The House Archives -

December 4, 2018February 27, 2019

BREVIEW: Katie Melua @ Symphony Hall 30.11.18

Words by Ed King / Pics from Symphony Hall by Dave Cox – courtesy of the Express & Star. Pics from Bournemouth Pavilion Theatre by Allan Jones – courtesy of Republic Media

So, I have this thing about honesty. It’s a rule and a burden. Yet it’s also a freedom, if you can understand why. One that keeps us in bed with the truth and one that’s behind anything I put into the public domain. I also have this thing about framing techniques.

Katie Melua is in Birmingham tonight, stopping of on her European tour to play to a sold out Symphony Hall crowd (no mean feat) with a set that promises tracks from her latest album, In Winter – joined live on stage by the Gori Women’s Choir, who were a home grown backbone to her 2016 release. That in itself carries a high expectation; the Gori Women’s Choir’s three albums are all quite powerful collections (thank you Spotify) and tonight’s marriage of a strong vocal ensemble with an acoustic lead are a tempting hook to this little fish.

But my interest has been further piqued by the lack of a Mike Batt signature anywhere on the paperwork. Locked into an arguably suffocating six album deal whilst still in her late teens, I’m curious to see a Melua set without Orinoco waiting in the wings – although I suspect there will still be a few laments about to two wheeled statistics and borderline personality disorders.

As we file slowly, languidly, into the hall, the stage is set simply for Melua and her band. Large screen backdrops host a medley of soft illustrations, pastels, and swirling patterns of light against water – eight mics, for the sixteen extra mouths that will fall in and out across the evening, stand ready and waiting stage right. We are poised for a dimple yet elegant display.

Melua’s opening number is sung solo (in what I assume to be as Georgian) and begins the evening with something seemingly untouchable, yet once embraced – as music can allow you to close your eyes and accept without shame, query or question – quite beautiful.

Her immediate follow up, ‘Plane Song’, brings in her younger brother on guitar accompaniment – layering a subtle red brick onto the Cyrillic foundations. And by the time we are halfway through ‘Nine Million Bicycles’, I am yearning for the return of a language that I don’t understand. Melua, even from this immediate dissection, offers a much firmer delivery when her performance is less obvious. To a solely English speaker, at least.

A curiously saccharine cover of ‘Just Like Heaven’ gets served up next, giving Robert Smith a sugar coating that was endearing but perhaps misjudged, before the Gori Women’s Choir return for another homage – this time to the prickly Christmas tree of Joni Mitchell’s ‘River’. Now there’s a moment when every evening finds its point, and when the words that were first delivered in 1971 – exorcising Mitchell’s broken heart – are reissued by nearly 50 years later, I can’t move my attention away from the following:

“I’m going to make a lot of money and quit this crazy scene”.

Katie Melua is a widely respected artist, with both a strong international fan base and public appearance track record. She has travelled the world and the world has travelled behind her. But I have not, with tonight being my first encounter of seeing this artist on stage. And when I’m watching a seasoned performer, walk with well rehearsed blocking around a stage set designed for a cause, planting every note with the precision of a LAMDA exam distinction, I clap with only half of my heart. No matter how surprising or wonderful the occasion has turned out to be.

But here, echoing the words of a woman who will always be remembered for brave intent and anti-establishment honesty, I want to stand in ovation and solidarity. Bill Hicks wanted his rock stars dead, and I’m not Bill Hicks (and Katie Melua is not a ‘rock star’) but the request is the same. And when it is answered, in whatever language, with whatever accompaniment, the more visceral response is quite a spectacle.

I wasn’t sure how much of this evening I’d enjoy, it had been a long day in a longer week, and when the Gori Women’s Choir sang I simply acquiesced and stopped thinking. But Katie Melua is a much more impressive artist than I had I walked into this room believing, and with all the set’s manicures, pop infused covers, and platinum achieving polish, the most glorious of moments were the ones from an older heart.

I surmise, as such: discernible talent deserves the rawest and most truthful of edges, for else what are we but obligation or ego? So let go. More. Scream if you have to, with a yawp or elocution. But give this world what you want it to see and trust in this, anyone who challenges a truthful intent is simply not worth appeasing. What’s left is heartfelt and an honest delight.

For more on Katie Melua, visit www.katiemelua.com

For more on the Gori Women’s Choir, visit www.facebook.com/GoriWomensChoir

For more from the Town & Symphony Halls, including venues details and full event programmes, visit www.thsh.co.uk

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NOT NORMAL – NOT OK is a campaign to encourage safety and respect within live music venues, and to combat the culture of sexual assault and aggression – from dance floor to dressing room.

To learn more about the NOT NORMAL – NOT OK campaign, click here. To sign up and join the NOT NORMAL – NOT OK campaign, click here.

If you have been affected by any of the issues raised in this feature – or if you want to report an act of sexual aggression, abuse, or assault – click here for information via the ‘Help & Support’ page on the NOT NORMAL – NOT OK website.

February 15, 2018February 15, 2018

BREVIEW: Brief Encounter @ REP until 17.02.18

Words by Lucy Mounfield

Heading to the Birmingham REP for Kneehigh Theatre’s Brief Encounter, I pondered what might be in store. Kneehigh always produce imaginative and lively productions, where music, dance and high theatricality have all play a large part in developing the atmosphere.

946: The Amazing Story of Adolphus Tips utilised puppetry, the carnivalesque, lindy hop, music, extensive props and costume changes to aid the story-telling, and this worked a treat: the chaotic upheaval and influx of American GIs during world war two was brought to life.

All the theatrical accouterments were used to great effect and in service of the story. However, the frenetic effects of Kneehigh productions have tended, in my opinion, to jar with romantic or serious plays. Their 2015 adaptation of Daphne Du Maurier’s romantic thriller Rebecca was a feast for the senses, but it left me a little cold.

As a fan of the book, I felt that Du Maurier’s Gothic sensibilities were flattened by the silliness and high-camp of the Charleston music and the dancing during the intervals. The shanty singing built up an eerie tension as the boat containing Rebecca’s dead body was raised from the sea, and was in service to the play, yet these moments became more frequent as the play progressed and ultimately dimmed the climatic reveal at the end. And how could comedic musicality work in an adaptation of such an emotionally sincere script as Brief Encounter?

I have been an admirer of David Lean’s cinematic masterpiece Brief Encounter (and Noël Coward’s screenplay for it) since I watched it as a child. What immediately comes to my mind for me, and probably for many people, is the image of Celia Johnson and Trevor Howard as protagonists Laura and Alec looking deeply into one another’s eyes before they depart at a train station, seemingly never to be reunited. They find each other and wish for their love to continue, but outside commitments interfere. Although they do not remain together, they forever have the experience of their romance.

So, with all this in my mind, I was a little nervous. However, it is reassuring that, as you enter the theatre, director Emma Rice has referenced the original film: the space has been re-imagined as a cinema auditorium, with a screen on stage playing clips that meld with the performance, the actors slipping in and out, sometimes watching from seats at the front. Ushers show us to our seats, adding a special nostalgic touch.

Not everything seems to fit though: a glitzy curtain is drawn across the stage with a pink gel cast onto it making it seem bawdy and cabaret-like, which seemed slightly out of place for a ‘30s cinema. On stage, musicians and singers (all members of the cast) perform witty ditties from Coward’s 1930s back catalogue whilst ushers mingle with the audience. The songs work well with the cinematic stage, balancing the serendipity of love with the reality of life.

The trope of the cinema screen is a fantastic way to situate the story of Laura (Isobel Pollen), a bored housewife. Whilst she sits with Alec (Jim Sturgeon) on the front row with the audience, her husband Fred (Dean Nolan) is on the screen asking for her to return. Laura pulls away from Alec and walks onto the stage and into the screen. This is an effective way to prefigure her encounter with Alec at the train station and foreshadows the end of the play, perfectly pitching the balance between the stylistic elements of the piece with the poignancy of her return.

This filmic technique is used less as the performance gets going; from here on, Kneehigh’s version takes the intimate world of Laura and Alec and blows it wide open to include an ensemble cast of couples, station staff and Laura’s family and friends. Their first meeting, when Alec removes some grit from Laura’s eye, is a tender moment which, for me, was slightly marred by movement from the ensemble cast behind them.

The station scenes provide comedy, whilst courting couples contrast with the intimacy of the protagonist’s stiff emotion. Beverley Russ as Beryl stands out as the naïve café waitress who is being courted by Jos Slovick’s Stanley. These characters were superbly acted, but at times they distracted from the story of Laura and Alec; each couple had a story to tell, but this resulted in them competing for attention with (and detracting from the nuanced dialog and intimacy between) the leads.

For instance, the buns that Beryl and her boss Myrtle (Lucy Thackeray) bake are used in a Carry On routine wherein Beryl teases Stanley by placing a bun on each of her breasts. At their best, though, the flamboyant station staff and travelers, through their cavorting and dancing, provide a fluid physicality that juxtaposes with Laura and Alec’s reserved body-language. It is what they both cannot say and do that makes the most powerful statements.

The scene that really hits the mark is the boat scene in which the main, couple during a romantic boat ride, fall overboard. The quiet moment sees them merely undressing their wet clothes and announce to each other their love. The ensemble cast add to the atmosphere with gently singing an almost lullaby effect. However, as the scene changes the glamourous curtain comes down and Slovick sings in a cabaret rock style, Coward’s ‘I’m Mad About the Boy’. This completely contrasts with the naturalness and beauty of the early moment and is too fast paced. When Rice gets it right Brief Encounter is fantastic but all too often she intersperses fast physical dance routines that, for me, jar with the tone of the romance.

Projection is used throughout to submerge us within the period; black and white images of trains, menus, ticket stubs, timetables, and so on, all flash past. Most effectively, in one scene, a calendar and pressure gauge from a train are used to symbolise Laura’s desperation to see Alec and the pressure that their affair creates. A further theme throughout Kneehigh‘s Brief Encounter is Laura’s childhood desire to swim in the Devon sea, with the projection often showing choppy coastal waves. The natural freedom with which the waves crash and roll against each other symbolises Laura’s desire to let go and fully embrace Alec. After she kisses him, Laura’s body contorts and bends to the shape of the sea, her eyes closed as if the power of his kiss has transported her back to her natural raw state.

The ending is particularly moving too, as Laura and Alec finally say goodbye only for Laura’s annoying friend Hermione (Rudd) to interfere. Laura, in a fit of desperation, runs off to a bridge where she contemplates throwing herself onto the train tracks until a train races past on a cloth projection and she collapses in a heap. The thunderous classical music played at the end, by Laura, perfectly matches her heartbreak and suggests that forever she will play music to remember Alec.

The world that is created is rather fantastical, yet the period detail does occasional err on the side of parody. For instance, a model train is used with a smoke machine to create the effect of a passing steam locomotive, which is effective yet comical. The raucous comedy and dance is highly entertaining, but it fails to capture the flawed middle-class sensibilities of the ‘30s and ‘40s.

If you love the style of previous Kneehigh productions, then you will love their adaptation of Brief Encounter, and overall it is a wondrous love story. But as an adaptation of the cinematic classic, for me, it falls a little too far from the mark.

Brief Encounter runs at the Birmingham REP until Saturday 17^th February. For direct show information – including all performance times, venue details and online ticket sales, visit www.birmingham-rep.co.uk/whats-on/brief-encounter

For more from Kneehigh Theatre, visit www.kneehigh.co.uk

For more from the Birmingham REP, including full event listings and online ticket sales, visit www.birmingham-rep.co.uk

February 2, 2018

BPREVIEW: Brief Encounter @ REP 02-17.02.18

Words by Lucy Mounfield

From Friday 2^ndto Saturday 17^th February, the Birmingham REP’s main stage, The House, will host Kneehigh Theatre’s adaptation of Brief Encounter – written and directed by Kneehigh’s former artistic director, Emma Rice.

Brief Encounter will present evening shows every day at 7:30pm (except Sundays), with a Saturday matinee at 2:00pm on 10^th and 17^th February.

Extra shows will included a captioned performance at 2pm on Thursday 8^th February, an audio described performance at 7:30pm on Friday 9^th February, a relaxed performance on at 2pm on Thursday 15^th February, and a BSL interpreted performance at 7:30pm on Friday 16^th February.

Tickets to Brief Encounter at REP are priced at £10-£15, dependent on the day and time of performance. For direct show information – including all performance times, venue details and online ticket sales, click here.

Originally commissioned and produced by David Pugh & Dafydd Rogers and Cineworld in 2008, opening at the Birmingham REP, Kneehigh Theatre have revived the production with a new cast for a 2018 UK tour.

Prior to debuting Brief Encounter ten years ago, Kneehigh Theatre have produced numerous theatrical adaptations such as Daphne Du Maurier’s Rebecca, Powell and Pressburger’s The Red Shoes and A Matter of Life and Death – as well as family favourites such as 946: The Amazing Story of Adolphus Tips based on Michael Morpurgo’s classic novel.

Kneehigh create ‘vigorous, popular and challenging theatre and perform with joyful anarchy’ – taking the seemingly unadaptable and making it come to life on stage with bold and charismatic touches. The Cornish theatre company has been producing shows for over 30 years, with a portfolio that has helped them build a reputation and tour circuit far beyond the ‘breath taking barns on the South Coast of Cornwall’ where they began.

Kneehigh Theatre’s Brief Encounter is adapted from Noël Coward’s screenplay for the 1945 film of the same name, which was based on Coward’s 1936 one-act play Still Life. The film, directed by David Lean, has become widely regarded as a cornerstone of British cinema and has been hailed as a romantic masterpiece by many critics.

Brief Encounter has also garnered a special place in many people’s hearts – arguably defining the society and frustrations of a wartime generation. On the eve of the second world war, Laura, a married woman with children, encounters a chance meeting at a railway station with a man called Alec. From their casual conversations the two are immediately attracted to one another, they arrange further meetings – despite the social taboos of the time – and soon fall in love.

“I’m a happily married woman. Or rather I was until a few weeks ago. This is my whole world and it’s enough, or rather it was until a few weeks ago. Your heart dances. The world seems strange and new. You want to laugh and skip and fall forever… You are in love. You are in love with the wrong person.”

With lines such as these it’s easy to see why many have fallen in love with the characters and unapologetic, ‘haunting’ romanticism of Coward’s writing – a man who was no stranger to the attention of a more clipped and unforgiving era.

Kneehigh Theatre have tackled such themes of love and desire before in their productions of Rebecca, Tristan & Yseult, and A Matter of Life and Death, marrying the light and dark elements of romance, punctuating stark realist moments with dark comic bursts of theatricality. Hopefully with her adaptation of Brief Encounter, Rice will retain the essence of Coward’s witty yet candid script whilst maintaining her signature inventive and breathtakingly bold direction.

Brief Encounter – Behind the scenes with Kneehigh Theatre

Brief Encounter runs at the Birmingham REP from Friday 2^nd to Saturday 17^th February. For direct show information – including all performance times, venue details and online ticket sales, visit www.birmingham-rep.co.uk/whats-on/brief-encounter

For more from Kneehigh Theatre, visit www.kneehigh.co.uk

For more from the Birmingham REP, including full event listings and online ticket sales, visit www.birmingham-rep.co.uk