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Post by Deleted on May 31, 2017 10:45:24 GMT
So being European is 'right on'? What is this, a UKIP Conference?
Dramaturgy originated centuries ago in Germany before it was Germany as we know it, so the Free Imperial City of Hamburg is more accurate. What a dramaturg brings is another eye, a way of making sure that the director/author isn't a dictator. Something that most people will appreciate (although not the dictatorially inclined).
I imagine that if they were called a Dramatic Adviser that would be considered more acceptable in certain quarters.
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Post by Deleted on Jan 29, 2018 15:53:02 GMT
Good offer for The Captive Queen - £20 off the top three price bands with code pcd20dis. Just booked one of my favoured seats in the front row of the pit for £18.
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Post by Deleted on Feb 25, 2018 9:08:36 GMT
Saw "The Captive Queen" yesterday. Worth a visit if you like your 17th Century drama (how many other opportunities are you going to get to see "Aureng-zebe"?) but a flawed production
Seems to be a pretty straight rendition of the text. The setting is a garment factory in Yorkshire in (I think) the 70s - this makes absolutely no sense whatsoever and the production makes no use of the setting except at a couple of points. So you get a very detailed set of the factory, everyone dressed as garment factory workers, but they are all threatening to kill each other, invade the city, capture queens, etc. Would possibly have worked if there was a framing device like the Donmar Shakespeare Trilogy, ie the conceit is that the characters in the garment factory are putting on the play. But this didn't seem to be the case. Or if it was the case, it wasn't clear at all.
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Post by martin1965 on Feb 25, 2018 9:30:19 GMT
Wanted to see this when announced, it is a rare outing. However the combination of Barrie Rutter, the ridiculous updating and transport shenanigans put me off. From the reviews im glad. Doesnt sound like you bought a programme Mr X?
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Post by Deleted on Feb 25, 2018 9:54:15 GMT
No, didn't buy a programme, which might have clarified the setting, but you shouldn't need the programme to do that!
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Post by oxfordsimon on Feb 25, 2018 10:26:10 GMT
It doesn't sound like you got to see Aureng-zebe anyway.
Rutter - why does he keep casting himself? Yes, I get that Northern Broadsides is his baby. But casting himself in near enough everything he directs is not great. I am never a fan of directors who appear in their own work - it makes it almost impossible for them to judge the production as a whole when they are at the heart of it.
But with Rutter, I fear that it is his ego that gets in the way. Having interviewed him once, I was left with an overwhelming sense of his own self-importance.
I think the idea behind Northern Broadsides is fantastic - and, in some ways, can bring us closer to the voices of Shakespeare's own time. But Rutter doesn't always get things right.
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Post by Jan on Feb 25, 2018 13:30:44 GMT
It doesn't sound like you got to see Aureng-zebe anyway. Rutter - why does he keep casting himself? Yes, I get that Northern Broadsides is his baby. But casting himself in near enough everything he directs is not great. I am never a fan of directors who appear in their own work - it makes it almost impossible for them to judge the production as a whole when they are at the heart of it. But with Rutter, I fear that it is his ego that gets in the way. Having interviewed him once, I was left with an overwhelming sense of his own self-importance. I think the idea behind Northern Broadsides is fantastic - and, in some ways, can bring us closer to the voices of Shakespeare's own time. But Rutter doesn't always get things right. He keeps casting himself because he isn’t a good enough director to realise he isn’t a very good actor. |
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Post by martin1965 on Feb 25, 2018 14:25:14 GMT
He was an underwhelming Lear couple of years ago, though he didnt direct.
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Post by Steve on Feb 27, 2018 18:16:52 GMT
Seems to be a pretty straight rendition of the text. The setting is a garment factory in Yorkshire in (I think) the 70s - this makes absolutely no sense whatsoever Agreed. The setting is completely ignored, the text is presented straight. The explanation, one assumes, is that Rutter realised that casting himself as Shahjahan, the Mughal emperor who built the Taj Mahal, might expose him to criticism, whereas playing a white boss, of mostly BAME employees, would be uncontroversial. And it's almost impossible to begrudge Rutter his wily historical juggling act, as he does in fact succeed in staging a show that hasn't been seen in hundreds of years, and in so doing, he has created a slew of good parts for BAME actors. His own part doesn't really amount to much, nor do Dryden's super-dry heroic couplets, whereby Dryden depicts absolute melodramatic carnage in such a contained way that he seems to disdain his own content. I enjoyed the performers who chose to smash through Dryden's civil couplets with weird and aggressive line readings, negating his rather pompous refinement. I also enjoyed the musicians, who seemed determined to wail laments and drums through every prim line reading. In the plot, a Mughal Helen of Troy (Neerja Naik's Indamora) fends off unwanted advances from three men, while a Cougar Cleopatra (Angela Griffin's Nourmahal) tries to steal the one man (Naeem Hayat's Aurangzeb) she does want from under her nose. It's all quite lurid and hilarious, and Angela Griffin knows that, and gleefully cougar carves up Dryden's poetry like Madonna auditioning a new male dancer. Just as good, Dharmesh Patel infuses himself with decadent aggression at every turn, whereas Naeem Hayat conjures up a deeply felt tender poetic rawness that resists Dryden's stylistic formalism. The actors and musicians at war with the play were the best at playing at war. I thought there was great fun to be had here, but I don't think the play deserves another run for another few hundred years. 3 stars  |
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