based on John Lahr’s biography and Orton’s diaries blamed Orton’s murder by gay partner Halliwell on sexual tensions between the ill-matched pair. Orton’s success with back comedy masterpieces Entertaining Mr Sloane and Loot is a mere aggravating factor. Alfred Molina portrayed Halliwell as tormented by the promiscuity of the young man, a camp performance contributed by Gary Oldman. Orton’s upper-class agent Peggy Ramsay (Vanessa Redgrave) was openly contemptuous of the bald introvert.

In Bent’s play, the focus is shifted. The couple having shared a bedsitter since meeting at RADA, have collaborated on a number of unpublished works, ennumerated by Halliwell in the first scene. When Orton claims sole authorship for plays Halliwell claims he helped to create, their relationship falls apart.

A key change is the introduction of busy-body neighbour Mrs Cordon, Gwen Taylor bustling in a flowery apron, hardly seeming to notice the men are gay. Orton and Halliwell wrote to a real Mrs Cordon when they were in imprisoned for defacing library books. She not only detracts from the sexual element by 'normalising' the relationship. Echoing the comic middle-aged stereotypes of the plays, she’s a reminder that Orton drew inspiration from his and Halliwell’s shared life.

The clever and successful casting of Matt Lucas is a delightful coup. First seen prancing to music in multicoloured pyjamas, Lucas’s chubby ‘only gay in the village’ persona is both comic and pathetic. He’s evidently the source of funny lines and ideas which the less flamboyant Orton(Chris New) notes for future use. Halliwell is the sophisticated wit, apparent in the scene where they record a hilarious spoof of the early BBC radio soap ‘Mrs Dale’s Diary’. Far from protesting at Joe’s sexual adventures, Kenneth seems to excuse it on the grounds of his own impotence .

It's left to the staging to deliver the necessary sense of menace: scene ends are marked by the sudden surrounding of the room by a lighted frame, and a loud clashing noise. The walls of the bedsitter gradually darken, covered by illustrations like creeping fungus. Toward the end, when Halliwell hardly leaves the house, bars of light filter through shutters into the cramped interior. Conversations are punctuated by the failed writer’s frantic imbibing of pills and the now feted playwright’s stealthy movements and growing obsession with his diary. The climax, provoked by the sleep-deprived Orton’s remark to Halliwell that he is a ‘middle-aged nonentity’, seems inevitable.

Most writers experience years of struggle and rejection. Simon Bent’s play shows the anguish of an aspiring writer and mentor whose partner achieves celebrity. Joe Orton wins the Evening Standard Award for best West End Play just before he’s murdered. Halliwell, his former mentor, has by then abandoned his own writing and the aggrieved attack seems a logical,if tragic, outcome.

Prick Up Your Ears (1987) http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0093776/

2009-09-19T10:03:00.000+01:00

Reflections

‘Bad news- they don’t have any exhibitions on!’ Friend M had travelled from Kent at my invitation to meet at the Royal Academy. I could take her in as a guest on my membership card, I’d told her, but we were four days too late for the ‘Post-Modernist Pre-Raphaelite’ J W Waterhouse exhibition.

Luckily, I remembered Ken Howard. An artist who excels in depicting the play of light on reflective surfaces, his collection entitled 'Small oils fromVenice, Cornwall and London’ was on display in the Friends’ Room. Water was much in evidence, also a number of his studio portraits of models with mirrors which I’ve admired in Summer Exhibitions .

By happy chance (or thoughtful programming), reflections figured in the courtyard, where workmen were putting the finishing touches to an installation.

The giant bubbles towered over poor diminished Joshua Reynolds and his palette, reflecting the Georgians facades of the surrounding RA buildings. When we stood up close, they also threw back our own distorted images, like a funfair ‘Hall of Mirrors’.

M is by way of an amateur painter, and about to start on an evening course in portrait painting in Rochester. I suggested we go to the BP Awards exhibition at the National Portrait Galley, to see some more reflections, this time of subjects distorted by artistic interpretation.

As we walked through Green Park, under leaves turning to Autumnal gold, we saw ourselves reflected again as spectators, this time in the sides of a shiny coach emerging from some imposing gates onto The Mall.

Ken Howard at the RA: http://www.royalacademy.org.uk/exhibitions/hugh-casson-room-for-friends/ken-howard-ra-recent-small-oils-of-london-venice-and-cornwall,287,RAL.html

Anish Kapoor at the RA: http://www.guardian.co.uk/artanddesign/2009/sep/20/anish-kapoor-sculpture-royal-academy

BP Portraits Awards at the NPG: http://www.npg.org.uk/index.php?id=3940

2009-09-13T23:05:00.000+01:00

Climate Camp

‘I’ll meet you by the donkeys opposite the park gates’ said my octogenarian friend. French, Marxist, veteran demonstrator and former colleague, C was shocked that I hadn’t been to visit the Climate Camp already. After all, this was the fourth day and it was located on the heath at the top of my road. I mumbled something about it being a secret, but in truth I'd heard a rumour. I was just busy getting ready for my holiday.

The camp area was fenced on all sides, obliging us to listen to a convoluted explanation of the connection between capitalism and climate change from a well-spoken youth guarding the entry gate. He was sitting on a bale of hay.

Bringing down capitalism appealed to me much more than my ecologically-conscious friend D’s approach. Her latest claim to the moral high-ground includes knitting waistcoats for rescued battery hens. I’d much rather man the barricades.

There was an air of conspiracy about the camp; a notice in one of the marquees warned against discussing ‘business’ in case of listeners with long-distance audio equipment.

The protagonists seemed innocent enough, sitting or standing around with plaited hair and cotton skirts - women included - like villagers at an annual fete or grown-up characters from the Malcolm Saville book I was once given as an attendance prize Some were chalking notices about workshops and film shows. I’d have liked to attend a screening of ‘Dr Stranglelove’, but it wasn’t on until 9pm.

As we strolled around the camp C confided she felt like shouting ‘More power to your elbows’, which alarmed me on two counts. I didn’t want to call attention to our status as incomers, and it didn’t seem quite approprate – especially as regards the people peacefully lounging around on the grass.

The young man on the hay bale had concluded his talk by inviting us to sample free food about to be served in one of the tents C’s eyes lit up, then she saw the queues. She inspected the overflowing plates of people turning away from trestles laden with huge vats

‘Couscous! Just because I ‘m a protester, doesn’t mean I have to turn vegetarian !’ expostulated La Gourmande. Meantime I was thinking I’d had enough of camping for one year. Maybe we’re both getting too old for demos.

Climate Camp:http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2009/aug/26/climate-camp-location

2009-09-09T12:58:00.000+01:00

Travelling Companion

'Friend! Friend!' The toddler patted the window in the shopping centre. Apart from the squeaky voice, blonde hair and cherubic face , it was a re-run of Boris Karloff in the Frankenstein film, trying out the new word the nice blind man taught him. (The only character in the film not to run screaming at the sight of the craggy creature with a bolt through his neck)

It seemed strange, when the window was devoted to a set of matching luggage. Luckily, his mother knew what he meant.

'Yes, I do like the suitcases', she said.' But they're pink. Mummy doesn't do pink.'

I'd just called in at the shop next door, pricing up medium-sized travel-bags. Surely the heavy clothes I'd need for half a Castile-Leon Winter wouldn't fit into my cabin bag. The ones I'd seen carried price tags between £30 and £40 - too steep; just as well I've started looking a month before I'm due to go.

The medium pink one in the window was only £15, 'reduced' from £20. I ask myself does it really matter what colour of luggage I have? For a 50% price reduction, this mummy would most definitely do pink!

The Curse of Frankenstein (1931) http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0021884/

2009-08-31T09:18:00.000+01:00

Goodbye (for now) to all This

'There's a glut', said the Lewisham market trader on Friday, shovelling 50p's worth of green beans, about 2 kilos, into a huge bag. I love them, but a dodgy tum caused by over-consumption nearly kept me indoors yesterday. I'm glad I vowed to stick to bread and go out anyway.

R went off to Oxford Street to buy trousers that will be comfortable in 30 degrees of heat, and I arrived at Regents Park Bandstand at 4pm. I jigged a bit to Brazilian Jazz and gave altruistic D some sponsor money for walking on coals to support Air Ambulances. I talked to her about Madrid, where she now lives. I hope to meet up with her there on my way to Castile-Leon in October. Music by Samara was mellow, and it was an-all-family-plus-dogs affair, very good-natured, although the lead singer said she'd be glad to leave the 'English Summer' behind.

I've never seen a bad production at Regent's Park Open Air Theatre, and the last time was Pinocchio with the grandchildren, in the heat of a July afternoon. Friday's visit was more magical, though, a packed audience laughing and shrieking as thunder and lightning and a heavy shower delayed the start of Hello Dolly. It was a beautifully-designed production of a fairly vapid musical. I loved the choreography of the waiters' scene in the second half, all arm-flinging in soldierly formation, but the best part was snuggling under a double sleeping bag in the back row with R . Good thing I still hadn't stowed all the camping gear.

So, after writing this last blog for a while, I must clear up the bedside clutter and clean some floors before we pack for Italy. It's been a really hectic August, what with having to disassemble my plans for the Winter just after I'd made them, so I can spend two months volunteering in Spain, the camping trip and D's job search. Not to mention the new lodger. At least we'll know someone is clearing the letterbox. The temporary postman is too harrassed to push things all the way through.

(Maybe there'll be time to catch the new Almodovar release at West India Quay Cineworld. I don't want to risk it having gone by the time we get back on the 8th. )

So a temporary goodbye to London. I hope 30 degrees of heat in Liguria will lead to a week of nothing more stimulating than reading and daily seaside strolls.

Jazz at Regents Park: http://www.royalparks.org.uk/parks/regents_park/event.cfm?id=1562

Firewalk for London Air Ambulances: http://londonist.com/2009/08/firewalk_and_raise_funds.php

Climate Camp http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/blog/2009/aug/26/climate-camp-climate-change

Hello Dolly at the Open Air Theatre : http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/culturecritics/charlesspencer/6043118/Hello-Dolly-at-the-Open-Air-Theatre-Regents-Park---review.html

2009-08-25T13:01:00.000+01:00

The Kindness of Strangers

'You know why you're having trouble putting that tent up?' I was struggling against the wind, and probably should have practised at home, but my new neighour from across the field had his own theory. I was glad to see him come over because I was beginning to have doubts about the whole venture.

There were only two poles, crossing in the centre and fixed at the ends to form a dome. The poles were made up of sections and I'd just bent one of the metal sleeves where they joined. Now how was I going to slide it through the outer sleeve, as per instructions, without piercing the material?

My granddaugher, meantime, had grown tired of holding one end of the sleeve, and was watching from the car. She came out when a wiry man, rather bald and short of teeth, appeared from behind a wind-break with his nine year old daughter, Paige. He was joined by two others - a weather-beaten camping hand and a tall young man in a T-shirt. It was my cue to stand aside while the three men discussed what was to be done about the bent pole. 'I think I've got some tape that will hold it', said the elderly one and fairly skipped back to his caravan. I noticed most of the other campers in the field were in caravans with awnings.

In no time, it seemed, the tape was applied and the tent erected. Although it had a somewhat lopsided appearance like a house in a 1930s German Expressionist film, it seemed stable, especially with guy-ropes in place. One corner seemed liable to collapse but the car was shielding it from the worst of the wind. I'd buy myself one of those stripey wind-breaks as soon as I could.

'What you really need is a replacement section. I thought I saw one up on the hillside.' And the nimble old man disappeared. While we waited, Paige's father told me this was his seventh year at the site, usually staying six weeks or so until the beginning of September. The one in the T-shirt laughed and said it was his first, and last, season. I could imagine it would make for a cheap and pleasant holiday, with lots of places to ramble nearby and the sea not far away. We saw the families later in the neighbouring village , eating fish and chips.

The potential replacement from the hill was thicker than the existing segments. It didn't seem worth the bother of dismantling it all to see if it would fit, despite the old man's offering to do just that. So I thanked them all for their help and we set to pumping up the mattresses.

'Well, that's one lesson learned', said the man as he left. 'Don't try to put a tent up in the wind!'

What I'd learned, or been reminded of, was the kindness of strangers and their willingness to help.

2009-08-19T12:12:00.000+01:00

Carry on Camping

'We're fairly full-up, but I think we can just about squeeze in an extra tent. You won't want a hook-up, will you?'

After trawling Internet campsite pages I was savvy with the lingo, so I knew the kindly site owner was talking about electricity. My kettle-boiler and lantern run on calor-gas, but in any case I didn't want to push my luck. With forecasters predicting a fine Summer and the harsh economic climate, it took some time to find even a 'squeezed in' vacancy.

I'm all set, now, though . Extra tent-pegs, gas canister, notebook and a mallet from Milletts meant a fairly modest outlay, but that's the beauty of camping: once you've got all the basics -it's cheap( as well as fashionable )

The notebook's included because I won't be taking my laptop. It wouldn't surprise me, really, to find that the 'working farm' campsite where I'm headed with my granddaughter has free Wi-F. But a tent's not very secure and I still remember a Womad where thieves crept into tents in the night and stole purses from rucksacks.

Was that the year when it was so muddy we couldn't get into the music field? It was the clayey, glutinous kind that sucked in your wellies so every step was an effort and it took ages to reach the loos, never mind the music. We had to pay out for a visit to Laycock and a cinema, plus cafe meals, and my friend in a wheelchair had to stay in a local B&B. Several tractors were on permanent duty towing cars from ruts. It put me right off.

Womad used to take place on a well-drained site near Reading town-centre.There were plenty of plastic duckboards laid out as pathways, between the area where you could buy a Reiki massage or driftwood furniture, the air heavy with incense, and the international food stalls where huge vats of paella and cassoulet vied with spiced Cornish mackerel.

I have fond memories of camping South of Bordeaux, where we used to head with the children when we had lots of holiday time but not much money. We'd arrive after a three day drive in our tiny Diane 6, having stayed in sites that were little more than fields with a shed and a chemical loo. It seemed to be a rule that every village in France had to have a campsite, however primitive, but Camping du Lac was luxurious, with a cafe and a games area, a beach and a lake. There was even a van that came round every day delivering ice.

We'd find our reserved pitch under the pine-trees, staked out with string and marked with a numbered board. The first thing to do after pitching the tent was dig a trench all around in the sandy soil to act as a drain during the occasional downpours.

Alas, Womad was resited to the grounds of some stately home in the West Country. The mud-bath ensued when the owners failed to supply duckboards. 'All in use at other festivals', the cheery tractor-drivers told us as they hooked tow-ropes to cars, no doubt mentally calculating the overtime.

Trouble is, camping's addictive. My son regarded Womad as an excuse to break out the tent and take his children, with grandma along to keep an eye on potential wanderers. Now my grandaughter is 'hooked', though not in the electrical sense. So it's just me and her at Ecclesden Farm, near Angmering, Sussex. Don't try going this week, because they're full. Besides, torrential rain's forecast for tomorrow.

Ecclesden Farm Campsite: http://www.ecclesden.co.uk/

Womad: www.efestivals.co.uk/festivals/womad

2009-08-16T11:00:00.000+01:00

Raymond Chandler's The Lady in the Lake

A wealthy businessman hires Private Investigator Philip Marlow to find a missing wife, suspected of eloping with a bit-part film actor. The trail leads to seedy hotels and a remote lake with a bloated body. There's more than one femme fatale in the convoluted plot, and Marlowe is often on wrong end of a gun barrel or has his head in the way of a blackjack. So far so 'Chandleresque'. Given his reputation, it comes as a surprise to learn that Chandler, like Jane Austen, wrote only six novels.

His writing style made his work particularly suitable for adapting to the 'film noir' genre popular in US cinemas of the 40s and early 50s. When much younger I attended an 'all-night Humphrey Bogart ' programme at the NFT - ironically enough, sleeping through the Chandler-based The Big Sleep, in which Bogart made the perfect Marlowe. At a later date, though , I was wide awake to watch Robert Mitchum as the hardboiled detective hero, typically wreathed in cigarette smoke, in Farewell, My Lovely.

Chandler was born and spent his adulthood in America, where his stories are set, but he was educated at Dulwich College, credited with encouraging literary talents such as P. G. Wodehouse.

It seems to me Chandler's personal history and experiences- he came to England aged twelve after his parents divorced - played a part in creating the character of Marlowe, a troubled outsider in a society where infidelity and greed characterise the well-to-do.

It's his style, though, that makes the books so readable -his way of creating atmosphere by describing the essentials, the character-revealing dialogue and the telling imagery. For instance, Marlowe waits in an outer office to see his client as:

'The minutes went by on tip-toe, with their fingers to their lips'

or builds up to a startling revelation, as when he is disturbed by a woman when searching a house:

'She saw me and didn't stop or change expression in the slightest degree. She came slowly on into the room, holding her right hand away from her body. Her left hand wore the brown glove I had seen on the railing. The right-hand glove that matched it was wrapped around the butt of a small automatic.'

2009-08-12T15:24:00.000+01:00

Vaughan Town Volunteer

'What do you mean, you'd forgotten you'd applied?' said R. I'd just I told him I'd been accepted on a two month volunteer teaching programme in Spain.

Sangria was a welcome refreshment at the Camino Bar, King's Cross when I went to share the news with J, my ex-colleague. I hadn't intended to go to the last Vaughan Town Meetup of 2009- most of the volunteer slots have been taken up for the rest of the year, so they don't need extra support from 'veterans' as Ian the organiser calls us.

Every month or so there's a Meetup and it's a chance to catch up with friends made on the programme - in my case a week in the Extramadura last September. It was too hot to venture out after 11am, unless to sit with my feet dangling in the swimming pool or in the air-conditioned hotel as I chatted to Spanish business people on an 'immersion' English language course. Over five days they had one-to-ones with all 14 of us 'Anglos' - Americans, Australians and British.

I learned quite a lot about local customs - for one thing that Spanish business people depend a lot on their families and and are reluctant to work abroad. They were all friendly and sociable.

I didn't get to speak much Spanish, except on the two short stays in Madrid before and after the course. Did I really do 80 hours? 'What can't speak can't lie', my late mother-in-law used to say, and it's there in black and white on the certificate. Maybe that includes the hilarious meal-times and the lovely long siestas, which I spent lying on my bed watching Spanish TV. It was one of the most enjoyable weeks I've ever had; no wonder people go back again and again.

For me, though, a week's too short. Vaughan Systems run a whole raft of English Language teaching activities in Spain.

'I'd have preferred a whole year, but my sense of wifely duty persuaded me to go for a shorter period'. R gave me a sceptical look and said, 'Wifely duty! That phrase doesn't exactly trip lightly off your tongue'. He did smile, though.

In March I'd applied for the Castile-Leon schools project, run jointly with the local Spanish education authorities to intoduce English speakers as classroom assistants into junior schools. Within a week I had an email to say the funding would only be settled much later. I promptly forgot about it. So it was a surprise when I received an email inviting me to join the programme on October 13th. I still can't quite believe it.

'It's not as if I'm off to climb Everest or paddle round the world in a canoe'. After a while he softened and began to enquire about the weather in Castile-Leon in October. I suppose it occcurred to him that besides basking in sympathy at the bridge club, there's always Easyjet for long weekends. As I said, it's not as far as China. And it's only for two months.

I wonder if it'll be warm enough for Sangria.

Vaughan Town: www.vaughantown.com/EnglishNew/programavolunteers.asp

Camino Bar: www.timeout.com/london/restaurants/reviews/10918.html

2009-08-07T11:24:00.000+01:00

Coco vs Pelham

Two very different films this week, French biopic, Coco Avant Chanel, and a remake thriller, The Taking of Pelham 123, shared an awareness of filmic possibilities.

Anne Fontaine's direction of Coco was plodding, a common fault with costume dramas, though costumes, scenery and sets rang the changes: French orphanage, Parisian dress shop, cabaret bar, theatre, seaside and society gatherings. The cunning couturier, Audrey Tatou at full pout, stalked a reluctant Baron, (Benoit Poelvoorde, a Bill Paterson look-alike with a moustache and wavy hair), to escape drudgery as a seamstress. His sexual demands met with the same polite demurring as when she allowed her playboy lover to set her up in business. It was as well-laundered as a nun's wimple, sex a tiresome necessity for a woman set on freeing women from corsets. Her playboy lover's marriage to an English heiress was seen in much the same light.

The liveliest scenes had Emanuelle Devros as Coco's wordly lesbian admirer and purveyor of hat-hungry ladies. They seem to have had the some role as shoes today. Emanuelle's scenes as star of luridly-lit farces made Coco's earlier cabaret act look like a Sunday school recital.

In a different part of the universe, John Travolta had stolen a New York subway train and was holding the passengers hostage until the Mayor, played by a rascally James Gandolfini organised the delivery of £10 million dollars. Denzel Washington was an unperturnable chief negotiator, after some bungling attempts by police 'expert' John Tuturro. It's a long time since I saw the original, but this version seemed to foreground action and sets rather than character-interaction, although there was a moderate amount of buddy-bonding between the principals.

What linked the films was the emphasis on the camera-work. In Coco the lens lingered on carefully framed scenery or details of fabric and processes. For the most part the camera functioned as the heroine's 'eyes', taking in the cool greys of the nuns' habits, the stripy jumpers of fishermen at Deauville or the elaborate lacework of high-class ballgowns.

If Coco was self-consciously art-house, Tony Scott's flashy swerves and sharp edits demanded whip-lash alertness, as trains whooshed through tunnels and cop cars careered across intersections. Even the control room was full of blinking lights and huge neon-lit screens, as well as characters dashing to and fro as they were variously summoned or recalled to deal with minor crises during the main emergency. Both films, although flawed, explored in different ways the possibilities of film media, instead of merely illustrating the narratives on which they were based.

Coco Avant Chanel http://www.institut-francais.org.uk/cine-lumiere/films/coco-avant-chanel.html

The Taking of Pelham 123 http://www.institut-francais.org.uk/cine-lumiere/films/coco-avant-chanel.html

2009-08-05T14:00:00.000+01:00

Chun Yi: The Legend of Kung Fu

'Always listen to your muyu', says the Abbot with the long white beard. He's giving advice to the Shaolin temple's newest recruit, a boy of about eight. In case you were wondering, the muyu or 'wooden fish' is a gourd with a slit that produces a pleasant sound when struck with a small hammer. To get the audience in the mood, a youth in a saffron robe was striking one in the foyer of the Coliseum when I went on Monday. 'Already seen by 2 million in Beijing!' confided my Chinese ticket facilitator.

In fact, music was almost the only aspect of the show I liked - bells and zithers and chanting that reminded me of the Buddhist chants on CD that makes a pleasant prelude to sleep.

No chance of falling asleep during Chun Yin, a tale within a tale of a reluctant novice left by his mother at the temple. To encourage him to stay, the Abbot tells the story of another hesitant disciple, a story enacted in a number of striking and contrasting scenes by a talented cast of Chinese acrobatic dancers and singers.

The spectacle was impressive. But watching half-naked men breaking sticks over their heads, tumbling about the stage or flying through the air suspended on lengths of cloth doesn't thrill me at all. No amount of smoke and bubbles and flashing red lights, not to mention clashing cymbals and drumming, can convince me the quasi-mystical cult of physical prowess ('Carve your body like wood or stone!') leads to spiritual enlightenment.

It was more coherent and watchable than 'Monkey' at the O2 last Winter and more honest than the Falun Gong-funded show I complained of at the Festival Hall, but a dream sequence about rejecting female temptation needed more explanation for a modern audience. So my attention wandered in the second half. It didn't help that I was seated in the upper circle behind three rows of Chinese youths who moved about and commented on the action.

They were more interested in taking photos on their mobiles than listening to any muyus.

Chun Yi:The Legend of Kung Fu http://www.chunyi-kungfu.com/home/

2009-08-03T14:40:00.000+01:00

The Mountaintop

I loved this two-hander by American writer Katori Hall, and so did the rest of the audience, going by the standing ovation at Trafalgar Studio1 last Friday. James Dacre's direction is brisk in a play that keeps its momentum for 85 uninterrupted minutes.

It’s April 1968, and a stormy night in Memphis, as ‘Preacher’ King prepares an address to protesting workers the following day. He worries about his family back home and the possibly violent outcome of the march. Sassy maid Camae, with a cigarette pack in her garter, agrees to keep the insomniac leader company, for reasons of her own. As they review the self-doubting activist’s career, a shocking connection between the wildly different characters is revealed. More astute audience members no doubt guessed Camae’s identity long before I did.

Memorable touches include a tour de force portrayal of the great man’s preaching style, delivered by Camae as she stands on the bed, Luther jumping to ominous thunder cracks and a pillow fight which echoes the weather outside as well as the astonishing surprise. ‘It sometimes snows in Memphis in April’, says Camae. The best surprise of all, though, is who can be reached on the telephone extension. Eat your heart out, BT!

The play’s title refers to what became known as King’s ‘mountaintop speech’ – it’s superbly acted by David Harewood and Lorraine Burroughs and full of surprises.

Although the set’s what you might call adequate, Richard Hammarton's music & sound and Emma Chapman's lighting design are very effective. The script keeps you laughing until you end up crying and clapping.

The Mountaintop:http://www.themountaintop.co.uk/?gclid=CIqA5uTRh5wCFU0B4wod3E88-Q

2009-08-01T19:36:00.000+01:00

Too Close to the Sun

‘A writer is not just the sum total of his books – he’s a legend’, says Hemingway’s stalwart fourth wife. She defends the dying author from his floozy secretary and a predatory old school chum in this feeble musical about the Nobel Prize-wining author's last days. Snake-hipped Louella hopes to be wife number five and the Indiana Jones-style project Rex outlines can only tarnish the writer’s reputation.

Daniel Reitz’s much better Studies for a Portrait, at the Oval House Theatre explored a similar theme in more dynamic style. As an admirer of Hemingway's prose, if not his subject matter, I was interested. Whereas Reitz’s play pitted respectful homage against get-rich-quick opportunism in the final days of a dying painter, writers Roberto Trippino and John Robinson stumble under the weight of Hemingway’s action-hero reputation and the mystery of his shotgun death.

‘Words fly at me like meteor showers’ and ‘America only knows what to think when I have my say’ pronounces the shambolic hero, in a terminal state of writer’s block but happy to re-imagine the hell-raising youth evoked by Rex. The play offers no real insight or portrait of the action-hero writer. The actors did their best with a poor script and some banal and unmelodic songs

Christopher Wood’s set is the best thing about the show - three spaces in the ground floor of a house in Ketchum Idaho, where the reclusive Hemingway has come to die. The rooms’ dividers are slatted wood, making a kind of tropical see-through log cabin, the walls festooned with bleached animal skulls. A revolving stage makes for seamless scene-changes, and suggests a steamy Somerset Maugham or Tennessee Williams atmosphere, while the see-through walls suggest the characters keep each other under constant surveillance. In a memorable sequence where Rex runs through his frenetic screenplay, Ernest following him from room to room, it becomes a model zoetrope, a visual preview of the proposed Hollywood travesty.

The fatal weakness is the musical numbers. Each character steps forward in turn and crudely expresses their aims in a recitative style. Ernest’s expository ‘I lived too Close to the Sun’, is little more than an ‘I did it My Way’ apologia that doesn’t endear, an impression reinforced when Rex and he join in a song about their womanising. In a chilling precursor of the final scene Ernest demonstrates to Rex the only certain way to shoot oneself (place the shotgun in the mouth), but otherwise the script is rambling.

Christopher Howell was an adequate standby Rex in the performance I saw, but James Graeme made an over-active Hemingway for a man suppsosedly physically ruined by his excesses. Tammy Joelle as Louella was pert rather than seductive. Helen Dallimore as wife Mary, the only admirable character, brought a resigned dignity to her role as the protector of a husband whose work she admired. It’s a shame the writers can’t make the audience care as much as she did about his legacy.

Too Close to the Sun at The Comedy Theatre, Panton Street: http://www.ambassadortickets.com/1287/667/London/Comedy-Theatre/Too-Close-To-The-Sun