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Footloose – The Musical At HMT: Duncan Harley Reviews

Aberdeen City, Featured, Opinion No Responses »

Jun 242016

Duncan Harley Reviews Footloose – The Musical at His Majesty’s Theatre Aberdeen

The 1980s were pelvic times. Hard Rock, Glam Rock, R&B, Hip Hop, Northern Soul and all shades of everything in-between made quite sure of that.

A torrent of unstoppable sound and movement swept the globe, empowering youth and challenging oldies.

Barriers of colour and creed turned fluid, and a new politics of expression brought young people together in an explosive mixture of sound, dance and visual art.

Except of course in Elmore City, Garvin County, Oklahoma, where evangelical Protestantism and social conservatism contrived to pretty much ban fun. A Bible Belt town of around 600 souls, Elmore has one graveyard, a Junior School and a High School. It features in the Gideon Book of Historical Places, and seemingly the school mascot is Bogey the Talking Badger.

For reasons no one could even remember, fun in the form of dancing had been banned by local ordnance since 1898. On March 3rd 1980, the Elmore School Board voted 3-2 to allow the class of 1980 to hold a school prom.

In ‘Footloose – The Musical’, Elmore has been re-named Bomont. Dancing is strictly forbidden under Local Ordnance 416, and a classic head-to-head between emerging youth and well-established establishment is defo on the cards.

Those who have seen the 1984 film, and who hasn’t, will be familiar with the plot line. Good lookin’ Chicago boy moves to Bomont, tries to fit in and meets rivalry from peers and opposition from elders. Love blossoms, establishment attitudes soften and compromise comes. Everyone starts to have fun and the art of dance is again legalized.

The transition from film to stage both retains and builds on the essential energy of the film, and although perhaps a tad slow in the very early scenes, this production builds steadily to a heady audience-engaging climax by the end of Act Two.

The casting of actor-musicians is a brave move but works very well indeed.

Any lingering suspicion that a rock band or two lurks behind the scenes is soon dispelled as Luke Baker’s ‘Ren McCormack’ and Scott Haining’s ‘Cowboy Bob’ strut their stuff and swing those flying guitars.

Even Nigel Lister’s soul-searchingly honest ‘Rev Shaw Moore’ gets in on the musical act with a rousing bass finale.

Add to the mix singer/actor Maureen Nolan as preacher’s wife ‘Vi’, a quorum of swing cowgirls and understudy Luke Thornton’s ‘Willard’ – Gareth Gates was unavailable on first night in Aberdeen – and Footloose really takes off big-time.

With around twenty classic Eighties hits, including ‘Holding Out For A Hero’, ‘Mama Says, Dancing Is Not A Crime’ and the pounding ‘Footloose Finale’, ‘Footloose – The Musical’ served up exactly what the audience wanted, and by the finale had folk dancing wildly in the aisles.

Directed by Racky Plews with David Morgan as Touring Company Stage Manager.

Footloose – The Musical plays at HMT Aberdeen until Saturday 25th June

Tickets from Aberdeen Performing Arts Tel: 01224- 641122

Words © Duncan Harley and Images © APA

Bennachie Landscapes Series 3: Duncan Harley Reviews

Aberdeenshire, History No Responses »

Jun 102016

Duncan Harley reviews Bennachie Landscapes Series 3.

In this, the third publication in the Bennachie Landscapes Series, further aspects of the story of Grampian’s favourite hill are discussed in often minute detail.

Dedicated to Gordon Ingram, treasurer to the Bailies of Bennachie until 2000, and with a foreword by Dr Jo Vergunst of the University of Aberdeen’s Department of Anthropology this publication focuses on both our historical and our modern day relationship with the Bennachie range.

Funded through the Connected Communities programme the content reflects the work of project partners including the University of Aberdeen, The Forestry Commission Scotland and The Bailies of Bennachie.

The book presents as 10 research papers, each distinct but related and written by both Bennachie experts and Bennachie enthusiasts.

The ecology and social history of the area feature alongside the geology, flora and the exploitation of both peat and stone on and around the hill. Additionally there are excavation reports featuring Colony houses and Drumminor Castle.

Several of the papers make for highly technical reading and are not for the faint hearted. Peter Thorn’s description of the geological setting around Drumminor Castle is a case in point. Other chapters such as the interim report into the excavations at Drumminor Castle are written with the general reader in mind and should be accessible to anyone happy to sit through an episode of Time Team.

The site of the Bennachie Colonists comes under particular scrutiny. Sue Taylor provides insight into the social and domestic lives of the crofters, who made a living on the slopes of the hill, through the interpretation of pottery found at the Bennachie Colony site.

The excavations during 2011 – 2013 at Shepherd’s Lodge and Hillside yielded both sponge decorated and transfer printed earthenware indicating perhaps a previously unsuspected degree of economic sophistication amongst Colony settlers who often lived at subsistence level.

Barry Foster’s introduction to the peat lands of the hill not only gives the reader food for thought but illustrates clearly, using aerial photographs, the scale of the 18th century peat cutting industry.

In 2013 a partnership between Keig School and the Bennachie Landscapes Fieldwork Group surveyed the ecology and landscape use within the Lordship of Forbes. The research report makes for fascinating reading and describes the discovery of a previously unknown water-mill in the grounds of Castle Forbes.

A dig at the Back of Bennachie by students of Kemnay Academy features alongside an investigation of the English Quarry by Andrew Wainwright and a paper, by Colin Millar, reflects on the controversial 19th century seizure and “Division of the Commonty of Bennachie” by a group of powerful local landowners.

Illustrated throughout with both images relating to Bennachie and survey maps describing the digs and investigations, this book is essential reading for anyone with an interest in the North East and clearly illustrates the value of community partnership research.

At 115pp, Bennachie Landscapes Series 3 is available from Inverurie Library and at www.bailiesofbennachie.co.uk p
Price £10. ISBN 978-0-9576384-1-9

This review was first published in the May 2016 edition of Leopard Magazine.

Words © Duncan Harley

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Dreich Encounter At HMT – Duncan Harley Reviews

Aberdeen City, Featured, Opinion No Responses »

Jun 032016

Duncan Harley reviews ‘Dreich Encounter’ at His Majesty’s Theatre Aberdeen,

In the classic 1945 David Lean romantic drama, Brief Encounter, Laura famously meets Alec at the local railway station and the chance encounter leads to unexpected consequences including an emotional love affair

In the classic 2016 Flying Pig’s comedy drama, Dreich Encounter, both Celia Johnson and Trevor Howard are conspicuously absent.

Mither meets Faither on the sofa and then in the bedroom and then yet again in the sitting-room. Screenwriter Noël Coward would have simply loved the unconventionality of the Pig’s production.

Dreich is such a wonderfully emotive adjective. In a 2013 YouGov Plc opinion poll, which asked adults across the country to select their number one Scots word, it ranked well ahead of sleekit, glaikit and even blether; and a recent Tripadvisor review of the shortbread tin favourite Eilean Donan Castle really put the welly in when it concluded that the place was “dreich AND disappointing”.

Aberdeen’s very own Flying Pig’s latest offering ‘Dreich Encounter’ is far from dreich and certainly far from disappointing.

‘Father Ted meets Ivor Cutler’ utterly fails to describe this production adequately. With past classics such as ‘Stanley Cooslick’s Clockwork Sporran’, ‘Finzean in the Rain’, ‘All Quiet on the Westburn Front’ and ‘How to Look Glaikit’ firmly behind them; this new production elevates the Pig’s very own brand of parody-punkesque Doric humour to completely new levels.

From the moment the show opens with the startling announcement that “this evening’s performance has been sponsored by naebody” to the final sketch where Cooncillor Croonie introduces the theatre audience to the new and improved Aberdeen Town motto, no-one and certainly no public institution is safe from gentle ridicule.

As musical comedy sketch revue, ‘Dreich Encounter’ goes bravely where no-one else usually dares or wins. In fact anyone daft enough to emulate the Doric dynamos risks being put up against a wall in Broad Street and executed by firing squad.

Predictably, the Donald gets a mention, as does the Robbie Shepherd. Less predictably Anuptaphobia, medically defined as “a morbid fear of staying or remaining single” features briefly, and the Rodgers and Hammerstein classic ‘You’ll Never Walk Alone’ is sung with more up-to-date lyrics including the hilarious line “When you walk through the storm, hold your head up high and don’t be afraid of the duck.”

There are 28 laughter-strewn sketches, featuring the likes of grand piano player Hilton John, the dulcet-toned, tartan-trewed Delmonte-jacketed Buckie Drifters, and of course Archie and Davie: this is a show which has something for everyone. Classics include the Bakery Wifies, a Doric A to Z, and Meikle Wartle TV, surely a parody of the Garioch’s very own household favourite, Kintore-based Turnip Radio.

Then there are the words and phrases. Best not repeat the punch line “I’m aff for a shite” perhaps; however lard arse, wobble-bottom and pleiter certainly make it into the non-expletive top ten.

For my money, Mither’s Happy Days and Mither’s Happy Anniversary represent the best that ‘Dreich Encounter’ has to offer. Reminiscent of Cutler’s Glasgow classic “Life in a Scotch Sitting Room”, “Mither” gently parodies the folk memories of the North east.
In fact you can almost taste that delightfully carbonated Blue Nun and those cheesy pineapple hedgehogs.

A Flying Pig Production, Dreich Encounter plays at HMT Aberdeen until Saturday 11th June

Tickets from Aberdeen Performing Arts Tel: 01224- 641122

Words © Duncan Harley and Images © APA

Annie At HMT: Duncan Harley Reviews

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May 132016

Duncan Harley Reviews ‘Annie’ at His Majesty’s Theatre Aberdeen.

When writer Thomas Meehan was hired to write the story for a musical based on Harold Gray’s newspaper-strip Little Orphan Annie he seemingly thought that it was the worst idea he’d ever heard.

The brief was to convert Gray’s far right cartoon rants against welfare, unions and Roosevelt’s ‘creeping communist policies’ into a sugar sweet Dickensian romp fit for Broadway.

The result is a powerful and entertaining celebration of the enduring power of the American Dream set within a slightly dubious tale about a balding US billionaire, war profiteer Daddy Warbucks, who sends his PA down-town to the local children’s home to pick up an orphan for Christmas.

Its depression era 1933 New York and the banks are going bust. The stock market is in chaos and the factories are shutting down nationwide. The citizens are starving on the streets and there is barely controlled civil unrest afoot. To make matters worse, Japan’s colonial ambitions threaten American interests in the Pacific and in Europe Herr Hitler has just become Chancellor of Germany.

Red headed Annie lives at NY’s Municipal Orphanage for Girls along with Molly, Pepper, Kate, July, Duffy and Tessie.

Run by the tyrannical Miss Hannigan AKA Elaine C. Smith, the orphanage is in reality a sad sweat-shop where gin soaked Miss Hannigan subjects her charges to an oppressive regime from which escape seems impossible. In a scene reminiscent of Colditz the feisty freckled Annie, Anya Evans of Team Liberty – there are three alternating teams of young actors in this production, defies the odds and makes her bid for freedom.

Meeting downtrodden out of-work Americans along the way she and her canine pal Sandy, played obediently by Amber the Labradoodle, defy the odds and achieve the seemingly impossible.

By the end of Act Two, Annie has come to terms with orphanity, advised the US President on economic policy and made an old man very happy. The nasty Miss Hannigan gets her just deserts, Annie’s fellow orphans won’t have to work no more and all is well in the land of FDR’s New Deal.

This is a picture perfect production. From the moment early in Act One where the orphans throw off the bed-clothes to the final curtain call, the electrifying entertainment pounds on. Lighting, sound and set combine superbly and it is obvious from the very start that each and every cast-member is committed 110% to the show’s success.

Alongside comedic asides, dance routines to die for and a wee measure of slapstick the musical highlights include Easy Street, Hard Knock Life and Elaine C. Smith’s stunning rendering of Little Girls. There are around sixteen musical numbers in the show.

With a list of credits including leads as Dean Martin in Rat Pack and Buddy Holly in The Buddy Holly Story, Alex Bourne is a natural as Daddy Warbucks. He commands the stage just as Warbucks commands his business empire. Anya Evan’s Annie is of course centre stage throughout and she excels in, what is after all, a very demanding role.

Callum McArdle’s portrayal of the wheelchair bound president was refreshingly honest. In reality of course, Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s mid-career polio was stage managed to the point where most of the American public remained blissfully unaware of his condition.

Tuesday’s performance at His Majesty’s concluded with a five minute stand-up ovation. By the end of the week the likelihood is that this will have increased to ten minutes at the very least! Harold Gray must be rolling in his grave.

Directed by Nikolai Foster with Children’s Casting by Debbie O’Brien and starring Elaine C. Smith Annie plays at HMT Aberdeen until Saturday 14th May

Tickets from Aberdeen Performing Arts Tel: 01224- 641122

Words © Duncan Harley and Images © APA

Breakfast At Tiffany’s @ HMT – Duncan Harley Reviews

Aberdeen City, Featured, Opinion No Responses »

May 052016

Duncan Harley Reviews Breakfast at Tiffany’s at His Majesty’s Theatre Aberdeen.

Theatregoers expecting a re-run of the 1961 Rom-Com Hollywood blockbuster film are likely to be disappointed with this production. Those with fresh eyes and those who have read Truman Capote’s novella are likely to enjoy the experience.

Leading lady Holly Golightly welcomes a succession of men into her bedroom, she never names her cat and insists on applying lipstick before receiving bad news.

Aspiring writer Fred wrestles with his sexuality, narrates Holly’s story and gets fired for not making friends with the semicolon.

Meanwhile Bing Crosby croons softly in the background, a roller-skating burned-out-diva circles the stage and the veiled spectre of Audrey Hepburn haunts the audience. Neither a musical nor a love story Breakfast at Tiffany’s is in a complicated place.

As a love story, Capote’s tale was never going to cut the mustard anyway. It’s not really a stereotypical boy meets girl tale. In act two, Holly memorably reveals that she has really only had eleven lovers, that is if you discount all of those from before she was sixteen.

As an honest exploration of sexual morals Breakfast at Tiffany’s remains challenging and in its day the risqué behaviour and sexual ambiguity of Capote’s characters invited both fierce criticism and intensely voyeuristic interest.

Interviewed for Playboy in 1968 Capote was asked whether Holly was the prototype of today’s liberated female. In reply he likened her to an authentic American geisha.

“She had no job, but accompanied expense-account men to the best restaurants and night clubs with the understanding that her escort was obligated to give her some sort of gift. Perhaps jewellery or a cheque … if she felt like it, she might take her escort home for the night.”

Played out in flashback, Richard Greenberg’s adaptation can be challenging.

Set in both the 1950’s and in war-time 1944 the story moves sharply backwards and forwards between the two era’s, relying on New York accented machine-gun dialogue, delivered speedily by Matt Barber’s Fred, to fill in the blanks. In general this works well although Matt’s delivery was on occasion let down by a poor sound envelope.

The 1950’s action takes place in an oddly deserted New York bar. Holly has left the country some years before following legal difficulties connected to her relationship with Sing Sing resident and some time mobster Sally Tomato. Many of the 1944 scenes are played out in Holly’s room, in the street outside her apartment, at a bus station and on Brooklyn Bridge. There are frequent changes of scene.

All eyes of course are on leading lady Emily Atack.

New to the role, in fact new to the touring stage, and fresh from playing Daphne in a re-make of Dad’s Army could Emily step into Holly’s wee black dress and high-heels? Thankfully the answer is a resounding yes.

This is a demanding role with Holly Golightly on-stage virtually throughout the performance. Alongside the reams of Capote dialogue and those iconic costume changes, Holly is required to deliver Moon River and of course Emily does this memorably.

Robert Calvert’s portrayal of horse doctor Doc Golightly is a delight. Old enough to be her father but in reality her legal wedded husband, Doc accepts Holly for who she is and after ae fond kiss, parts gracefully before broken-heartedly riding the interstate bus back to Texas.

Bob the Cat plays Holly’s unnamed feline companion and deserves special mention. Hailing from a small animal rescue centre in Surrey he has made it into the Moggie A-list with a list of credits including East Enders, Crimewatch and The Secret Life of Cats. Seemingly he is purring with delight to be appearing in Breakfast at Tiffany’s but is far too well mannered to purr loudly on-stage.

It’s a brave cast who take on the ghost of a worldwide blockbuster and on some levels it is impossible to shake the temptation to make comparisons. That however might be a mistake since this production stands well enough on its own merits.

Directed by Nikolai Foster, Breakfast at Tiffany’s plays at HMT Aberdeen until Saturday 7th May

Tickets from Aberdeen Performing Arts Tel: 01224- 641122

Words © Duncan Harley and Images © APA

Hamish Napier’s ‘The River’ – Duncan Harley Reviews

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Apr 222016

Hamish Napier’s debut album The River is now on general release. Duncan Harley reviews.

For the past three years Hamish has
been Musical Director of big folk band Ceol Mor at Aberdeen International Youth Festival.

This year at Celtic Connections Ceol Mor celebrated the music of the North East with a programme of ballads, Scots songs, storytelling, and braw tunes by Scots fiddle and accordion legends of past and present.

What is the The River all about?

“Well,” says Hamish, “growing up next to the Spey, I spent many hours of youth practicing to the roar of the river in the background, so it’s always been there in my music.

“The River brings to the surface vivid sonic images of occurrences, past and present, along the mile-long stretch of the Spey that flows past my childhood home.

“One of my brother’s fishes it, the other canoes it, my Uncle Sandy photographed it, my mother paints it, and there’s my Father’s daily fascination with its erratically changing water level. It will always symbolize home and a strong connection to nature. No mortal’s relationship with the river can ever be truly harmonious, its ever-changing micro-climate, mysteriously dark depths and unrelenting power are both merciless and enchanting.”

The themes of The River range from the epic journeys of the Atlantic salmon to the river as home to local characters including fishermen, bailiffs, spirits and children. Hamish grew up on the banks of the Spey and spent many hours practicing to the roar of the river in the background

“Its always been there in my music … and brings to the surface vivid sonic images of occurrences, past and present,” says Hamish.

“For this piece I wanted to make use of all my musical resources … I am a huge fan of every one of the musicians on this project.”

Alongside Hamish on piano, clavinet and harmonium the album features Martin O’Neal on bhodran, Sarah Haynes on alto-flute and James Lindsay on base. Pitcaple born James was winner of the 2014 Martyn Bennet Prize for Traditional Music Composition.

Using backing vocals from natural sources including Oystercatchers, Heron and Curlew this is a groundbreaking album reflecting, says Hamish on the rivers “mysteriously dark depths and unrelenting power.”

A crackin’ album, The River is available from digital download stores and direct from Hamish at http://www.hamishnapier.com/

Guys And Dolls At HMT- Duncan Harley Reviews

Aberdeen City, Featured, Opinion No Responses »

Apr 082016

Duncan Harley Reviews Guys and Dolls at His Majesty’s Theatre Aberdeen.

L-R, Maxwell Caulfield (Nathan Detroit), Louise Dearman (Adelaide) credit APA Guys and Dolls

Based on the short stories of Alfred Damon Runyon, the musical Guys and Dolls first took to the Broadway stage in 1950 and has been touring in various incarnations ever since. Runyon was an intrepid gambler who funded his habit partly through journalism. He claimed to have met Mexican revolutionary Pancho Villa in a Texas bar, he fought in the Spanish-American War of 1898 and seemingly has a lake in Pueblo named after him.

When Runyon died, aged 66, in 1946 his ashes were scattered from an aeroplane over Manhattan.

He wrote mainly in the present tense and many of his plots involve the seedier side of 1930s New York, featuring gangsters, gamblers and of course dolls.

Sharp suits and spectacular sets feature big time in this musical fable of the seamier side of Runyonland, an idealized version of sinful downtown Manhattan, where guys in the know can get away with almost anything. Dolls in the know take a more reformist approach. First nab your man, then change him for the better. Behind the fabulous dance routines and the show-stopping songs lies an evergreen tale of romance and coming-of-age angst.

Hot-Box-Club cabaret singer Miss Adelaide, Louise Dearman, has been engaged to grifter Nathan Detroit, Maxwell Caulfield, for all of fourteen years, and all she really wants is a cosy life barefoot and pregnant in the kitchen. Nathan however has other ideas, preferring hustling and shooting crap to marital bliss.

New York’s finest are on the case in the form of Anthony McGill as the intrepid Columbo-coated Lieutenant Brannigan; and a suitably secluded spot to hold the next crap game, the Biltmore Garage, will cost $1,000 up-front rent.

Nathan is broke, but proposes an unloseable bet to raise the cash. Call the Midwife star Richard Fleeshman’s Sky Masterson accepts the wager, agreeing to wine and dine Salvationist missionary Sarah Brown, head of the Save-A-Soul Mission, in far off Havana. If he fails in his quest, Nathan wins the thousand dollars and the dice game goes ahead.

After a good few Bacardis and a measure of spectacularly Diva-ridden Rumba, Sarah and Sky declare “I’ve Never Been in Love Before”.

The witty punch-lines rumble on, but the dialogue wears a little thin at points.

Unbelievably, the childless Miss Adelaide has told her mum that she and Nathan have five children and a sixth on the way, and tells Nathan that, when finally married, they can easily cover the lie by breeding like rabbits.

Additionally, the spectre of Cameron Johnson’s giant gangster Big Jule morphing from murderous mobster to amiable Salvationist takes some believing.

No matter! The songs and spellbinding dance routines are what drive Gordon Greenberg’s revival. Familiar favourites “Sit Down, You’re Rockin’ the Boat”, “Havana” and “Luck Be a Lady” are surely where Guys and Dolls is at in the 21st century.

This musical masterpiece may have turned 65, but the odds are two to one that there’s plenty of life in the old doll yet.

Directed by Gordon Greenberg, with Musical Direction by Andy Massey, Guys and Dolls plays at HMT Aberdeen until Saturday 9th April.

Tickets from Aberdeen Performing Arts Tel: 01224- 641122

Words © Duncan Harley and Images © APA

Avenue Q At HMT – Duncan Harley Reviews

Aberdeen City, Featured, Opinion No Responses »

Apr 012016

Duncan Harley Reviews ‘Avenue Q’ at His Majesty’s Theatre Aberdeen

Avenue Q. Possibly the funniest musical to hit the Aberdeen stage in recent years.

Billed as unsuitable for little monsters, ‘Avenue Q’ pushes the boundaries of acceptability well beyond the realms of the kiddies’ Saturday afternoon matinée.
Fluffy Muppetry, or the sanitized Cookie Monster-ridden Elmo’s World of Sesame Street don’t even get a look-in, as the Bad Idea Bears and Lucy the Slut strut their stuff in what must be the funniest musical to hit the Aberdeen stage in recent years.

Internet porn, courtesy of Trekkie Monster, and the temptations of puppet flesh are to the fore in this coming of age musical parable.

Charles Bukowski would have loved ‘Avenue Q’; in fact maybe, in some forgotten way, he inspired it.

The theme of this production is simple. The sun may be shining and it may be a lovely day, but life sucks. A cast of losers inhabit a run down street in the lowest of the lowest districts of New York City, while life in general passes them by.

Enter stage left Rhiane Drummond, as the upbeat and cheery Gary Coleman, juvenile star of 1980s US sitcom Diff’rent Strokes, who infamously sued his parents for financial mismanagement before hitting rock bottom. The residents unanimously agree that it sucks, big-time, to be Gary.

Gary of course is played by a woman, and since most of the other characters in the musical are played by puppets, it is strikingly obvious that a fair degree of suspension of disbelief is required if this musical production is to be taken at all seriously.

Proving perhaps that puppets can get away with offensive behaviour where humans often can not, this show not only includes graphic puppet sex scenes, but also a host of hilarious musical numbers likely to cause offence to the unwary.

Laid back numbers include ‘It Sucks to Be Me’, ‘Everyone’s a Little Bit Racist’ and that Trekkie Monster classic ‘The Internet is for Porn’.

The puppets don’t have a monopoly on lewdness however, and Richard Morse’s quite brilliant rendition of ‘I’m Not Wearing Underwear Today’ presents as a classic example of finely delivered and masterfully understated slapstick.

The central theme of ‘life sucks’ is examined closely alongside ideas surrounding commitment, sexuality, racism and of course the well known concept of Schadenfreude.

It came as a surprise to realise that the puppets outnumber the humans throughout this production; and that is a testament to the folk in black who pull the strings, work the rods, sing the songs and voice the dialogue.

‘Avenue Q’ makes absolutely no pretence whatsoever at treading that fine line between bawdy Bukowski and fluffy Muppetry; and as for Schadenfreude? You can Google it or simply go along to the theatre and ask Lucy the Slut to explain. Either way you won’t be disappointed.

Directed and Choreographed by Cressida Carré / Resident Director/Choreographer Jessica Parker.

‘Avenue Q’ plays at HMT Aberdeen until Saturday 2nd April.

Tickets from Aberdeen Performing Arts Tel: 01224- 641122

Flare Path At HMT – Duncan Harley Reviews

Aberdeen City, Featured, Opinion No Responses »

Mar 172016

Duncan Harley Reviews Flare Path at His Majesty’s Theatre, Aberdeen.

Of every 100 airmen who joined Bomber Command during the Second World War, 45 were killed and a further fourteen badly wounded or taken prisoner of war. As the war progressed the odds improved, but when this play was first staged in the war-time London of 1942, the chances of surviving a tour of duty in the primitive heavy bombers of the time were firmly stacked against the young aircrews.

Terence Rattigan wrote Flare Path while serving as an air-gunner in Coastal Command, which at the very least enabled him to insert a degree of authenticity into the script.

Early performances were frequented by the good and the great including RAF Air Marshals keen to advise the playwright on how to improve things. When Churchill saw the play he famously remarked that it was a masterpiece of understatement.

Bizarrely, Keith Newman, Rattigan’s psychiatrist, felt compelled to attend the first 250 performances before publishing an impenetrable book entitled ‘250 Times I Saw a Play’. He was later confined in a psychiatric hospital having subjected one of the male leads to a barrage of love letters.

Few original 1940s RAF flyers survive into the 21st century and Rattigan himself died in 1977. However, now revived as a national tour, Flare Path still has the power both to shock and to entertain a modern audience.

The action takes place in 1940s Lincolnshire. The setting is the residents’ lounge of the austere but adequate Falcon Hotel. Overhead, bombers take off, land and explode in flames.

Audrey Palmer’s portrayal of hotelier Mrs Oakes captures the mood of the time perfectly. The prickly proprietor provides an austerely correct foil to the chummy aircrew who, in the main, ignore rank and privilege even to the point of directly addressing their commanding officer as Gloria.

Amidst a love tangle which threatens to break apart Teddy’s marriage to Patricia, the motley bunch of airmen look forward to some well earned time off-duty.

Enter stage left Squadron Leader ‘Gloria’ Swanson, Graham Seed, with some difficult news.

Take off for Germany is at 2240 hours and it won’t exactly be a piece of cake. The wives are left to worry and wait. There is a war on, after all.

It’s not all doom and gloom however. There are comedy turns: the best of which must be William Reay’s portrayal of Polish Flying Officer Count Skriczevinsky’s reunion with Countess Doris, played by the bubbly Claire Andreadis. Following an air crash into the English Channel, he returns blackened but triumphant from his dip in the drink, to deliver a comedy routine worthy of Eric Morecambe.

Wellingtons and Wimpys, passion and loyalty and above all a sense of duty are central themes of this play and by the final curtain the audience will have received some insight into the psychological effects of waging total war from the air.

The dialogue may be dated, and many of the accents typically posh British, but the essential message of Rattigan’s play still reaches out to modern audiences; and that, surely, is the whole point of a revival.

Directed by Justin Audibert with Sound Design by Dominic Bilkey, Flare Path plays at HMT Aberdeen until Saturday 19th March.

Tickets from Aberdeen Performing Arts Tel: 01224- 641122

An Inspector Calls At HMT: Duncan Harley reviews

Aberdeen City, Featured, Opinion No Responses »

Mar 112016

Duncan Harley reviews.

When dramatist JB Priestley attended an opening night of his play ‘Time and the Conways’ at Chichester Festival Theatre, a fellow theatregoer commented that she didn’t really understand what it was all about.

“Neither do I”, he seemingly retorted, “and I wrote the bloody thing!”

Priestley’s Time Plays are challenging at the best of times. Plots not only thicken but tread an intricate path through such niceties as quantum physics and Ouspensky’s theory of eternal recurrence.

In ‘Dangerous Corner’, past dark deeds are expunged when time reverts; and in ‘Time and the Conways’, Dunne’s theory of simultaneous time takes a theatrical bow.

The Time Plays can of course be enjoyed on various levels, and ‘An Inspector Calls’ is no exception. A socialist versus capitalist parable, a critique of outdated Edwardian values and a fourth dimensional take on collective responsibility all present as central themes.

Premiered in the USSR in 1945, the narrative probes the inner secrets of the prosperous but almost hopelessly dysfunctional Birling family. In the midst of a house party celebrating the engagement of daughter Sheila, played by Katherine Jack, to suitor Gerald Croft, played by Matthew Douglas, the doorbell rings. A trench coated Scotsman calling himself Inspector Goole has called, to investigate the circumstances surrounding the tragic and very recent suicide of a young woman.

In this superbly challenging revival by director Stephen Daldry, nothing is as it seems. Even the time frame remains fluid.

Set in pre-First-War 1912, the action takes place amidst the wailing of 1940s air raid sirens and the crump of Luftwaffe bombs exploding in the near distance. This provides a counterpoint, if one were needed, to the privilege and safety enjoyed by the precious few. As the interrogation of the guilty partygoers progresses, it becomes clear that Inspector Goole’s goal is one of exposure, ridicule and censure. He already knows what he has come to find out.

Liam Brennan’s quietly confident Inspector Goole presents initially as a somewhat awkward foil to the privileged and self-assured folk of the Birling household. Slowly and inexorably his softly spoken interrogations build one upon the other until, one by one, the accused recognise some measure of personal complicity in the events leading to the poor girl’s suicide.

By the time Goole delivers his ‘Fire, Blood and Anguish’ speech in Act Three, the sharply clipped and supremely confident language of the partygoers has given way to despair and even regret. As they attempt to pick up the pieces of their shattered lives, the plot takes yet one more unexpected turn.

‘An Inspector Calls’ is a challenging and thought-provoking drama raising important issues which remain relevant today.

In order to sustain tension among the audience, there is no interval during this production.

Directed by Stephen Daldry, ‘An Inspector Calls’ plays at HMT Aberdeen until Saturday March 12th.

Tickets from Aberdeen Performing Arts Tel: 01224- 641122

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