Matthew Bourne's Romeo & Juliet

Copyright Johan Persson & New Adventures

Matthew Bourne's Romeo & Juliet

I will be honest, I am massive fan of this company (check out my review of The Red Shoes) so I might be a tad unbiased but I hope to make it clear why this is a worth while visit to the theatre.

Matthew Bourne has a unique style bridging ballet and modern dance, he used the classic score of the ballets but condenses it into a more narrative form so anyone can watch the performance and understand what is going on. This is the first time that company have had a live orchestra to work with and it was as seamless as when they used recordings which goes to show how a live orchestra can support the dancers in expressing the emotions of the piece. They use Prokofiev Ballet score with all the familiar movements you will recognise. It will be interesting to see whether they continue with this.

To the plot; They have gone very Gen Z which is appropriate for this story. Romeo is the son of a rich and famous couple who are committing him to an asylum (or the Verona Institute) for the nervous tick he has. He meets Juliet there who is being sexually abused by the guard. They have their meet cute at a dance arranged by the Rev (The Spiritual adviser). They fall 'madly' in love but as we all know that it is all very fragile and tragedy is moments away. I loved that Juliet is given a lot more agency, Romeo is less 'romantic' (read useless) but still it is Juliet who is the rebel, fighting the ones who oppress her and her fellow inmates. 

The set for Romeo and Juliet

I got to see the Montague cast (there are two casts Capulets & Montagues) and I thought they were amazing. Especially Seren Williams who plays Juliet. I did love the passion that Andrew Monaghan brought to the part but I don't know if he was recovering from an injury because he didn't do lifts, It is modern dance so they may have been the choreography but he seemed awkward in places and notable to me that he wasn't lifting. Again I love the skill and artistry of the choreography and the whole thing is lovely to watch but I wanted to highlight some spectacular moments such when Romeo and Juliet meet and dance together at the dance, the whole ensemble lift them and they 'float' towards each other. There is also the use of the Dance of the Knights to symbolise the oppressive regime at the Institute (I always thought it was an angry piece of music, Prokofiev socialism slipping out?). Also a great solo from Joao Carolino as Mercutio's lover, Benvolio.

The other new addition to the New Adventure performance is the use of young dancers, as this is a play about teenagers it works and it says something to how talented they all are as they were indistinguishable from the main company. Bravo to them!

Just a quick thing about the Venue which was the Wales Millennium Centre, It was one of the best venues I have ever been to; having very comfortable seats with good views (no being blocked by someone's head) and toilets on ever floor. Good job!

Board game review: The Festival Game

The Festival Game copyright: own

The Festival Game

I run my workplace board game club and was recently contacted about trying out a new Kickstarter game called: The Festival Game and giving it a review. So here it is!

The board mid game. copyright: own

As you can see from this photo this is a 'roll and move' game where 4 groups (you will need more then one person on each team to play) have to collect between 3 and 5 backstage passes and all the items you need to camp at a festival before heading to the main stage and answering a question to end the game. The one with the highest points win the game. 

Game play

You start the game with a certain number of camping gear and you can use these to trade for the items you need to complete the game. You can see on the board that every square has a icon which lets you pick up a bottle (bottles are points or can be traded for items), roll again or pick up a Karma card (basically an action card that gives you extra items from the other players or moves you to another area of the board). There is also a Lost/Found square which means you can grab anything that has been discarded (or lost) previously in the game. There are also squares were you have to get everyone a drink and one which gives you a meet card earning you points at the end of the game. Each team has to throw the dice after saying which stage they are going to head towards. When you get to the stage you have to complete the action on the card which involves some form of performance. 

Review

I have to admit I find that most people who play board games are fairly introvert so asking them to dance and sing was little more then they might feel comfortable with! If you like Cranium and that sort of family game then this might suit you. We adapted the game so it was just pictionary/humming or charades. Pictionary and humming worked best however only if you knew the thing you were trying to describe! Here is a selection of some of the cards from the Acoustic Stage (you had to pick one to perform for the rest of your team to guess in one minute):

Sure Leonard Cohen and Guns N' Roses are pretty universally known but the rest?? If you google Waking the Witch they were a indie band from 10 years ago. There were more of the former then the latter and again as introverts we are not natural festival goers so it is unlikely that we would have seen these less famous band perform (not everyone but in our fairly diverse group at work none of us had heard of them). Which made it pretty hard to complete the challenge. I fully embrace the fact that it shouldn't be easy but this was too obscure for us and would have involved swapping out alot of cards to make it playable. 

Even if you managed to complete the correct backstage passes and collected the camping items you needed then when you got to the Main Stage you were greeted with questions like this:

They are all like this! Again how many people really know the history and technical information about festivals? It was too hard for us and we would need to write different ones to play it again. 

It is an active game were you always have something to do and we mostly got around the board quickly, the difficultly of knowing the bands not withstanding. It definitely had alot of potential with some more universal acts or with a more festival loving group. It was fun and could be played quickly or with more breaks if you want.

Home, I'm Darling

Katherine Parkinson in Home, I'm Darling Copyright: Seatplan.com

Home, I'm Darling tour

I was lucky enough to get last minute tickets to see this new play by Laura Wade at the Theatre Royal Bath so it was my first time in this venue.

The play itself is interesting; exploring what is feminism and what is the perfect marriage. We are introduced to a seemingly perfect 1950's couple, wife making breakfast and husband getting ready for work. The stage is set up as four rooms in a house (a typical two up, two down) and once the husband leaves the wife busies herself cleaning before pulling a laptop out a drawer and sitting down to work on it. The play has a lot of fun with the jarring nature of living an old fashioned lifestyle in a modern world. The wife (Katherine Parkinson) use to be high powered but when she was made redundant throws herself into the keeping the 1950's lifestyle committed to the point of cutting herself off from modern news and seeming to be the 'little, ignorant wife' when guests visit. Her husband also seems to find her servile and this causes friction in their marriage. The play has another 50's loving couple who are contrasted with the main two and this is used to show the difference between hobby and obsession. The wife also has a hippy 2nd wave feminist mother who is frustrated by her daughter harking back to a type of life that was inflexible, racist and sexist and until rationing ended not as bountiful as the films she loves so much suggest! The play explores the fantasy of the perfect marriage and then deftly demonstrates what a real, happy marriage is. 

The set is lovely and beautifully curated and when we have a flashback the cast do an excellent job of changing the scenery around them so there is a seamless change back to the present. The costumes are great and really pop.

Theatre Royal Bath is a nice theatre but does have a few issues in that it has pillar that restrict views on the Royal and Dress Circle but they have an 'Standby ticket' option which for £9 means you can sit on unreserved benches or restricted view seats that are only available on the day. Plenty of bars and snacks but only programmes no additional merchandise.