More theatre!

It's almost the end of 2005, and time for the second half of the year theatre recap.

Since the last theatre entry, we've seen:

Guys and Dolls, with Ewan McGregor and Jane Krakowski, co-produced by Donmar Warehouse
This was a TERRIFIC production. I've always liked Jane Krakowski, and thought she stole the TV series "Ally McBeal" from all those stick figure girls who got all the newsprint. She was born to play Miss Adelaide, the burlesque dancer who just wants Nathan Detroit to make an honest woman out of her after being engaged for fourteen years. Adorable and sexy, she lit up the stage. The headlining star was Ewan McGregor, who has a pleasant voice and is far from difficult on the eyes (as millions of female Star Wars fans can attest). His Skye Masterson was appealing enough, and he turned up the sexual heat in the Havana nightclub number. But Krakowski and Douglas Hodge, who played Detroit, really shone. Score another steal from the big name star for Krakowski. One of my favorite West End musicals of the year.

Twelfth Night, Open Air Theatre in Regent's Park
Shakespeare in the park, London style. An absolutely gorgeous production, in which Regent's Park is turned into a tropical Spanish island colony. And there's a parrot. And they serve sangria at the bar. Not a difficult night out at all. Oh, and there's shipwrecked siblings, star-crossed lovers, lots of cross-dressing, and did I mention the parrot? OK, I might have had more sangria than was good for my comprehension of Shakespearean language. But it's hard to go wrong watching theatre in a beautiful setting on a lovely summer night.

Aristocrats by Brian Friel, at the National
A dysfunctional Irish family gathers at the ancestral pile as their father withers away. Gina McKee was v. v. good, but the play was sloooow, I had worked a long day, and, well, I was asleep long before the father died.

Theatre of Blood with Jim Broadbent, at the National
This was my husband's favorite play of 2005 (so far). A re-imagination of the 1973 Vincent Price MGM film, the stage play was a collaboration with Improbable Theatre. Broadbent played Edward Lionheart, an over-the-top Shakespearean actor who disappeared after a particularly vicious public dissing by seven theatre critics. Several years later, those same critics find themselves invited to an abandoned theatre. Each critic has an invite that is specifically tailored to flatter their pretensions. They soon learn that Lionheart is out to exact revenge, picking them off one by one in gruesome, gory and laugh-out-loud scenarios taken from Shakespeare. Campy but stylish fun, pulled off with panache.

Mary Stuart by Friedrich Schiller, with Janet McTeer and Harriet Walter, at Donmar Warehouse
Absolutely amazing acting, and my favorite play of 2005. We saw it in the very intimate setting of the Donmar Warehouse (it has since transferred to a larger venue), which really emphasized the personal in the politics played between the two Queens and cousins, and between Elizabeth and her courtiers. The play isn't historically accurate - the most riveting scene, in which a disheveled, passionate, impulsive Mary, Queen of Scots meets the impeccably groomed and emotionally controlled Elizabeth I, never happened - but it's theatre at its most compelling.

Henry IV, Part 1 and Part 2, with Matthew Macfadyen and Michael Gambon, at the National, directed by Nicholas Hynter
This production received mixed reviews and I'm not sure why, because I was riveted from the opening: King Henry standing on a battlefield still smoking from the conflict, with distraught women crying over their dead kinfolk in the background.

I sometimes have a hard time listening to Shakespeare's language as I grew up reading his plays instead of seeing them performed. I have no problem with his words on paper, but spoken Shakespeare is rather difficult to follow. Not this play. The language felt fresh and immediate, as current as the nightly news. This was helped by the production design, which was spare and elegant, suggesting medieval England but also the 21st century.

Both Macfadyen and Gambon have big Hollywood movies out now, but while Matthew Macfadyen's Prince Hal shared some of Mr. Darcy's mannerisms, Gambon's Falstaff was 180 degrees from Dumbledore.

HMS Pinafore by Gilbert & Sullivan, Open Air Theatre at Regent's Park
I drank less sangria this time (it was later in the summer and starting to get cold at night). In 7th grade, I was in the chorus of the school production of Pinafore, but either I've forgotten much of it or it was radically shortened (and cleaned up - don't remember all the baby switching) for our budding adolescent attention spans. And this production turned Deadeye Dick into a comic one man Greek chorus, breaking the fourth wall to explain the Victorian in-jokes. All good fun, cheerful and colorful.

The History Boys by Alan Bennett, directed by Nicholas Hytner, at the National
The History Boys will be transitioning to Broadway soon, and the play returned to the National for its run-up. I enjoyed this play, very much, even if some of the jokes and references were completely lost on me. Set in a grammar school (aka high school) in Northern England in the late 80s, the play is a rumination on education, coming of age, sexual identity and moral trade-offs. A group of male students are earmarked by the headmaster as "Oxbridge" prospects. However, the school has a terrible track record at prepping students for their entrance exams. The headmaster hires a teacher with Oxbridge credentials to ready the boys for their exams. However, the new teacher, who coaches the students to give the answers the examiners want to hear, conflicts with the boys' regular teacher who wants to teach them to think for themselves via a solid grounding in the classics. It's a very smart play, very funny play, very moving play. Highly recommended, although I'm curious how well it will transfer to the States - our high schools are very different. And even after 18 months in Britian, my husband and I missed quite a few jokes that had the rest of the audience in the aisles, while we found otherselves the only ones laughing in other spots.

2000 Years by Mike Leigh, at the National
This play sold out before it had a title. Leigh is famous for gathering a troupe of actors and improvising the play during rehearsal. This particular play turned out to be about a family of secular British Jews who are shocked and horrified when their grown son becomes devout and even *gasp* says his daily prayers. I have lots of respect for Leigh but 2000 Years felt like a small, sad tempest in a teapot; I'm sure it is because I am a Los Angeleno who has had lots of exposure to Jewish culture and especially to Jewish families that this didn't feel at all fresh or new (despite au courant references to Katrina and the Gaza pull-out.) Leigh didn't say anything about being Jewish in an Anglo world that Woody Allen didn't say better and funnier 20 years ago, and since religion is not quite the four letter word in America that it is Britian, the mishegaas over the son's religious awakening felt especially forced to me. A watchable play, with some really great acting, but worth skipping.

Ducktastic directed by Kenneth Branagh
We really wanted to see this. And it got some good reviews. So imagine our surprise when the producers announced that the show was closing early and all seats were just ten pounds.

As it turns out, ten pounds was rather steep. A really, really confused show - a cross between a Christmas panto, a magic act and a sketch comedy run amuck. Plus live ducks. My husband is convinced that the show came into being after someone muttered "duck knows" instead of its ruder cousin, only for another person to say "Eureka! What a great line on which to build a West End musical!"

It had some moments: Sean Foley is an incredibly gifted physical comedian, and I enjoyed his rubbery dances. Some of the illusions were spectacular (others, merely stupid). And I'm a sucker for live animals on stage, even large white ducks.

But since I'm not British, the cross-dressing, the faux nudity and the really bad puns were just lost on me. Sorry, Kenneth.

God of Hell by Sam Shepard, at Donmar Warehouse
I am a fan of Shepard's writing. But God of Hell is not one of his strongest efforts. It hits you over the head with a frying pan, and then just to make sure you get the message, it hits you with a side of beef, several plant pots, electric shock torture and finishes off with a nuclear bang.

Shepard's play - more like a rant - is a warning about the neo-cons leading America into a totalitarian future decorated with stars and stripes. And I hear ya, Sam. I'm not too happy about the neo-cons, either. But this the play is so dissonant that the message assaults the audience almost as much the neo-con character in the play assaults the military experiment escapee.

Lesley Sharp is very good as Emma, the one character who resists the neo-con's seductions and/or tortures. But overall, all I can say about the play is thankfully it was only a one-act.

We also saw two Broadway musicals this year, both more than worth the price of the ticket: Spamalot (and we paid exhorbiant ticket broker fees) and Dirty Rotten Scoundrels. Norbert Leo Butz is my new theater crush.

We have two more plays before the end of the New Year: the Royal Shakespeare Company's Great Expectations at Stratford-Upon-Avon and Patrick Stewart's one-man A Christmas Carol. And we've already got tickets for next year: more from the RSC (this year they're doing the Complete Works of Shakespeare, and we've tickets to a few of them), Resurrection Blues at the Old Vic, Once in a Lifetime at the National, and finally Billy Elliot in March. I love living in London!