Queer Theatre @ National

harlow that's exactly it- not worth the round trip for it (had I been down anyway I'd have gone) I do love George and SRB too, and I've never seen any of the other cast and I'm sure they're fab.

BUT also for me the play holds such a dear place and my memory of the Alan Cumming production is SO strong that I'd rather keep that and wait for another 'proper' production to come along.

Fun story, I only discovered the play because I saw Alan in the Pret around the corner from the Trafalgar and thought 'Oh I heard he's in a play must check it out'

I've just turned the air blue (inside my head) I'd made my peace with not going and then you drop a T bomb NT not cool, not cool.

I went to the Neaptide reading on Thursday night, and loved it! Vivid performances rendered vital the humour in the play, but the substance had massively dated, though critically, not in one way!

A word about the format of these readings. The playwright and directors are under instructions to get the plays to run ninety minutes without an interval. This is so that, after a five minute break, a 40 minute discussion can take place in the Lyttelton Lounge, where the writer (together with the director of the reading) gets to discuss revisiting the work, after which everyone can go home at about 10:15pm.

For "Neaptide", the playwright, Sarah Daniels, gave Sarah Frankcomm, the director, carte blanche to cut her play down to ninety minutes. This involved excising one character, Jean, the roommate of the lead character, entirely out of the play. When I watched the reading, I had no idea that this had been done, and not knowing the play, had no sense it was incomplete in any way. Thus, I conclude the character of Jean was pretty much superfluous.

The play, which involves a closeted teacher, Claire (Jessica Raine) instructed by her headmistress to punish a brave girl, Diane (Karla Crome) for being an out Lesbian, is severely dated, thank goodness! In the play, we are told that in the early eighties, the consequence of Claire stepping up, and coming out herself, would be that she would inevitably both lose her job as a teacher AND lose her custody bid for her child, for whom she was the primary carer.

Today, these consequences seem not only ludicrous, but illegally discriminatory, so we've clearly come a LONG way, and the play is rendered, to a degree, a relic unlikely ever to see a large scale production again, and more the type of fare that the Orange Tree or the Finborough might nostalgically revive, with major doubling of cast members.

In two key ways though, the play still breathed:

(1) The humour: Daniels, a writer who went on to create the first gay teacher on "Grange Hill," is an absolute pro at comedy, creating believably comic situations and hilarious naturalistic dialogue. Strength in the ensemble brought this out to perfection: Ronke Adekolueojo's spaced out Val, playing off the manic denial of her mother, Maureen Beattie's Joyce, who, in turn relentlessly bulldozed the ever patient decency of her other daughter, Jessica Raine's Claire (nobody does intelligent world-weary frustration as compassionately and convincingly as Jessica Raine), who, in turn was threatened by the bold, heroic toughness of out student, Karla Crome's Diane, herself resisting the brazen prejudice enforced by overbearing yet brittle headmistress, Adjoa Andoh's Beatrice. The dialogue is so natural, the characters so distinct, that we got all the comic milking of a sitcom, without the typically wretched phoniness of that format. Of all the actors, Adjoa Andoh was the funniest, able to embody the strict fierceness of the headmistress, as well as simultaneously illustrate the slippery comedy and brittle tragedy of a character, herself a gay woman, enforcing heterosexuality as the compulsory norm, desperately trying to stop the "endemic" of homosexuality (the character meant "epidemic," of course, as pointed out by Jessica Raine's sighing Claire) overtaking the school;

(2) Teachers today: In the chit chat that followed the play, gay teachers in the audience identified themselves by raising their hands. They were asked to keep their hands raised if they were out about their sexual orientation, and all hands came down. Anecdotally at least, it seemed, changes in the law and in attitudes have not come so far that gay teachers are free of the fear of persecution by uneducated parents, who conflate sexual orientation with a proclivity to abusiveness, a conflation that perniciously persists, particularly in the tabloids. So the play still speaks to the plight of closeted teachers.

Sarah Daniels herself was delightful, in the chit chat, as funny as her play. She joked about how dated she feared the play was, grateful to discover it's still topical in Chechnya. But if many of the issues in her issues play are as stiff as Monty Python's parrot, in her hilariously modest and quick witted turns of phrase, both she and her play remain very much alive.

Ha! Having seen the Royal Court Theatre production, I couldn't imagine how Wig Out could possibly work as an unstaged reading.

 Absolutely loved Wig Out - Jonjo was definitely a highlight but thought everyone bought so much joy and life to it. Definitely not your standard "reading"! The atmosphere in the room was really wonderful - I had originally not booked for this one as I wondered how on earth they would manage this play as a reading but I was so excited by the cast that I decided to chance it, so glad I did. 

Exciting to hear Sherman is in talks for a new production of Bent in London next year.

(And apologies for lowering the tone, but the silver fox who chaired the post-show should perhaps invest in underwear next time he's on stage, as I'm pretty sure the first few rows know his religion now.)

Great guy, not the best interviewer. His questions were unfocused and usually contained him giving his own answer first. The play was amazing though.

Well. The cast of 'Certain Young Men' was like having a delicious box of chocolates and not knowing which one to grab first.

Not sure I liked the play so much but the cast were great. Gorgeous little Jonny B was the standout for me. Plus he's got the most delicious arms which I'm pleased to say he shoehorned into a nice tight black shirt, closely followed by Oliver Chris who is an Elyot in 'Private Lives' waiting to happen. Lorne MacFadyen (more delicious arms), Billy Howle (fast to become one of our most interesting stage actors), Ben Batt and Brian Vernel were also terrific.

There was a post-show talk afterwards with Peter Gill, Peter Tatchell and Justin Myers. I don't think Peter Gill and Justin got on. 

I much preferred 'Bent'. It was such a glorious play (and so unexpectedly funny in parts) and performed perfectly. There was even a touch of unexpected nudity which certainly wasn't unwelcome. Fabulous cast, Russell Tovey (brilliant) and Papa Essiedu ("You're my wife now!") were terrific but it was stolen for me by George MacKay as Rudy. The train scene was devastating. You couldn't see anything but you saw everything. I was in bits.

It needs a revival. Preferably with this cast.

Oh and if anyone decides to cast Giles Terera as Albin in 'La Cage Aux Folles', it will be a stroke of genius. Genius I tell you!

De rien! 

Even Peter Gill admitted he cast the reading of 'Certain Young Men' so that the gays would have something nice to look at! Not sure I agreed with much else he went on about to be honest (neither did Justin Myers by the looks of things) but that bit was rather amusing.

Damn! I just knew the Bent reading was going to be amazing. Wish I'd seen it.

Well. For such an old play 'The Drag' has some really rather modern moments. It's a bit Noel Coward with a big dose of Mae West sass. It could have done with a bit more zip but they only had two days rehearsal so I'll forgive them. Some of the cast were better than others and Niamh Cusack did seem like it was the first time she'd actually read the script. She just wasn't acerbic or sassy enough for the role (Helen McCrory would have tore the role to pieces). Graham Butler, Arun-Blair Mangat and Richard Dempsey almost stole the whole thing (there's a bit of powder puff action which was hilarious) had it not been for Tom Edden who clearly comes from the Maggie Smith School of Scene Stealing. He comes on, he does his bit, he leaves trailing everyone else in his wake. His eye-rolling work was a delight. I'd also like to thank director Polly Stenham (great shoes btw) for bringing me another future ex-husband in the deliciously manspreading shape of Sacha Dhawan.

It really is hard to believe that this was written in 1927 and with a few tweaks here and there could easily manage a bit of a full scale revival.

The post-show chit-chat with Scottee and Polly Stenham was a jolly bit of fun too. It certainly made me want to read up a bit more on Mae West.