901 posts
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Post by bordeaux on Oct 18, 2016 9:03:54 GMT
Quick, read the opening paragraph of the whatsonstage review for a wonderfully surreal typo...(before they change it).
40 mins later - a shame: they've now corrected it. Maigret read Magritte before.
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1,237 posts
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Post by nash16 on Oct 18, 2016 14:05:32 GMT
Billington summing up Icke's mode: "As it is, we have a strange hybrid in which a novel has been turned into a stage production that paradoxically aspires to the condition of film."
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Post by Deleted on Oct 18, 2016 16:50:21 GMT
RE: Typo, I didn't realise the Maigret/Magritte and on scanning for one, I assumed it had since been corrected before my reading and must have been...
"...he wrote when he left his popular defective behind" to "...he wrote when he left his popular detective behind".
Happy Tuesday one and all.
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105 posts
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Post by youngoffender on Oct 19, 2016 11:41:49 GMT
I saw this last night, and I'm in the 3* camp. Interesting staging, good sound design (somewhat stymied by the broken fan above the circle which sounds like a swarm of cicadas), dull play. After all the NT's warnings about its 'tense nature' (I'll be the judge of that, thanks), the audience should have been staggering out at the end having being put through the wringer, but instead there was a palpable collective shrug. Some of the four-star notices seem to be coming from middle-aged straight male critics who were mesmerised by Debicki's gratuitous wardrobe malfunction.
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Post by Deleted on Oct 19, 2016 16:21:19 GMT
I thoroughly enjoyed this today. Mark Strong leads an excellent cast. It didn't feel long and I did not see the ending coming at all.
Loved the design - you really can't beat a National Theatre set change!
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816 posts
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Post by stefy69 on Oct 20, 2016 6:28:13 GMT
I saw this last night, and I'm in the 3* camp. Interesting staging, good sound design (somewhat stymied by the broken fan above the circle which sounds like a swarm of cicadas), dull play. After all the NT's warnings about its 'tense nature' (I'll be the judge of that, thanks), the audience should have been staggering out at the end having being put through the wringer, but instead there was a palpable collective shrug. Some of the four-star notices seem to be coming from middle-aged straight male critics who were mesmerised by Debicki's gratuitous wardrobe malfunction. Or they just might have liked the play..... |
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Post by Deleted on Oct 20, 2016 7:25:57 GMT
They might... but then why mention Debicki disrobing at all?
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Post by Deleted on Oct 20, 2016 7:47:36 GMT
I saw this last night, and I'm in the 3* camp. Interesting staging, good sound design (somewhat stymied by the broken fan above the circle which sounds like a swarm of cicadas), dull play. After all the NT's warnings about its 'tense nature' (I'll be the judge of that, thanks), the audience should have been staggering out at the end having being put through the wringer, but instead there was a palpable collective shrug. Some of the four-star notices seem to be coming from middle-aged straight male critics who were mesmerised by Debicki's gratuitous wardrobe malfunction. Or they just might have liked the play..... Well *someone's* not read Dominic Cavendish's review..... |
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Post by theatremad on Oct 27, 2016 10:32:54 GMT
OK I'm going to be one of the voices who like. Thought this was actually not bad, yes they overacted in the storm, but overall I really did enjoy it. Kept me guessing who was actually going to get murdered, so the end was slightly surprising.
Only voice of concern is they could have cut some of the scene changes.
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Post by Deleted on Oct 27, 2016 11:24:36 GMT
This is one of those plays that I quite enjoyed at the time but increasingly dislike in retrospect. The staging was stylish (though didn't work if you were anywhere but centre stalls - from the front row I missed most of the final scene, which is something of a flaw). It is a terribly old fashioned play - all about a not very interesting male crisis and everything is subject to that gaze. Even the end scene is part of his crisis rather than being about the woman, who very much suffers more from it. The portrayal of the women feels very sexist and one dimensional (again, total male gaze rather than real women) - though having said that, the central make character is a total stereotype as well.
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Post by theatremad on Oct 27, 2016 11:27:05 GMT
As an aside, I was in the Circle Slips (the cheap seats), and the view wasn't too bad at all (yes small amounts missed but nothing major).
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520 posts
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Post by theatreliker on Oct 30, 2016 11:05:38 GMT
Really impressed with this yesterday. Stunning set and production, great play.
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403 posts
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Post by altamont on Oct 30, 2016 11:40:05 GMT
Very impressed indeed with the setting - the play not so much. It promised much. but I think in the end failed to deliver. Would have liked to see more of Hope Davis' character
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76 posts
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Post by bingomatic on Nov 3, 2016 19:33:09 GMT
Brilliant and will definitely make it into my highlights of 2016 awards list.
Loved the staging, music, everything apart from the person behind me saying 'where are we now ?' when it moved to the NY apartment, 'is that the end?' at the end and the brilliant 'did you order interval drinks ?'
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Post by lolli on Nov 5, 2016 20:23:18 GMT
Disappointed by this. And very slow. Adding to the list of unbelievable moments that others have mentioned - why spend the effort getting three mattresses down to put on the floor by the fire, when there are already two very nice looking sofa things very near it? Illogical.
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183 posts
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Post by caa on Nov 10, 2016 18:53:09 GMT
Disappointed by this. And very slow. Adding to the list of unbelievable moments that others have mentioned - why spend the effort getting three mattresses down to put on the floor by the fire, when there are already two very nice looking sofa things very near it? Illogical. Yes and the cushion's weren't used, that said I did go with the story and the time flew by.
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1,046 posts
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Post by jgblunners on Nov 19, 2016 22:13:55 GMT
Saw this tonight and was really impressed after hearing many mixed opinions. Brilliant performances from the 3 leads, and I actually didn't mind the cinematic style - it took a couple of scene changes to get used to, but then I embraced it and found that, in combination with the set design, I found it quite effective. Speaking of set - wow! Thinking back, I just want to pull those screens back and see how it all fits together. I always find sets at the National to be wonderful, probably because of the unique and diverse nature of the theatres.
As for the play itself - probably the quickest 2 hours I've ever spent in a theatre. Despite many pauses and atmospheric spaces in the dialogue, the pace felt very good and carried me through without losing my attention. I was sceptical about how much of a thriller it would turn out to be as it progressed, but found that in the last 20/30 minutes my heart was pounding and I was genuinely quite invested and begging to find out what would happen next. Yes, there are moments where the speech seems a little unnatural but all in all I was very impressed.
Now I just wish that Entry Pass tickets for it hadn't sold out so that I could watch again and look out for all the little things that I'm sure will jump out with knowledge of how the plot unfolds!
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2,058 posts
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Post by Marwood on Nov 24, 2016 8:14:23 GMT
Saw this last night and have to say that while I didn't dislike it, I wasn't impressed either. Some interesting use of the framing and sound effects and music, but beyond that, didn't find much there to like. A thriller that wasn't particularly thrilling, populated with a cast of thinly sketched, uninteresting people. Main problem with a play about a boring schlub who only realises that he's a schlub (and finds out everyone else has thought the same of him all along) by the end , such a character wasn't interesting enough to care about what happened to him or the other characters after 2 hours in their company.
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1,103 posts
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Post by mallardo on Nov 25, 2016 11:01:28 GMT
I wonder how much of the style of this show, the mis-en-scene, stems from David Hare? Everyone is assuming that the cinematic treatment, the iris-in/iris-out transitions, the scenic reveals, the flashbacks, etc., is Robert Icke's doing but I find it hard to imagine this play done any other way - so much so that I'm thinking Hare had this approach in mind all along. Otherwise, why do it? It would never work played straight. It's not overtly dramatic, not substantial enough. It's totally dependent on its stylized production.
But, as it turns out, that's no bad thing. The Hare/Icke collaboration has, in fact, produced a stunning piece of theatre. Sometimes style trumps (hate to use that word) content and this is one of those times. It's a play in which the atmosphere is everything. The languid pace, the pinched dialogue, the looks and silences, the forced focus on details - Mona's hand in the fireside scene, Donald's eyes - all contribute to a seamless synthesis of words and images and actions, such as I have rarely experienced in a theatre. I was drawn into the play's intricately somber world from the first moments and my attention never flagged. I fully believed what I was seeing.
Much credit must go to the cast. It cannot be easy to act within the constraints of such a production, to maintain the required tone and pace, and these actors were exceptional. Some here have said they didn't care enough about Donald, but I did. The way Mark Strong played him - diffident, uncertain, everything internalized - I was completely convinced and sympathetic. I thought he totally justified the ending - if I didn't see it coming, I was certainly not surprised. Hope Davis, strong, tightly controlled, almost spooky, and Elizabeth Debicki, an intriguing puzzle, were equally good.
I understand why some would not respond to this but, for me, it cast a spell, it worked on all levels - as it had to in order to succeed. A unique theatrical experience.
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433 posts
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Post by DuchessConstance on Nov 25, 2016 11:45:13 GMT
I wonder how much of the style of this show, the mis-en-scene, stems from David Hare? Everyone is assuming that the cinematic treatment, the iris-in/iris-out transitions, the scenic reveals, the flashbacks, etc., is Robert Icke's doing but I find it hard to imagine this play done any other way - so much so that I'm thinking Hare had this approach in mind all along. Otherwise, why do it? It would never work played straight. It's not overtly dramatic, not substantial enough. It's totally dependent on its stylized production. The staging of the first (optician) scene with the iris in/iris out transition is in Hare's script. The rest of the transitions aren't, but I think a certain cinematic style is implied. |
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830 posts
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Post by rumbledoll on Nov 25, 2016 11:51:19 GMT
I wanted to like it so much but sadly failed to do so. I was waiting for that much-spoken about 'intensity" but it never grabbed hard. Although the staging is stunning visually and clever, with added music and almost cinematic quality it was just style over substance for me. The charaters struck me as cliched and barely interesting.. Totally illogical behaviour at times (come on, wear yur coat open in such storm?) made it too artificial to feel convincing. Performances are solid but it lacks that special something which makes your heart beat faster (considering it's advertised as a thriller). Left me cold even though the prodution values are remarkable. Never thought Lyttelton was capable of such magic.
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830 posts
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Post by rumbledoll on Nov 25, 2016 12:21:38 GMT
I don't know whether I was the only one bemused by open overcoats but we acually do sometimes get nightmarish snow storms like this in Russia and you certainly want to button up your coat (or whatever outergarment you are lucky to have) from top to bottom. I just couldn't ignore it - such things tend to distract me (I wish they rather didn't) Don't get me started on that matrasses nonsense..
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2,389 posts
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Post by peggs on Nov 25, 2016 13:26:33 GMT
I don't know whether I was the only one bemused by open overcoats but we acually do sometimes get nightmarish snow storms like this in Russia and you certainly want to button up your coat (or whatever outergarment you are lucky to have) from top to bottom. I just couldn't ignore it - such things tend to distract me (I wish they rather didn't) Don't get me started on that matrasses nonsense.. No it got to me too, I am able to suspend disbelief only so far it seems and being voluntarily colder than you need to be wasn't one of them!
I think I might have benefitted from seeing this later in the run so I'd have known maybe what to expect and would have informed my expectations so I wouldn't have been thinking 'why is everyone speaking so slowly?'. It's quite different but vaguely on the same line The Hairy Ape caught me out as it was so far from my experience that I couldn't appreciate it as a different styled piece.
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2,859 posts
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Post by couldileaveyou on Nov 26, 2016 17:19:22 GMT
Just back home from this, it was a mixed bag for me. It was beautifully acted, particularly by Mark Strong and Hope Davis, the set was very elegant and I loved the costumes. I didn't mind the framing at all, it wasn't nearly as bad as the stinky man at my right.
I liked the first part of the play, it worked well for me until the protagonist goes to New York for the first time. It reminded me a bit of A Single Man - the movie, not the novel. The second part was just meh... at the end you realize what they were doing but at the moment I felt some of the scenes (especially the one with the father) were just random. And even when you realize why they were doing it it's not a good enough epiphany to justify 20 minutes of the play. I enjoyed it more than I expected, but I had very low expectations so it doesn't mean much. I mean, it's not that bad but I doubt it will haunt me in the days to come. It's an elegant play and production, but I found it lacking.
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2,859 posts
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Post by couldileaveyou on Nov 26, 2016 17:22:02 GMT
also, were the seats at the Lyttelton conceived to make people suffer for their sins?
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