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Post by samuelwhiskers on Mar 24, 2024 16:07:47 GMT
This is not very interesting, but ROH gave me the dates for Maddaddam as 14th-30th November. I'm surprised it's not a longer run as they're bigging it up a lot and it's only March.
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Post by samuelwhiskers on Mar 24, 2024 16:02:48 GMT
So was this planned to be open ended or planned to be limited run? Semi rhetorical question as I guess nobody other than the producers know. Wonder how long cast were initially contracted for. Anyway, I don't think this is selling nearly as badly as some online prophets of doom are decreeing. Advance seating plans for next few weeks look much healthier than Crazy For You ever did at same theatre! There are also no decent advance offers yet.... The intention and hope was for a lengthy run. Gillian Lynne was/is aggressively looking for a hit with potential to be a long runner. They want the new Guys and Dolls. Sky's Edge is a great show but it underperformed compared to expectations. One of the Totoro leads told me yesterday that they're transferring to GL (not a scoop, that transfer has been mentioned here before) and GL wants it to run for six months minimum. Though personally I hope Totoro does well in the West End but not so well it runs for years, because I still have hopes that GL will take Tammy Faye back after the Broadway run.
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Post by samuelwhiskers on Nov 24, 2023 17:45:18 GMT
Nothing is being snubbed intentionally.
There were plans in place to transfer to the Gillian Lynn before the Almeida run started, which had to be cancelled after Katie announced her pregnancy and after all involved how crucial she was to the success of the show. They hoped to postpone the W/E run till early 2024 but Skye's Edge ended up taking the slot they wanted, and there was no other theatre available that met their requirements.
Alot of people worked hard to try to make a West End transfer happen. It's a shame they were not successful. It happens. A future West End run isn’t impossible but there are no active plans as of this moment. However things change all the time in theatre. 🤞
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Post by samuelwhiskers on Jul 9, 2023 11:55:10 GMT
Don't hold your breath for Tammy Faye. (And sometimes posters aren't wrong, but rather things and situations change due to unforeseen events)
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Post by samuelwhiskers on Jun 3, 2023 22:43:45 GMT
If the AD resigns surely the post has to go through the usual process that all public sector job go through? Maybe X is already lined up but still a process needs to be applied - doesn't it ? In theory, but in practise it's lip service. It's like the Royal Court, they advertised the AD role on the website, anyone could have applied, but in reality people get the hand on the shoulder and the conversations with serious contenders start months or years before the job is officially open. Anyone going online and submitting an application is unlikely to be considered, it's just there to fulfil the legal requirement. There are some theatres that are more equitable and do assess all applications, but not the really big theatres. I feel like a jaded cynic now!
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Post by samuelwhiskers on Jun 3, 2023 22:27:51 GMT
I believe RuNo is leaving end of 2024 It seems to be accepted wisdom that he's leaving in summer 2025 (but planning to announce two years in advance), but then accepted wisdoms are often wrong, so wait and see I guess. I'm reasonable sure the press launch is to announce his eventual exit.
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Post by samuelwhiskers on Jun 2, 2023 17:33:00 GMT
NT doing a press conference mid June to ‘announce programming’, I have a suspicion it’ll be to announce Norris is stepping down… let’s see Pretty much an open secret that's what the press conference is for (and there are only two names under consideration for the new AD).
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Post by samuelwhiskers on May 3, 2023 12:38:12 GMT
Why would you want an American actress to play Elizabeth Taylor? Elizabeth Taylor was British-American. She was born in London but her parents were both American (both her parents were from Kansas originally, and only came to Britain a couple of years before she was born). The family moved back to the US when she was 7, so she lived in the US for most of her life. She's certainly played here with an American accent, and to my ears one that is serviceable but not great.
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Post by samuelwhiskers on May 3, 2023 12:13:10 GMT
I have no doubt this will be a huge hit and get 5* reviews but it left me cold. Maybe I'm the only one since it got a rapturous standing ovation last night.
I love Hamlet very much, have performed in Hamlet (but not as Hamlet), and I've watched the Burton Hamlet recording. I was excited for this. But there's just no there, there. It just felt incredibly artificial and the writing is superficial and shallow. Apart from one scene where Gielgud is alone, there was not one moment that felt like genuine emotion. Didn't see the point of having Elizabeth Taylor pop up every now and then to be sexy and to editorialise on celebrity and acting but have zero character development or even anything to do. Tuppence Middleton is a good actor but you could have replaced her with the Madame Tussauds waxwork of Elizabeth Taylor and not noticed any difference, and for God's sake is there not a single American actress in London who could have played that role?
It's entertaining and has some funny sitcom-style lines. But basically a gossipy Lifetime movie. 3* from me.
Trivia: John Heffernan was in an early workshop of this play. Now there's an actor who brings real emotional truth to every role he plays.
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Post by samuelwhiskers on Apr 27, 2023 10:08:12 GMT
How far in advance are theatre shows cast? I take it if it's a big name it must be timetabled some time ahead but just generally I wondered about this and with TV and film. I notice with TV and film you often don't get names announced until filming has actually started. Unless an actor has been 'attached' to the play for a while for some specific reason (celeb casting, director and actor pitched the project together, playwright wrote the character with that actor in mind) it's usually pretty short notice. Anything from two weeks to six months ahead of time, with smaller roles cast right up to the wire. I've cast shows where we were still calling agents on the Friday for rehearsals starting on Monday, but only for tiny roles or last minute emergencies. For leads, well how long is a piece of string. I'm currently casting a play that starts in November, partly because they're looking for a name for the lead, and partly because the casting has rigid requirements that won't be easy to meet.
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Post by samuelwhiskers on Apr 27, 2023 10:00:48 GMT
Dear England & The Motive and the Cue could be up for NT Live and/or a West End transfer… I wonder how do they decide on which productions will be at NT Live but others will be at NT at Home… Meanwhile, NT has long promised and teased on The Corn is Green for NT at Home, but it’s already been a year since the play was staged and it’s still not in the streaming library! It isn't either/or. Many productions on NT at Home were NT Live first.
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Post by samuelwhiskers on Apr 24, 2023 12:41:19 GMT
I love NT At Home. I watch about one production a month. Sometimes rewatch as well. My recent favorites: Prima Facie Straight Line Crazy Habit of Art Hansard Which current productions will be filmed and made available? Dear England and Motive and the Cue, not sure what else right now.
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Post by samuelwhiskers on Apr 21, 2023 21:47:28 GMT
Deciding that the black guy is in the wrong (based on nothing except personal opinion as to how creatives should and should not use social media, and vague rumours about 'being difficult') and the theatre that's known for mistreating writers is in the right, is not "people starting to make sense of things."
Not one person on this forum has actually disclosed any details. It's just people reaffirming each other's biases and opinions, egged on by nebulous hints from people implying insider status. (It's pretty telling that when non-white posters post "I personally work on this show and here's some non-controversial info", even if they have years of posting proven insider casting and production scoops, they're consistently undermined, called liars and bullied. Yet posters, even brand new posters, can post the vaguest and most innuendo-filled posts hinting at insider status that demonise a black actor, and aren't questioned or challenged at all.)
It's also very odd to frame allegations of mistreatment as "dragging a theatre into it." The whole reason theatre and the entertainment industry in general has such a big abuse problem (MeToo, Harvey Weinstein, Spacey, at al but also things like racism) is because of the culture of silence where people are slammed for speaking out. Obviously this is a different situation than Weinstein or Spacey. There's no indication there's any sexual component here and the Court actually has a great reputation in terms of not tolerating any form of sexual abuse or harassment. Of all the criticisms or allegations made about them, I'm not aware of anything sexual. But abuse is abuse.
Remember, Weinstein used a lot of tactics like astroturfing and anonymously leaking stories online painting actresses he'd raped as "difficult" as a deliberate tactic to destroy their credibility and smear their reputations online, as a preventative measure to discourage them from coming forward about the abuse and to ensure that if they did come forward, they wouldn't be believed. I really don't think anyone at the Court is Machiavellian enough to be badmouthing Danny Lee Wynter online under fake names to damage the credibility of his allegations against the Court, but it's still very worrying that people who speak up are so consistently demonised. I don't think Wynter has handled things at all well, but there's a general attitude of "you must silently suffer any abuse because if you ever speak up, ever, you're a whiny attention whore who's not trustworthy" is extremely alarming.
Can we not go five minutes without Meghan bashing? The RF leaked private conversations and damaging lies about Harry and Meghan since day one. Any trust was destroyed by them long before Harry and Meghan said a single word.
Personally I'd feel a lot safer engaging with someone who's willing to state their opinions openly and on the record under their real name (because that means there's transparency and accountability), than someone who refuses to engage publicly but is doing God knows what sneaky underhand stuff covertly or behind the scenes.
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Post by samuelwhiskers on Apr 20, 2023 11:25:03 GMT
I had open arms for this, and was left only half-met by the production. Performances were decent enough, particularly Louisa Harland as Agnes, but somehow the whimsy just didn't draw me in as much as I hoped it would. The foreshadowing that the narrator provides is really where all the drama resides - meaning that not much actually happens on stage. I'm all for small moments and missed connections but I was really struggling to find much to hold onto here. This was my issue too. Immaculately directed and acted (at least by the sisters), the dancing especially is a huge highlight. I understand why the play is structured like it is but it feels more like a book structure. What I mean is, if you read a novel that utilises first person narration and has the main character narrating from the present day, but most of the book is his memories of the past, that works well since it's all just text that you're reading. Performance has to be show not tell, but all the plot is literally told. Tons of plot jammed into extremely plot-tense short bursts of narration, while nothing actually happens during the scenes themselves. You can have elegiac character-driven plays where nothing really happens or you can have plot plot plot. It's poignant sometimes to watch the women enjoying their summer already knowing what ends up happening to them in the future, but I needed more of a link between the dire future narrated by the adult Michael, and the summer-set scenes. I was flummoxed they made such a big deal in the first half about going to the Harvest Dance then it wasn't mentioned again. I realise it's in the original script but seeing actors doing "bending over addressing an imaginary character" acting is so deeply cringe.
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Post by samuelwhiskers on Apr 20, 2023 11:13:26 GMT
It'll be someone they've tipped the nod to. Could be a writer. Not an emerging one. When Vicky took over they approached her and iirc two other people. One was a famous playwright who turned it down.
Going back to the play. I've never met or spoken to Danny Lee Wynter (for transparency) but the only unique thing about this situation is that he's been so public about it, and it became public in the first place due to him being both writer and performer. You can hide a writer leaving a production but not an actor. It's not the first time by a long shot that a production has resulted in a breach and permanent falling out between the Court and a writer but it doesn't usually become public knowledge. Whether Wynter's decision to make it public is admirable or scorn worthy, stupid or worth it, persecution complex or justified, is entirely a matter of opinion. My bias is generally against the Court (which is not the same as being pro-Wynter, necessarily) but personally I wouldn't make a matter public unless I was willing to make a clear statement of fact.
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Post by samuelwhiskers on Apr 20, 2023 11:04:09 GMT
Kwame IS an actor. But he's also extremely tenacious, so maybe he'll manage to hang in there.
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Post by samuelwhiskers on Apr 9, 2023 10:09:10 GMT
I was there too. One of the most bizarre productions of a Coward play I've ever seen. Running time, maybe two hours ten minutes? Spoilers... First, it's not funny, except maybe in the first act. It's played very naturalistically and with an emphasis on the toxic nature of relationships. The domestic violence scene that closes the second act is brutal and raw. The food fight bit made me feel squeamish. There are two really weird directorial choices which I didn't understand. First, during the interval two of the musicians (a man and a woman) come down from the orchestra and play on stage, but the male musician keeps interrupting the piece to give "helpful" advice to the female musician on the flaws in her musical technique, and she becomes increasingly irritated and finally storms off in a huff. The male musician is thrilled to have the stage to himself and delivers a solo, while the actors are waiting for him to stop and get off the stage, and finally a stagehand has to make him leave the stage so the play can resume. I guess this is supposed to be a bit of fun during the interval that carries on the theme of the war of the sexes but it's just weird. Amanda and Elyot have a toxic romantic relationship, fighting is part of the passion of their relationship. He's not trying to put her down because she's a woman and they are equally toxic, she gives as good as she gets and even initiates the violence. It's a completely different dynamic from some jerk mansplaining as a calculated choice to try to undermine a female colleague. All three of Coward's female characters stand up for themselves, so it feels regressive introduce an original female character who doesn't fight back and is bullied off the stage.
The second thing and the thing that destroyed the play for me, they've added a sound track of artificial sound effects, basically a background track which plays through the speaker system at various points throughout the play. Maybe it's because I was sitting directly underneath the speaker but the sound effects were so loud it was a constant source of distraction and made it incredibly hard to focus on the actors. I overheard some other people complaining about it too. I don't understand why anyone thinks a live theatre play needs a background track anyway. Some of the sound effects were fine but didn't really work (for example when Stirling throws a glass at the wall there's a really hammy and overly dramatic "glass smashing" sound effect but the timing is slightly off, so she smashes the glass then a beat later the sound effect plays. She really does smash the glass for real so why add a fake sound effect over it?) During the whole of the last half, there's a background track of car noises. Like cars going brmm brmm, car doors opening and closing. But super loud and distracting. WHY?? They're in the living room of an apartment. Not in the pit of a Formula 1 race. It felt like trying to watch a movie on your phone while driving down the M1 with the windows open.
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Post by samuelwhiskers on Apr 9, 2023 10:01:51 GMT
I don't claim to know the full, full story (two sides and all that) but from what I have been told, my sympathy is entirely with Danny. Seems like most people in the industry are siding with Danny. I have to admit I'm biased because I had a play on at the Court quite a few years ago (early in Vicky's reign) and certain aspects of their behaviour was not acceptable and quite shocking.
The Court has the worst reputation in theatre (maybe joint with the Young Vic) for treating writers badly and being borderline abusive, and they have a racism problem which is the elephant in the room. There's a WhatsApp group that has probably at least half all the famous and working playwrights in Britain on it, and the Court is the one name that pops up again and again when people are discussing bad experiences.
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Post by samuelwhiskers on Feb 21, 2023 7:54:33 GMT
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Post by samuelwhiskers on Feb 21, 2023 7:53:44 GMT
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Post by samuelwhiskers on Feb 13, 2023 23:03:24 GMT
I was told a few months ago (but embargoed until now) that the plan is to have cast rotate in and out to accommodate “name” availability. It does make me laugh when people say this. I'm not saying you didn't know and you have known things in the past, but it's an anonymous chat board, unless people are using their real name or they're are the only person in the world to know, why not say it? Someone saying they knew something after it's announced makes me think they didn't have a clue. Has it been announced anywhere? I thought it was just another poster speculating. It's getting pretty damn boring that I can't post anything without being more or less being accused of being a liar. I've been a frequent poster here since all the way back to the days of the old board, I've broke tons of exclusives over the years. I was the first person to break the news about Tammy Faye long before Baz tweeted it as an "exclusive" and I was the first person to post (admittedly via hinting) that the Sondheim concert was coming back for a run. So why do I get ragged on all the time? It's pretty hypocritical that anytime I post news - even if it's about my own bloody shows! - I get snide comments and scepticism, yet other posters are treated like their every word is engraved on stone tablets, when they admit they don't even work on those shows. Hell, I've posted stuff and been called a liar and basically heckled, then seen other posters repeat what I'd already said and suddenly the same information is the gospel truth. Really, I don't know if it's because I'm strident in my political views (which I know aren't popular here) or resentment because I work on some of these shows, but the constant sniping is really starting to feel like bullying.
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Post by samuelwhiskers on Feb 13, 2023 22:58:52 GMT
Certainly a rapturous response at press night this eve.
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Post by samuelwhiskers on Feb 12, 2023 22:38:42 GMT
'Further names set to appear during the 16 weeks is to be revealed' That sounds like people will be doing a few weeks here and there. I assume they'll add some more men to the line up. Jac Yarrow might be a good Anthony, but i dont think he's ready for Sweeney just yet. Lea Salonga hasnt been on a London stage in 27 years? That doesnt sound right. I was told a few months ago (but embargoed until now) that the plan is to have cast rotate in and out to accommodate “name” availability.
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Post by samuelwhiskers on Feb 12, 2023 21:56:42 GMT
And weirdly scheduled on the same day as the Offie Awards. Some of the WOS nominees skipped the ceremony and went to the Offies instead.
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Post by samuelwhiskers on Jan 31, 2023 10:53:50 GMT
“Braybells Ring Are You Listening: Katie Brayben covers Tammy Faye Christmas Classics.”
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Post by samuelwhiskers on Jan 30, 2023 12:43:45 GMT
Hmm, the entire run of the RSC's spring/summer production of Hamnet is showing as completely sold out, which seems unusual for a new play with no cast announced, several months before it opens. Trying to debate whether to book the rest of my spring trip and hope tickets become available later on, what do people think? Is it really fully sold out, or some other reason it's showing as sold out?
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Post by samuelwhiskers on Jan 29, 2023 10:32:27 GMT
tbh, I'm still pretty chuffed sitting on the Elizabeth Line quietly going weeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee! And then getting off, going to the other platform and doing it all again. If you want to get really spicy, get off at Canary Wharf and explore the station's roof garden. Did you see the giant spiders?
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Post by samuelwhiskers on Jan 28, 2023 23:39:41 GMT
And Mark Shenton is using it to beef with Carl Woodward again. Plus ça change.
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Post by samuelwhiskers on Jan 26, 2023 13:25:17 GMT
Ooh! Something that’s not dour and about the war, how fun. I wonder if my Covid cancellation ticket voucher is still good.
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Post by samuelwhiskers on Jan 25, 2023 15:34:55 GMT
No, there were definitely posts pouring scorn on the idea of it transferring at all, suggesting that a transfer was doomed unless it was announced immediately, that it would go straight to Broadway, yadda yadda.
I've certainly never said it would transfer immediately, and posted several times about the possibility of having to wait several months or there being a long gap.
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