Review. News Play by Madeleine Brown @ Toronto Fringe

From the team that brought us the 2018 hit Everyone Wants a T-Shirt, News Play is a fun and stylized allegory about the perils of using others for our own advantage. The cast are all wonderfully smart and funny, and director Aaron Jan does a great job creating a made-up space that hearkens to the children’s books the two protagonists write.

The show got a lot of laughs from the late night audience, but I can’t say that I found the writing to be as insightful and snappy as Brown’s previous work. It isn’t bad, per say, it just felt a little more broad than the past work I’ve seen, like it could use tightening up of the ideas.

Review. Lexi & the Flying b's by Joan Jamieson @ Toronto Fringe

Bird Brain Productions bring Joan Jamieson’s sweet young audiences script to sparkling life at the George Ignatieff Kids' Fringe Venue. Focused on a young girl, Lexi, and her struggle with dyslexia, it weaves a warm story of overcoming adversity and helping others. The three actors are delightful in their work, striking just the right energy level to keep the young audiences engaged. When the big reveal of Lexi’s success approaches, one young audience member said aloud “this is going to be awesome”. And it was.

The production integrated images and video in an interesting (if slightly inconsistent) way, and I didn’t always feel the shifts in time/place were sufficiently clear. That said, the actors shone through.

Absolutely perfect for the 5-10 year old audience.

Review. The Brothers Size by Tarell Alvin McCraney @ Soulpepper

There is nothing more satisfying than watching a production that so perfectly understands the text, that just lets the words be in the space, and uses smart and simple choices to elevate that language to a powerful experience for the audience. Mumbi Tindyebwa Otu is masterful in her direction of Mazin Elsadig, Daren A. Herbert, and Marcel Stewart in The Brothers Size at Soulpepper. The play is filled with oppositions; strength and vulnerability, loudness and extreme quiet, public and private…all of which contribute to this deep interrogation of what masculinity means, and more specifically, what black masculinity is. Every aspect of this production, from the gorgeous choreography to the near-perfect use of music (performed live by the amazing Kobèna Aquaa-Harrison) and sound manipulation that seamlessly moves us from the real into the hyper-real dreams of the characters, to the simplicity with which each actor approaches their most heightened moments, builds into this interrogation.

The tension builds and releases so beautifully, that when we reach the final moments, you can collectively feel the audience leaning in, terrified to know the choice that will be made, the fate that we know is inevitable (like Anouilh’s spring, it is wound up tight, and the results of that release are beyond anyone’s control).

Please, please, see this production. It is beautifully constructed and utterly crushing in all the best ways.

Review. Inner Elder by Michelle Thrush @ Nightwood & Native Earth

My cheeks hurt. Michelle Thrush shares her beautiful, sad, funny, wonderful personal story in a lovely, winding way. While there are moments of tension, and beats of the story that hearken back to one another, it would be challenging to describe it as “dramatic” in the usual sense of the word…and that’s all for the better. Thrush shows us women of many ages and experiences, from the plucky young girl who “raises” her parents, to the hilarious elder who leads a dance party. Each character is unique physically and it is pure delight to watch Thrush transform from one character to the next. The script was filled with pop culture references spanning a lifetime, with a distinct commentary on the bodies we see and hear from, and whose stories are typically told.

The staging used the space beautifully, similarly transforming seamlessly to create multiple spaces.

Honestly, I don’t even know what else to say. It was just wonderful. Go see it.

review. The Chemical Valley Project - Broadleaf Theatre @ Theatre Passe Muraille

This is a late-arriving blog post, with my regrets. I caught a Saturday matinee of The Chemical Valley Project the other week; I was immediately intrigued by the welcoming nature of the space, with the lead actor speaking to each audience member as they entered, and inviting them on to the performance space to look at additional photos from the research on the project. If one had come to the show without a lot of context (as my two friends had) this would have been a touch confusing, but also intriguing. Certainly, though, it set a really great tone for the afternoon and the information and experience we were about to share.

The play focuses on the research journey of one actor/creator as he explored information relating to The Chemical Valley in the Sarnia region, and particularly in reference to two first nations people who supported and guided his journey. The script held a lot of information, which could very well have been overwhelming, however on the whole it was not. The staging and use of video to hear the actual voices of the indigenous guides was unique, and useful in terms of ensuring that it wasn’t someone else appropriating their story and experience. All of that said, for me the script & production felt a bit disjointed; almost like there were too many topics, as the manner in which they were organized left me feeling like there were a lot of starting points that weren’t always clearly connected to one another. What was the story this was ultimately trying to tell?

That isn’t to say I didn’t enjoy it; the visual aspects were really beautiful and the use of the space was inventive. My bigger qualm was with the style of the performance - after setting up a beautiful, relaxed, non-performative style in the pre-show, the performance itself felt forced and ultimately did a disservice to the material, for me. I simply wanted the actor to exist in the space, with the aid of some clever staging (seriously, the use of scale was magnificent), to share this journey with me. It didn’t need anything else.

All that said, I definitely recommend seeing it if it has a re-mount.

review. The Shimmering Verge by Molly Peacock

I always like the adventure of finding a show at a place I am not familiar with. You open the door, and immediately are immersed in a new world. Director Karthy Chin creates a warm and enveloping space, with interesting positioning and intrigue in the objects, where we first are greeted with a poetry reading. Each night features a reading from a different local poet, which made for a unique positioning of the play that follows. It may, in part, have been due to the skill and engagement of the reader (I saw the divine Anne Michaels) but the reading, with the words just falling through the air, without accoutrement was thrilling and emotional.

The play itself was performed with dexterity by Madeleine Brown, in that delightful set, and accompanied by sound design from electronic musician Laura Dickens. For me, although the script was interesting and the performance highly enjoyable, the production felt crowded. While I enjoyed the light elements and sound elements, at times it felt like there were too many things going on at once that it stifled the air for the poetry to breathe on its own. Heightened text is always a challenge, and for my taste, I prefer to give it more space. That said, it was an engaging production, and highly enjoyable to take in. I definitely recommend checking out this ambitious work by a young company for the quality of the work and performance. They have 4 more shows between April 11 and April 13.

review. Hamlet - Theatre WhyNot @ Canadian Stage Company

Ravi Jain’s re-imagined production of Hamlet was most recently in Toronto at Canadian Stage Company as part of the 2019 remount that is touring Canada,. I missed the 2018 production, so am not certain how the move to the high ceiling, raw space of the Berkeley Street Theatre informed the show, however I did find that for the most part, the production seemed “at home” in this space, making use of unconventional entrances and highlighting the gorgeous exposed brick.

For me, the production was strongest in the moments when it employed ASL, with Horatio speaking entirely in ASL, and characters, notably Hamlet, communicating at times using ASL as well. The dramaturgical choices of when to have sound, and when to have silent language only were highly informed — they highlighted Hamlet’s struggle to be understood, and that Horatio was the only person truly listening and engaging with Hamlet, while everyone else writes Hamlet off as childish.

I have thought for some time about the value of swapping gender roles in this script. Given the role mental illness plays in the relationships to the characters, and the difference in the way Hamlet is managed (“buck up” and “get over it” so to speak) versus Ophelia, who is pitied and mourned, there is much to learn from swapping the genders. That said, this production opted to make Hamlet played by a female, but otherwise quite androgynous, while Ophelia’s movements and gestures were quite stereotypically feminine. I wonder whether different choices may have opened up more about these two characters.

Other parts of the production felt uneven in the performance; everything to look at was beautiful, including the detailed choreography and pictures on the stage, however the spoken text was not uniform…some actors shouted too much while others mumbled too much. In a production where the language (verbal or otherwise) is the main focal point, this was challenging for me. I struggled to reconcile how it may have been a specific choice, but have been unable to do so.

That said, Karen Robinson (Gertrude) and Barbara Gordon (Polonius) in particular were SUBLIME. There was a moment where I had managed to forget Polonius dies so early in the play, and then was deeply saddened that Gordon’s time on the stage was going to be cut short. Such was the strength of her performance!

What i found really interesting was the similarity of images to other productions of Hamlet I’ve seen, notably Ostermeier’s Schaubühne production from a few years back — from the piles of mud, to the audience reflection (mirrors here, video screens for Ostermeier), to the graphic depiction of sexual acts and the relationship between Gertrude and Claudius. It was a stunning reminder of the images and questions that exist deep within the play, and our larger cultural relationship to these characters and this story...and a humbling reminder to me that as a director, any new idea you think of is probably not new.

This is, in many ways, some of the most exciting Shakespeare I’ve seen in Canada. While I have some quibbles, this is of course in reference to the work I’ve seen and the (rather absurd) amount of time I spend thinking about these things. In no way does that detract from the overall excellent quality of the interpretation and production as a whole.

review. Top Girls by Caryl Churchill @ Alumnae Theatre

Full disclosure, I was offered a comp to this show by the luminescent Lisa Lenihan who played Isabella Bird / Mrs Kidd.

I remember the first time I read Top Girls. Admittedly, at that point I had not read many plays that weren’t Shakespeare or a musical, so something that played with form and reality and lucidity so actively was a shock to my system. In fact, if I am totally honest, I seem to recall not really liking it. Mostly because on the surface, I just didn’t GET it. University being what it is, I had to keep reading and thinking and working on it and as I dove into unearthing just what the heck was going on in this play, the more it grew on me and I came to recognize the images in the play as manifestations of things I had felt or experienced.

The Alumnae production began with some interesting directorial choices. Doors that had cut outs of powerful female shapes in the design, which were re-built into various set pieces; showing women as the literal building blocks of this world, but passively so. A young female dancer moving through the space off the top, and also between scenes provided lovely imagery, but it did feel peripheral to the storytelling for me.

The performances were at times strong, but at times it felt uneven…one of the challenging aspects of Churchill’s text is the overlap of talking. How does one achieve this feeling of natural female conversation, but without having the actors competing and shouty at one another? For a director this is a huge challenge, and one that only at times was conquered in this production.

The overall interpretation of the play felt quite literal, which is likely the source of the challenges I felt the production faced. Each actor did well enough with the work, it just failed to come together as a cohesive whole for me.

review. What I Call Her by Ellie Moon @ Crow's Theatre

Full Disclosure: I saw this show in the first preview, so aspects of the performances and staging may have changed since I saw it.

Ellie Moon follows up her verbatim play from 2017 Asking For It stepping out of the #metoo and Ghomeshi moment, and into a complex story of a family dealing with their history. The play centres on two sisters and their dying mother who we never see, navigating their relationships with one another, with her, and with the men in their lives. The only man we see is Kate (the older sister’s) boyfriend, though we also hear about their father, and their mom’s new husband.

I felt as though the first part of the play, setting up the relationship between Kate and Kyle, was sluggish and lacking in urgency. It lasted an extraordinarily long time and felt like it was trying to fit too many ideas in (I won’t give spoilers here…). It is when Kate’s sister, Ruby, arrives uninvited, that the play begins to sing. In my opinion, it could do with dramaturgical work that helps it cut to the chase sooner, because the complex tension between the sisters is what gets really interesting to watch, how their behaviour to one another and in the presence of one another is so clearly different than it is with others. Ellie Elwand sparkles with fiery intensity, and Michael Ayres is extremely likeable as the boyfriend stuck in the middle of the sibling hellstorm.

Director Sarah Kitz does well helping the actors navigate the density of the material and creating some nice relationships. The choice to use a thrust setup didn’t quite work for me; I could sense what she was going for…a voyeuristic sense that the walls have just fallen off this apartment, but with audience on 3 sides (though predominantly on 2) the actors had to serve too many angles, causing the blocking to come off as stilted. I think it could have benefitted instead from an alley, perhaps, giving the actors more freedom.

Overall I think there is a seed of an extremely interesting play in here, and I hope it will be uncovered through further development of the script.

review. The Assembly: Episode 1 @ Crow's Theatre & Porte Parole

The Crow’s Theatre and Porte Parole have come together again for a new piece of politically charged verbatim theatre, The Assembly. The premise is to take 4 people with opposing viewpoints and experiences, who on the internet would rage at one another, bring them into a room and have them discuss some of the most polarizing subjects of our day. Being verbatim theatre, this is then edited, spliced, and sewn together into a narrative. I’m speaking vaguely in the below, to avoid spoilers for anyone who might see it in the coming days (it runs to Nov 3)

Among verbatim pieces, I feel this works quite well; the premise and the conversations themselves facilitate the editing, which I often find so problematic in this sort of writing. The style, snapping through different times, rewinding at times, is like a live on stage manifestation of scrolling through your Facebook news feed.

The actors shared polished performances, and director Chris Abraham’s choices to juxtapose the hyper-real with the non-naturalistic (at times) movement helped amplify this feeling of a disjointed digital world. The use of cameras to zoom in or out underlined, at times, the responses (or lack thereof) of the other 3 participants. One touch I really enjoyed was that the curtains were open to the street on some windows, so when we heard a bus or truck drive by (impossible to avoid in this space), we could also see them not only in the changing light, but also in the camera picking them up behind actors….an ever-present reminder of the real world that this play is situated in.

All of that said, I couldn’t help but wonder about what was missing; there was only one person of colour represented (the character Hope), which meant that during in-depth discussions of “Muslim immigration”, the voice of Muslims in North America was starkly absent. Similarly, there was no reference to indigenous issues (notably, there was no land acknowledgement in advance of the show) and although positioned with Canadians, the discussion was highly US-Centric (perhaps a bit tellingly truthful of our own lives and thoughts). But most importantly, I worry that despite efforts to remind us that theatre does not exist in a vaccuum (through the open window, etc) the play, at least in the audience I saw it with, did actually; the audience felt inherently against the Alt-Right character Valerie, laughing at her responses in a manner that they did not laugh at other characters. I think that efforts to show Valerie and Shayne (the self-identifying queer, Jewish, anarchist) as foils to one another fell down in the presence of an audience who (based on their responses at least) seemed quite liberal. I would love to see this play amongst an audience who wouldn’t normally see this kind of play; people like Valerie, or even James, who as the other conservative character gets lots in the scuffle between Valerie and Shayne.

A lot to keep thinking about here, for sure, and in many ways some of the most effective use of verbatim theatre I have seen…however if we keep telling these stories into an echo chamber, are we really changing anything?

review. Bikeface @ Toronto Fringe Best of Fringe

I saw this quite some time ago, and it has taken me some time to sit down and write about it. Playwright Natalie Frija weaves an intriguing tale of adventure and feminism, drawing parallels between turn-of-the-twentieth century anti-cycling messages and contemporary experiences of female cyclists. I think that the script is definitely a niche; if you never cycle, you might miss pieces of the story, and definitely jokes. Overall, however, a strong feminist message stands out, as she highlights the differences in how we position adventure to young boys versus young girls.

Director Mandy Roveda handles the staging challenges well. How do you block a show that primarily takes place on a bike?! She does a great job managing a relatively stationary stage setup, using additional spaces well to create the many locations we visit. Performer Clare Blackwood is engaging, and really makes the material sing.

Overall, I think that dramaturgically this could have had a few edits to tighten up the message while simultaneously making it a little less didactic. That said, it is a great fringe show, and one I hope gets to some more audiences.

review. Women of the Fur Trade @ Toronto Fringe

I preface these thoughts with an apology for the extreme delay in getting them posted.....I had to bolt out of town the next morning and haven't really stopped since. 

Frances Koncan's new play, Women of the Fur Trade, was shared in an early-ish form as part of Toronto Fringe, ahead of what I understand to be a subsequent full length version coming to Native Earth. The simplicity of the fringe production was enjoyable; 3 rocking chairs, 3 action figures, and a simple bunting of envelopes clipped to a string created a space for the 3 women to interact, allowing their similarities to shine, while their differing circumstances became increasingly apparent. 

What I loved about the script was the anachronism, with contemporary pop culture references interwoven with historical fact and circumstance. By positioning the 3 women in between history, it served to illustrate their absence from recorded history and the decisions that affect their lives historically, and through to today. By objectifying the male characters both intellectually, and literally with the use of the 3 action figures, the women begin to regain some power. 

The 3 performers (Liz Whitbread, Haley Vincent, and Joelle Peters) were delightful in their performances, clearly distinguishing the hierarchical relationship amongst the women. The pacing could have been tighter and more dynamic to provide a sense of movement in the piece, which grew a bit stationary at times (both verbally and physically). 

I'm very intrigued to see the full production, and can't wait to bring my Louis Riel obsessed Manitoba-born daughter. It seems the perfect vehicle and context for young women to relate to and learn about a historical event which still affects us today. 

review. Everyone Wants a T-Shirt by Madeleine Brown @ Toronto Fringe

This smart, funny, and unpretentious comedy about the perils of chasing success is just what we need. The 4 performers deftly navigate a multitude of unique characters in space and time, aided by some smart choreography in the direction. This is a world sort of like our own, but stretched from reality, and all aspects of the production are smartly guided to this logical imperative by director Aaron Jan. 

The pace is spot on, and the play carries a message without being preachy. Kudos to this young team for fine work! The production is perfectly fringe-y. 

review. The Mating Game by Dennie Theodore @ Toronto Fringe

I'll be honest; I am not the intended audience for this show, as a millennial in a long-term (15+ year) relationship, dating, new relationships, and middle age are foreign to me. Dennie Theodore's The Mating Game is an exploration of returning to and navigating the "dating scene" after some time away. This two-hander is well performed by Luc Nogna and Nawa Nicole Simon (who is utterly charming) however the material and the staging leave something to be desired. 

There are a few scenes that are directed clunkily with slow changes in space, and a stilted attempt at a few intervals for audience participation. Each actor plays a plethora of roles, but it is challenging to glean a perspective on any of them. There are some bizarre lighting choices (including one scene where one actor is in the dark for almost the entire scene...) and some awkward voice overs, all of which combines to make it difficult to connect to the characters and material. 

The idea is great, but I think more a fruitful and engaging script could come from mining the material we just got to at the end of the play. 

review. Wagon Play by Ben Hayward and Owen Fawcett @ Toronto Fringe

Toronto company Theatre By Committee bring us a delightfully fun piece about the celebrity and following along with their participatory piece, Wagon Play. From the second the gate opens, the audience are invited to engage with the performers, setting the tone for the remainder of the hours. The gentle setup serves well to help the performers gauge participation, and also to allow the audience their own pace to engage with the piece. Smart, silly, and irreverent, the performers are engaged 115%, with surprising staging choices, and a shocking attention to detail (kudos to the designer!!). The team don't fall victim to the pitfalls I see in a lot of immersive or participatory performance. 

I don't want to say too much, as Amber says it is best if you can experience a re-setting on your own, as you learn to live your truth.

Suffice it to say this is probably the most fun, and the most re-set you will feel after a Toronto Fringe performance!

review. RAGE AGAINST The Complacent by Daniel Bagg @ Toronto Fringe

RAGE AGAINST The Complacent presents an allegorical story of young and idealistic journalism students who attempt to fight against "the complacent" mainstream junk-food media a la Buzzfeed and BlogTO. Staged on a blank space, with a lot of mime and chorus-like speaking from the 5 performers, the characters speak at length about how they want to change things, while their actions rarely go further than some internet-activism. 

The didactic script is not helped along by the style of direction, which despite some strong individual performances from the actors, lacks a cohesiveness in its vision and rather than showing unity among the characters, comes across as half-baked. The ideas aren't new or exciting, nor is the staging, yet it is all presented to us as if it were. 

It isn't all for nought; the young performers are earnest and engaging, but they are failed by the weak material and poor direction. I hope to have the chance to see them in something else down the road. 

review. The Grass is Greenest at the Houston Astrodome by Michael Ross Albert @ Toronto Fringe

Toronto Playwright Michael Ross Albert's first Toronto production of his acclaimed play hits some great notes. Staged in a gallery, surrounded by smashed artwork, the production immerses the audience in the world of the play immediately. Starting the dialogue snappily, we are brought along on the journey of these friends and their tumultuous relationship filled with pride, envy, and a bit of spitfire. The snappy dialogue and searing pace set up for a great release as the major dramatic crux is revealed, allowing the characters to spin out as they reel from this information.

The performances were strong at moments, but also at times felt rushed; there was a sense of uneven direction which was to the detriment of our engagement with the story as some text was glossed over. Each performer alternately had fantastic moments, and weaker ones, which was a touch frustrating. Nonetheless, the performers got some great laughs out of the audience, and we felt a distinct voice from each. 

Found spaces can be a challenge, and I felt the direction used the space well, although there were some lighting choices toward the end which limited the full engagement with the space and the choice of staging it in such a manner. 

This has been a hot ticket already, and with good reason; definitely worth grabbing an advance ticket for the small space!

review. Burning Doors - Belarus Free Theatre @ Luminato Festival

In case you forgot, there is a war going on. A war not only of annexation of Crimea by Russia, which Ukrainians are resisting, but also a war against the artists and others who protest the Russian annexation as well as the totalitarian measures enacted within Russia on their people. 

Belarus Free Theatre make their Luminato (and I believe Canadian) debut with a piece of theatre centred as many of their pieces are around the imprisonment of artists under current totalitarian regimes. Unlike some of their other work, however, the stories told in this piece not only come from artists like Pussy Riot's Maria Alyokhina who is now free (and joins the company in the creation and performance) but also in artists still sitting in Russian prisons, like Ukrainian filmmaker Oleg Sentsov. 

The work is urgent. Using their language of extreme physical exertion, the company are led by artistic Director Natalia Kaliada and Nikolai Khalezin in the creation of a performance that is demanding. One that doesn't allow the audience to sit back and watch, but requires them to endure, much like Sentsov continues to as he endures day 37 of his hunger strike. What I always find striking in their work is the inclusion of humour. Dark and biting, their portrayal of the Russian yes-men as selfish and idiotic, while completely flippant about the lives of others is the perfect counterpoint to the extreme images of physical abuse and torture we see elsewhere in the production. Images of bodies dangling from circus ropes, or thrust out into the audience unsettle and inquire. Repetition of gesture defamiliarizes, seducing us into seeing the actors as just bodies, then jarring us into remembrance that these are real, living, breathing people. 

For many, the work is too extreme. The actors work like athletes, and have the physiques to show it. Hurling themselves through space, lifting and carrying one another. What's amazing is to see the reactions of a North American audience to this kind of dangerous physical work. While this tradition is far more common in Eastern Europe in the tradition of Grotowski and Barba, in North America this is foreign. 

Their work is not for everyone. It is difficult to watch, and causes some to shut off. I believe, however that it is this intentional polarization that makes the work so evocative. They don't just politely ask us to act, they require it. 

If you haven't seen their work, you should. But prepare. This is not easy watching, no matter how prepared you think you are. 

For more on Oleg Sentsov and the campaign to free him, visit the joint statement issued by Luminato and TIFF earlier this month. 

review. The Fever @ Luminato Festival

The Fever is a participatory performance created by New York artists 600 Highwaymen. It is based in storytelling and choreography, and posits the question of our relationship to other people, and our willingness to be there if someone needs help. Right off the top, the show demands participation. The actors are embedded in the audience, and begin a choreographed movement. There is no explicit instruction to participate, however those not participating face an encouraging look from one of the creators. This subsides when they concede and participate. 

From here, audience members are asked to join in participation in various physical activities. From as simple as raising a hand, to chasing an actor around the space, all in service of the story of connection and community that is unfolding. There are certainly some beautiful images and thoughts posed throughout this; do our feelings change when it is an older man lying on the ground versus a younger man? Are we willing to jump up and help when invited? And what happens when a large group of people participate in a physical movement, together, uncertain but together. 

What was problematic for me, however, was twofold. First, while the performers (in a subsequent Q&A) indicated that audience members were not required to comply, that dissent or refusal was something that there was "space for" in the work, there was no explicit indication of this. So when you place a group of people in the setting of a theatrical performance, looking at one another, and ask someone to do something, there are social obligations and expectations at play, to "not ruin it for everyone else". Without the actor who initiates the physical participation indicating verbally that it is okay if someone doesn't want to, there is an unspoken pressure to do so. It would take immense strength and bravery for an audience member to come out and deny participation when the space for this has not been made explicit. 

Second, the implication of this group participation, of this necessarily being swept up so as to not "ruin it" is a dangerous parallel to our own society, where people refrain from voicing concern at upsetting statements or dangerous beliefs for fear of "getting too political" or causing a scene. Without the expression of consent, I continued to hope that they would flip this on its ear, and show the audience something about the dangers of playing along blindly. But they did not.

It was an interesting concept and experience, but problematic for me, and easily fixable. We have a responsibility to ensure there is clarity of the rules of a space in immersive and participatory performance, otherwise we risk alienating when the goal of that work is to unite and engage. 

review. Angels in America (Millennium Approaches & Perestroika) @ Neil Simon Theatre (Broadway)

This play is gigantic. Both in terms of action on the stage, story, and the ideas contained within. In many ways it is difficult to imagine a production that could accurately capture the scope, the sheer scale of this play. 

Beginning with Part 1: Millennium Approaches, Marianne Elliot creates a world that is fast-paced, urgent, and disconnected. Rooms appear and disappear on three revolves, wherein actors run in and out, appearing in new spaces. Neon lights gleam and cut the edges of the darkness to create clear definitions of where people do and don't belong. This is a world that it is difficult to keep up with, where news and pain are revealed, fought against, and denied in favour of continuous movement. If I don't stop it won't catch me. Of the two, I find Part 1 the weaker play, mainly because it sticks to a more traditional form for the majority of the play. Elliot does a wonderful job creating engagement and anticipation, while also helping the audience to become accustomed to the more esoteric events, such as Harper's arctic adventure, ultimately preparing us for the Angel's arrival. 

This cast are astounding. For me, Denise Gough (Harper) and James McArdle (Louis) are the stand outs, purely because their characters are so east to become flat and one-note. We all know the beautiful arc of Pryor (a devastating Andrew Garfield) and Roy Cohn's toxic energy (played with sheer bile by Nathan Lane) but for me it is their foils who leave the greatest opportunity for an actor to show their true technique. 

The audience, I think, in part didn't know what they were there for. Which is both fantastic (what a play to encounter by accident!) but also annoying; they applauded at Lane's first entrance, and also at Garfield's. It was interesting, however, to sit among a crowd for whom this story was still unfamiliar. There were moments of humour I hadn't previously thought of, which made the moments of sadness all the richer. 

Being of sound mind and not too interested in paying to spend 9 hours consecutively in a theatre, I returned the following day for Part 2: Perestroika. Our spinning world has simplified somewhat, with the walls falling away. Rooms are now signified by a neon frame, or simply a door, and perhaps a piece of furniture. The breath of the Angel is everywhere in part 2, which Elliot realizes through the use of actors who function as puppeteers to the Angel and her wings, but also manipulators of space and time. They aren't hidden; we see them creep in to move objects, witness choreographed movement of set pieces and actors through the space. This all comes together to have an effect of normalcy; somehow the world is functioning better when the angels are there and in charge. It is less confusing. 

The sheer magic of Elliot's staging creates moments of beautiful theatricality. This is a production that doesn't pretend to be anything but theatre at its least naturalistic. It moves and swells physically, audibly, and emotionally to sweep the audience along in the logic of this world. 

It was interesting to think about how the play worked in the space of the Neil Simon, a traditional proscenium space, when this production was conceived for the Lyttleton at NT London, which is a considerably more open space. The lighting did a lot to envelop the audience, but I feel that in the original space it was probably even more effective.