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Music, Theatre

REVIEW ‘CABARET’ (RICHARD BURTON COMPANY) RWCMD GEMMA TREHARNE-FOOSE

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cabaret-no-heading-web
out of 5 stars (4 / 5) Very Good!

Whatever is in the water in the Royal Welsh College of music and drama, I want some of it for myself. Despite being a fan of many years of the soundtrack for the musical and Liza Minnelli’s legendary portrayal of Bowles in the film version – I hadn’t until tonight seen the full stage version of the production.

The musical tells the story of the seemingly wild and carefree days of Berlin in the 1930s and the outrageous goings on at the Kit Kat club, a place where the harshities of the rise of right wing ideology and the slow tentacles of anti-Semitism and Nazism will eventually bring the party to an end. Until then, as the fabulously quirky emcee reminds us: ‘Outside your life is disappointing….in here, life is beautiful!’

For those who are unfamiliar with the usual style of the musical, the usual depictions are famous for some of iconic choreographer Bob Fosse’s trademarks – bowler hats, canes. gloves, black clothes, wooden chairs, a smoky vintage jazz club, waistcoats, stockings and sleek buns. This production has turned the classic Cabaret on its head. It gives us 50 shades of sass. It has been dry humped by Beyonce and licked by Miley Cyrus. If as I did, you should see this show with your Mam, she may disapprove of the sexy stuff – far too many open legs and bending over perhaps. This may of course encourage you to like it even more. Corey Jones’ uninhibited performance may make your Nan or you Mam blush, but he and the cast execute Tom Jackson Greave’s choreography beautifully. I loved the freshening and brightening up of Jessica Campbell Plover’s costume design: flashes of pink bra or turquoise stockings and some strategically placed PVC bondage tape, a sweep of Adam-ant style eye make-up brought some a more modern and edgy look to the cast. The look and feel in the Richard Burton theatre was fresh and industrial – pendant lights lowering and raising up to complement the mood and pace of the songs, a cage wall which will remind you of the musical and film ‘Chicago’ and a stripped down feel rather than focussing solely on the style of the 1920s/30s.

Although the role of Sally Bowles can be a difficult one to pull off once you have seen Liza Minnelli mic drop it in the 1972 film version, Adena Cahill’s vocals are incredible and her performance of the song ‘ Maybe this time’ was blinding. Special mention also to Rosie Archer as Freulein Schneider and Dafydd Gape as Herr Schultz for their sweet portrayal of a blossoming relationship than never has an opportunity to come to fruition. The story of the play is as relevant in 2016 as it was when the play was first performed in the 60s, during a time of great civil unrest in the US. Politics and all the ugliness that comes with it is absolutely about us all, whether we realise it or not. At one point, Nazi sympathiser Ernst Luvig (played by Tom Corbishley) tells exasperated American Clifford Bradshaw (played by Jonathan Radford): “Enough politics…what does it matter anyway?”. Sally poo-poos Clifford and encourages him run an errand for the Nazis, as it’s ‘nothing to do with them anyway’. The friends and associates we think we know…we actually don’t. But life is a Cabaret and the show goes on, eventually. As Fraulein Schneider tells Cliff about all the hardships she previously encountered: ‘I survived’. It’s a message worth remembering this last week, especially.

I doff my bowler hat and wave my jazz hands excitedly in the direction of the Royal Welsh College. The show was a little bit saucy and a little bit rude…and I for one found it bloody ‘wunderbar’.

Type of show: Theatre
Title: Cabaret
Venue: Royal Welsh College of Music and Drama
Dates: 22-30 June
Director: Paul Kerryson
Music: John Kander
Lyrics: Fred Ebb
Musical Director: Nathan Jones
Choreographer: Tom Jackson Greaves
Set Designer: Tina Torbey
Lighting Designer: Becky Heslop
Costume Designer: Jessica Campbell Plover

Dance

Review Alternative Routes NDCW by Helen Joy

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out of 5 stars (4 / 5)

Dance. In a space I didn’t know existed. I am not proud of this fact. I am not proud that I know embarrassingly little about dance too.

We are met at the door by Paul Kaynes and his team and they welcome us with huge smiles and enthusiasm. Everyone chats and enjoys the view over Cardiff Bay from the rooftop of this marvellous building. We are given an introduction to the evening and invited in to the auditorium.

The seats are packed with colour and youth. I become slightly obsessed with wanting to swap this audience with that grey-haired one at the Cathedral earlier in the week. And as the evening progresses, I want to do this more and more. I want the opera lovers to be here, with me, sharing this beautiful experience. Oh to pull it all together somehow!

I confess, I don’t read programmes before I see something. I don’t want to be influenced. I want it to speak to me and me alone. This is about Voice, after all.

It begins with a woman and a man dancing to what feels like Eighties rave music with strobes and UV and hoops and planets and they tell a little love story through dance and gymnastics and ballet and they are so beautiful, just so beautiful. Luminously lovely. And I want to be Degas – I want to capture their shapes somehow. It is not enough to watch them.

Darkness. A spotlight. A man dances through a series of emotions and I feel I am watching his collapse into sadness. He makes me think of the loneliness of communication – the struggle to be understood. It is a deeply moving performance. I am relieved when finally he stands in the centre of the light.

A woman prowls onto the stage. She talks to us through her movements and I am desperate to interpret them. The music is sweeping and classical and it is all very pretty and acceptable and then it changes in a moment, it swells to panther proportions and I am watching a wild animal and the movements become the language of the wolf. Her body is not her own – she is absorbed in her passions and she is perfect in her credibility.

And then we break.

And I sit with Daniella. A student of dance. She looks me straight in the eye and tells me how wonderful it all is, how all she has ever done is dance, she has danced since she was a little child, it is who she is. She is enraptured by the second piece but she has loved it all. In her face I see that the gift of dance is a good one. There is such power in using dance to communicate – no-one else’s story, just your own; no tool as messenger, just your thoughts sent out there through your body.

It feels so loose, so uncontrolled, so unrepeatable. What an ability these people have and what a task to choreograph and to make it seem so easy every time!

We are asked to stand around the stage. It is a big space but we are shoulder to shoulder forming a square around a Crossword of 4 dancers. Each performs within a square, a battenburg cake of dance. Singly, together, this is an argument, a joke, a party, a series of opinions agreeing and clashing. I want to see it from above, see the patterns they make. It is gorgeous to watch and to be so close. I can see that I am not alone in wanting to join in – we all want to be part of it, to be understood.

We return to our seats. What now? Well. We get more cake, we get Nigella. We get a menopausal woman breaking the bonds of housewifery – as well as a few eggs! It is quite the most unusual performance I have ever seen and it is brilliant. I laugh! It is me!

I chat to others as we leave – what did you think of that last one? Oh yes, I do that – well, I want to do that…

I have loved it. Every minute of it. It has been challenging, beautiful, sad and funny. A novel in dance. And I still want to swap those audiences – bring those different voices together somehow and we will all be the wiser for it.


Event:                                       Alternate Routes
At:                                               National Dance Company Wales
Production:                           WMC, RWCMD & National Dance Company Wales for Festival of Voice
Artistic Director:               Caroline Finn
Choreographers:                Matteo Marfoglia, Camille Giraudeau and           Josef Perou
Chief Exec:                             Paul Kaynes
Seen:                                          6.45pm, 9th June, 2016
Reviewer:                                Helen Joy for 3rd Act Critics
Running:                                   09 Jun – 11 Jun 2016
Links:
http://www.ndcwales.co.uk/en/what-s-on/alternative-routes-20161/
http://www.ndcwales.co.uk/en/about/latest-news/national-dance-company-wales-and-royal-welsh-college-of-music-and-drama-inspires-the-next-generation-of-choereograghers-and-designers-through-alternative-routes/
 
Star rating:                4
 
 

Opera & classical

Review RWCMD The Cunning Little Vixen at the Sherman Theatre by Rebecca Hobbs

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Ninety years on and a cartoon strip that appeared in a Moravian newspaper continues to show us the nature of life and its cyclic immortality. Leoš Janáček’s beautiful and musically inviting The Cunning Little Vixen is currently being performed at the Sherman Theatre by the Royal Welsh College of Music and Drama.
Every time this opera is recreated, the director is faced with a decision as to whether the human context is more important to focus on than the cartoon comic woodland fairy tale. On this occasion, Harry Fehr chooses an extreme and creates a complete human adaptation with a darker edge that plays against the cartoon (aside from the wedding party which is a welcome folk interlude). Rather than the human characters being anthropomorphised, Fehr concentrates on the characters’ animal instincts being dramatised.
 The ‘Vixen’ is a moniker just as her love interest (Zlatohřbitek) goes by the name of ‘The Fox’.  Throughout her youth Bystrouška (Sophie Levi) is convicted for a number of criminal activities. Locked up by Sheriff (Emyr Wyn Jones), her obsessive pursuer usually takes the form of a forester but the creatures of the animal kingdom are replaced by their domestic counterparts: holiday makers, police offers and a gang of ‘liberated’ female convicts that replace the clucking hens of the animal kingdom.
 Whilst the production loses its comic enchanting quality, it was an interesting interpretation and one that comfortably plays to all the advantages of a young ensemble; the life cycle focuses on growing up and the adolescent right of passage. Sophie Levi’s expressive and impassioned performance as the cunning Vixen also captures an awkward teenage insecurity whilst she is being courted by  Zlatohřbitek, her love interest, charmingly played by Jessica Robinson. In the male cast, Emyr Wyn Jones’ command of the Sheriff role and his character’s journey is particularly impressive. Whilst the futile attempts to catch the Vixen enrage him, his concluding paean to nature is poignant and his rich tone is perfectly complimented by the moving orchestral score.
Aside from a few stage glitches, the production was performed to an incredibly high standard and the star voices were as good any professional production. The RWCMD chamber orchestra conducted by David Jones brought the colourful and boisterous score to life as the comic character resonated through the music. If you are a fan of Janáček’s work,  this unusual adaptation is well worth a watch.
The Cunning Little Vixen is on from 7-9th July at the Sherman Theatre.
http://www.shermancymru.co.uk/performance/music/the-cunning-little-vixen/