Rachel McMurray Fine Comb Theatre Company Oldham Coliseum Studio, June 1,4,6,7; 1hr, no interval Fine Comb Theatre has been making quite a name for itself in certain circles (not least the Coliseum, where it is an associate company) since being founded by Rachel McMurray and Catherine Morefield in 2013. The company’s promise is finely-detailed plays (written by writer-director McMurray), performed by a small selection of players (including producer Morefield), of which Not Yours, Mine is the latest example - based on a series of conversations with people in similar situations. The title refers to the baby just delivered by Adam’s former girlfriend, Kate - a baby to which Adam, the father, is denied access by a mix of vindictiveness and hurt. Adam is determined to overturn that decision. Fine Comb largely delivers on its promises: the play is a smartly-written examination of both love and responsibility among the young, mental anguish, determination, and not least of our generally useless legal system, which reduces parents in deeply hurtful dispute to cases, mediation and supervised access. It is also, though I suspect Fine Comb isn’t quite so keen to overplay the message, a suggestion that selfishness, childishness and immaturity among young adults has got them into the mess in the first place. There’s a lot going on here in just an hour: Adam (Jake Henderson) lives with his widowed mother Joyce (Kate Hampson), whose anguish at the loss of her husband has become agoraphobia and a tendency to over-shop online with money she doesn’t always have. The pressures lead to Adam breaking off his relationship with Kate (Catherine Morefield), herself the child of an abusive (though unseen) father, who cuts ties with her boyfriend completely, even though she is pregnant and worried what her future holds, and even though he wants a relationship with the child. Meanwhile Adam falls back on his easy childhood friendship with Lewis (Ned Cooper), an archetypal man-child whose response to misery is usually booze and drugs. Generally the evening moves quickly and with a growing sense of frustration and annoyance at all concerned, particularly a legal system that seems to treat people like children in school. The play fails a little when it indulges in the incorporation of choreographed movement into difficult scenes - not much, but for me too much. There’s a little shuffle of people and files when Adam sees a solicitor to fight for access; another whenever he pleads with Kate for the chance to see his son. I’d have preferred powerful dialogue rather than this form of dance shorthand, and the play might be better for it. McMurray already employs a dialogue shorthand, reducing tense conversations between the couple to keywords that convey more that we hear; it works better because there is no opportunity for levity at seeing a couple of solicitors juggling files around. The play doesn’t need levity, just gravity. The performances are honest though: Adam and Kate strike the audience as a typically baby-too-soon couple, she disappointed and angry, he lost and frustrated but determined that it can’t end the way it seems to be ending. Ned Cooper is laddishly enjoyable to watch as the friend, while Kate Hampson’s performance as the mother is fussily accurate as the grandmother-in-waiting, her mental pressures increased when she learns she won’t be having a relationship with her grandson. #NotYoursMine #FineCombTheatre #RachelMcMurray @FineCombUK

Choreography Russell Maliphant; video artist Panagiotis Tomaras Russell Maliphant Company Lowry Lyric theatre, Salford 29 May 2019; 1 hr Also Lancaster Arts, Lancaster, 11-12 October 2019 Call me sheltered, but I’ve never seen break-dancing to Chopin before. It was happening before we realised it and trust me, it works. Award-winning choreographer Russell Maliphant’s latest work, Silent Lines, comes with a PhD-level programme that could easily discourage. Luckily much of the audience at The Lowry performance had clearly not bothered with it; their enthusiasm was intact and many were on their feet whooping and hollering with delight at the curtain call. Maliphant is known for his flowing style, his detailed study of anatomy and his fusion of contemporary dance with bodywork, the catch-all term for movement disciplines such as yoga, pilates and Alexander technique. In this work he adds the “endless web of connections” of the body’s internal supporting membranes, the fascial system, so the work embodies flows of energy both internal and external. Silent Lines was developed with the Greek video artist Panagiotis Tomaras, whose hypnotic video design bathes the dancers in cellular-shaped beams and cross-sections of muscles (beautifully framed by Stevie Stewart's costumes). Circles of light pulse like heartbeats across the stage or wash in waves around the dancers’ feet. The complex score, designed by Maliphant’s long-term collaborator (and wife) Dana Fouras, includes a lullaby by Benjamin Godard as well as the Chopin (Piano Concerto No 2). But it is also drum-insistent, a techno beat driving the endless flow of movement and encouraging the crossover from breakdance and capoeira (an Afro-Brazilian martial art). Fine dancers will always mesmerise and astonish with the power and control of their bodies, but Maliphant’s choreography here adds another element. In rehearsal he works with each dancer’s personal mobility through improvisation; the result is that the detail of each dancer’s physical structure is on display. All shoulders, elbows, hips and backs work differently, of course, but here that difference is encouraged, celebrated and exploited rather than eradicated by the strictures of the choreography. Alethia Antonia, Edd Arnold, Grace Jabbari, Moronfoluwa Odimayo and Will Thompson swirled and spiralled and back-flipped in slow-motion and dipped and stretched, but with a control that indeed echoed the connective tissue encasing and moving with pounding arteries and flexing muscles. The Russell Maliphant Company became one of Arts Council England’s national portfolio organisations last year, despite which, and despite a stream of awards and prizes, it isn't as well known as it might be. Sometimes, as with the best inventions, you should ignore the science and concentrate on the joy of the final product. The relationship between music, movement and light is an endlessly fascinating one, and Silent Lines is a splendid exploration of it. I think it would have been even better in a smaller, more intimate venue, but the work was not overpowered by the size or formality of the Lyric stage. The Lowry audience was aged from about eight to (probably) approaching 80, and the atmosphere was joyful. Silent Lines returns to the North West on 11-12 October, with two performances at Lancaster Arts. #SilentLines #contemporarydance #RMco @The_Lowry @RMaliphant

Selladoor Productions and Arcola Theatre Book James Lapine, music and lyrics William Finn Based on the film script by Michael Arndt Lowry Quays, 28 May 2019 - 1 June 2019; 2hr 10min. Touring the UK until October. It was an off-beat film and it’s an off-beat musical, a show that concentrates on people and their quirks rather than attempting to stun audiences with spectacle and walls of sound. The film, from more than a decade ago now, is basically a road movie about the Hoovers, a distinctly dysfunctional American family, and the musical sticks pretty close to it... Seven-year-old Olive has set her heart on winning the Little Miss Sunshine child beauty pageant and, unexpectedly, gets an invite to take part, which means the Hoovers must squeeze into their ancient yellow VW camper van and make the 800-mile trip from Albuquerque to California, without a working clutch. Will the vehicle manage to get there without blowing a gasket? Will the Hoovers survive the potholes in the road and the yawning chasms in their relationships? Dad (Gabriel Vick) is an unsuccessful self-help guru. His wife (Lucy O’Byrne) is trying to hold the family together. Their son (Sev Keoshgerian) is teenage awkward and to add to the fun there’s the wife’s brother (Paul Keating), a suicidal Proust scholar, plus an outrageous, dissolute grandfather (Mark Moraghan). But the show’s star is the ultra-determined Olive (shared by Evie Gibson, Sophie Hartley Booth and Lily Mae Denman). All are flawed, apart from Olive, who is just lovely and thankfully always at the centre of things as they all face the setbacks life has thrown at them and struggle on. The show unashamedly wears its heart on its sleeve. It’s a warm and likeable tale that has a bit of a go at the excesses of American capitalism - and at the way children dressing up as adults and parading about has such a hold on a certain section of society. But turning it into a musical hasn’t added anything to the original and the score isn’t by any means memorable - you certainly don’t race for the car park humming the choruses. It’s the usual sub-Sondheim stuff, too shrill and uninvolving. The production is more or less straight from the West End: apart from Moraghan and O’Byrne the principal cast is very similar and they know what they’re doing. A chorus of other child performers seems to have been left behind though: now the climactic beauty pageant has Olive pitched against a parade of adults dressed as kids, making an already strange concept very strange indeed. #LittleMissSunshine #VWCamper #MeetTheHoovers

Hugh Jackman: The Man, The Music, The Show Manchester Arena Saturday 25th May 2019 The show is billed Hugh Jackman: The Man, The Music, The Show - but really The Man, The Musicals, The Show would be more fitting. Because this eagerly-awaited gig is really a showcase for Jackman’s stage presence and skills - honed before he got the Wolverine gig that turned him into one of Hollywood’s most bankable action stars. Before that big break, Jackman was mostly known for his stage roles - such as Curly in the National Theatre’s 1998 production of Oklahoma!, with a bit of Beauty and the Beast and Sunset Boulevard in his native Australia thrown in for good measure. Following his big screen comic-book breakthrough, Jackman returned to the stage with a memorable, Tony-winning turn as Peter Allan in The Boy From Oz on Broadway in 2004. In recent years it’s been the big screen musical hits of Les Miserables and The Greatest Showman, portraying Jean Valjean and PT Barnum respectively, that have won Jackman his musicals megastar status - and no doubt provided the impetus for this world tour Indeed you only have to look at the audience to see that here is a performer who appeals to all demographics. From girls' nights out to middle-aged couples to small children dressed up in ringmaster garb, it’s rare to see such a mixed bunch making up a 17,000 strong sell-out Manchester Arena audience. To call Jackman a true showman feels cliched now, but that’s exactly what he is. An old-fashioned hoofer/crooner/matinee idol. Opening with a barnstorming rendition of The Greatest Show, Jackman struts around the stage with his dancers and the screams almost drown him out. He invited his Greatest Showman co-star Keala Settle out to perform the now-iconic anthem This Is Me - and boy did she bring down the house! A genuinely moving moment. Act 1 is packed with great songs, including Gaston (Beauty and the Beast - complete with the technical tankard-tapping choreography from the show), You Will Be Found (Dear Evan Hanson - with help from Preston's One Voice Choir) Soliloquy and One Day More from Les Mis, alongside anecdotes about Jackman’s life and career (including a heartfelt tribute to his wife of over 20 years, Deborra-Lee Furness. But it’s in Act 2 that things really step up a gear and when Jackman really displays the confidence and charm that made him such a star of stage and screen; when he breaks out the sequins and unleashes his Peter Allen Boy From Oz persona in all his camp, charismatic glory. Perhaps less well known to some of the audience, this is where you really see Jackman’s natural showmanship come alive, his off-the-cuff quips and pointed asides captivating the audience, as well as songs like the Oscar-winning Arthur's Song and I Go to Rio. His Allen was a hard act to follow, but Jackman manages it with a toe-tapping homage to the golden movie musicals he grew up with - Singin’ In The Rain, Guys and Dolls (Luck Be A Lady), and a barnstorming tap and drum breakout number to classic modern hits - earning laughs and cheers for the Wolverine pose with drumsticks. “Let’s see Ryan Reynolds do that” says Jackman - alluding to his mock Twitter feud with his fellow action star and friend. The night ends with From Now On and Once Before I Go (with Jackman giving the crowd the heads up that there were two songs to go, in case anyone wanted to beat the rush to the car park The show was a lovely celebration of Jackman’s family, upbringing, native Australia, career and musical inspirations and the chance to see a true entertainer prove he really does live up to the hype. And mention also has to go to the show credits that rolled on the big screens after Jackman had departed the stage - the first time I’ve ever seen this at a live show. Classy to the very end. Hugh Jackman: The Man, The Music, The Show plays Birmingham, Dublin and London through to early June. Various dates and venues. See https://www.hughjackmantheshow.com/ for full details. #HughJackman #ArenaTour #TheManTheMusicTheShow

Moira Buffini Oldham Coliseum, York Theatre Royal and Wiltshire Creative joint production Oldham Coliseum 14 May 2019 - 1 June 2019; 2hr 25min with 20 min interval There is something mighty curious about this most regal and powerful (well, it features the Queen and Margaret Thatcher) of plays: it's not exactly a play. There are actors, acting, and there's a script and a set (such as it is), and a few cheap(ish) laughs at the expense of major political figures of the Eighties such as the aforementioned, plus Kinnock, Reagan and his First Lady, Heseltine and the slightly sheepish Geoffrey Howe, to name a few. What's missing, generally, is a plot or story to get involved in. This is not so much a New Statesman-like satirical comedy, nor even a Horrible History, more an animated lecture or two-hour bout of choral speaking: The Thatcher Years, An Imagined Personal History. Writer Moira Buffini is better known as the creator of a few National Theatre and London productions and for film and TV (particularly the sexy Harlots). This play has a free-wheeling, half-baked look about it, with four actors playing the younger and older central characters ("Q" and "T"), giving at least an interesting perspective on what people did and said at the time, and what they thought about it maybe decades later. Other actors play supporting characters, especially the men, who share the other roles and even talk about their roles both in and out of character - another of those drama-writers' tricks not often indulged in these days. But that's it. There's a level of mostly historical information in this chat-heavy, action-light evening that makes it a little wearing towards the end of the first act, though admittedly the action improves as we head into miners' strike territory and the Brighton bombing in act two. And yes it's funny in parts, but the laughs are often obvious and more than a bit sneery. It is very much like one of those satirical Radio 4 comedy shows, very amusing for half a second at the expense of the political figures generally lampooned, but forgotten as soon as the audience is out of the door because the writers have to get on with next week's edition... The acting, having said that, is enjoyable, with the revelation Susan Penhaligon as the older Queen. An actress once known for the sexy roles of her youth is here in a silver perm and almost unrecognisable, as well as being note-perfect in the Queen's regal tones. Caroline Harker as her younger self is also no-nonsense and fun to watch, as are Sarah Crowden and Alice Selwyn as the older and younger Iron Ladies. Andy Secombe and Jahvel Hall are the two men in the middle of all that power-oestrogen - though on one occasion Hall joins in to play Nancy Reagan. But then she was always more manned-up than her husband. And see, now I'm doing the cheap jokes too... #Handbagged #MoiraBuffini #MargaretThatcher #HMQueen

From the novel by Peter James, adapted by Shaun McKenna Original music by Nick Lloyd Webber Produced by Peter James and Joshua Andrews Opera House, Manchester 14 May 2019 - 18 May 2019; 2hrs The old run-down converted monastery on the Sussex Downs has been empty for 40 or more years but husband Ollie (Joe McFadden, of Strictly and Holby City), his wife Caro (Rita Simons, of EastEnders) and daughter Jade (Persephone Swales-Dawson, aka villainess Nico Blake in Hollyoaks) have moved the 20 or so miles from Brighton to make it their forever home. And so it comes to pass, but not in a good way. Even before things start going bump in the night you might think the fact that the locals give them odd looks whenever the history of the house is mentioned would have warned them about problems. Their estate agent certainly didn’t, but that’s estate agents for you. Never enter into property purchase without thoroughly checking out the history of the masonry and mortar seems to be message here. Adapted from Peter James’ 2015 novel, the story is apparently based on the author’s own experiences in a haunted house. As stage thrillers go (not usually very thrilling), after a slow and over-long first act the tension does ratchet up a notch or three. Ollie is a former ad agency chap setting up his own web design business. Daughter Jade is using Facetime to talk to her best friend and would rather be back in Brighton. Wife Caro is the practical one when things go wrong - and my, do they go wrong... It’s a decent cast: McFadden in particular is consistently on the ball throughout, and the others do their best with pretty much stock characters and a script that meanders for too long. The ghostly happenings have been interwoven with some modern technology – you always knew having Alexa around was more than a little spooky - and there are a few sudden shocks, though nothing quite so startling as the big hit in The Woman In Black, thank goodness (same designer though, Michael Holt). The ending is fairly unexpected and satisfyingly macabre. #JoeMcFadden #PeterJames #RitaSimons

Seeta Patel, reimagined from Stravinsky The Lowry, Salford 13 May, 2019; 65min, no interval It’s evidently open season for The Rite of Spring. This year alone, Stravinsky’s avant garde orchestral masterpiece has seen Chinese and Haitian dance stylings on stage, the latter part of an Opera North double bill also at this venue. So just when you thought you knew all your rites, along comes this reimagining by award-winning choreographer Seeta Patel, using a ritualistic Indian dance style that enhances the music’s sense of pagan ceremony. It’s a bold cultural crossover of modern Western orchestration and ancient Eastern movement that shares much more than the percussive qualities of both. Those drum-pounding and foot-stomping sections are an obvious meeting point but there are many more moments in which the angular score and geometric movement create exotic, and occasionally erotic, dance theatre. Particularly during an interlude in which an Indian vocalist allows the six multi-cultural dancers to adopt more recumbent poses. The final section uses a more contemporary dance style as this Rite moves towards a genuinely thrilling finale. Subdued lighting effects, by Warren Letton, intensify the drama amidst the musical chaos of Stravinsky’s score. This is the music that, when first performed in 1913, so outraged theatregoers that they were said to have rioted. While sadly there were not enough people in this night’s audience to man any barricades, their enthusiastic response should encourage repeat performances. To underline the cultural conjunction, the evening also included a Bach cello recital by Heather Bills and a performance of Occupying The Fifth - by four young South Asian dancers - of another original dance piece by Patel, set to the first movement of Beethoven’s ‘Victory V’ Symphony. A much more playful performance, but another illustration of the things that, culturally at least, can unite communities. #SeetaPatel #TheLowry #RiteOfSpring

David Nixon, after F Scott Fitzgerald Northern Ballet The Lowry (Lyric Theatre), Salford 8 May 2019 – 11 May 2019; 2hr 20min inc 20min interval One of the most successful story ballets of his whole tenure as Northern Ballet’s artistic director, David Nixon’s The Great Gatsby comes roaring into The Lowry, several years after its first creation, and provides great entertainment. The centerpieces of it are a set of party scenes from the America of the Twenties, non-stop in energetic commitment from the tireless Norther Ballet dancers and brilliantly choreographed to include and transform dance styles of the time into big ensemble numbers of constant imagination and considerable balletic challenge. Nixon is helped in this by a score deftly compiled from the works of Sir Richard Rodney Bennett, whose music fits the period and the atmosphere perfectly. Never mind that you first heard it as Poirot and the Orient Express picked up speed, the waltz that opens Gatsby’s big party is a perfect fit – and it’s succeeded by a setting of Johnson and Mack’s Charleston that seems to go on all night long, in a wonderful arrangement by Gavin Sutherland. So the music itself is one of the greatest attractions of the ballet, and Nixon’s dance language complements it, not only in the stage-filled scenes but in a variety of intimate pas de deux and trois that tell the story of the infidelities and unfulfilled longings of the post-First-World War generation, where (for some) success came easy and life was to be lived to the full, little suspecting the fragility of their world. Fitzgerald’s novel is, like most of the genre, filled with characters and built with twists and turns in its plotline. David Nixon makes a brave attempt at summarising most of them, with a prologue to outline the back story and a rapid succession of mini-scenes before we get to the parties, where the dancing really starts (though his narrative ends with the shot when cuckolded George kills Gatsby in mistaken revenge – by that point the detail of mistaken identity and car keys has got too complicated for any silent mime to explicate). Nixon puts the narrator figure, Nick, on stage, and, unless you knew the plot pretty well to begin with, it’s quite hard at first to follow who’s who and where their relationships are going. He also interprets some of their inner psychology in eloquent dance – again, OK if you’ve read the book first, but not necessarily meaningful if you haven’t. But in a way that hardly matters: it’s the flappers and the smart guys, the superficiality and the hedonism, the search for love and the final tragic accidents, that really tell the story. There are rich opportunities for the leading dancers to show what they can do – particularly Ashley Dixon as Jay Gatsby and Antoinette Brooks-Daw as Daisy. Dixon has some amazing lifts to perform in their pas de deux, and Brooks-Daw seems to be on stage for virtually the entire show. Pippa Moore also makes a characterful contribution as Jordan Baker, showing off her golf swing on every occasion in the early part of the ballet to establish her identity. The Northern Ballet Sinfonia was conducted by John Pryce-Jones, making one of his final appearances with the company after a quarter-century as music director. That is quite an achievement, and the compilation of the music for The Great Gatsby is one of the best legacies he’s given to us. #NorthernBallet #GreatGatsby

William Shakespeare Northern Broadsides & the New Vic The Lowry, Quays Theatre 7 May 2019 – 11 May 2019; 2hr 55min inc 20min interval Northern Broadsides’ versions of Shakespeare are always fun. For one thing, hearing the lines in north-of-England accents often makes them come alive in a way that never happens with Received Pronunciation. Phrases like ‘O Lord…’ and ‘God help me…’ (both are in this play) just sound natural. For another, they never knowingly undersell the laughs in his comedies, and Conrad Nelson’s production of Much Ado About Nothing – his last for Broadsides – is no exception. In fact its first half teeters on the edge of being too laid back and laugh-a-minute, so that the temporary twist into desperate tragedy, when it comes, is quite hard to take seriously. We ideally should have seen it coming and should believe that all those histrionics, as bright young lad Claudio jilts his true love Hero at the altar are for real. The transposed setting, from Shakespeare’s Mediterranean fantasy, is a great idea. We’re in England’s green and pleasant country at the end of the Second World War, and the Land Girls are still harvesting their veg to feed the nation, while the Battle of Britain airmen are still in uniform but thinking of bucolic delights and life after conflict. It gives point to the two ‘camps’ of unattached men and women we meet at the outset, and you forget the formal titles in the script. What’s more, when Dogberry and the Watch appear, they’re Dad’s Army and friends, and nasty Borachio is not just a drunk but a 1940s spiv. Add in a playlist of songs from the era – because this is an all-instrument-playing, nearly-all-dancing company, too – and you have a nice period feel to the whole thing (alongside other references such as Laurel and Hardy’s hats). I rather fancy, too, that some of the acting style models were taken from the post-war era – Robin Simpson’s Benedick gets his laughs with a old-style comedian’s meaningful looks at the audience … and when he actually gets down there with them manages to corpse the lot of them back up on the stage. David Nellist’s Dogberry is a Geordie – no hesitation about playing to type there – and James McLean’s Watchman is in comic camp mode. It’s quite un-PC and maybe a little bit self-indulgent, but they’re having fun – in particular Mr Nellist’s early small-part interventions last night of ‘I trained at RADA…’ (as the Boy), and ‘I played Hamlet in Halifax’ – and so do we. They've got a multi-talented cast, with Richard J Fletcher as Don John (and Sexton), Rachel Hammond as Ursula, Sophia Hatfield as Margaret, Anthony Hunt as Borachio, Linford Johnson as Claudio, Sarah Kameela Impey as Hero, Isobel Middleton as Beatrice, Heather Phoenix as Conrade, Matt Rixon as Don Pedro, Simeon Truby as Leonato,, Robert Wade as Balthasar and Andrew Whitehead as Antonio. A big credit also to Rebekah Hughes, the musical director. Quite apart from the instrumental abilities, the dancing (Beverley Norris Edmunds the choreographer) and the hit songs, these people can produce a very nice barbershop quartet and a gorgeous choral ensemble for There is no rose. Of course Beatrice and Benedick really do love each other, Claudio and Hero are reconciled, it ends happily and the broad sunlit uplands are there for all to see. You can’t say fairer than that. #MuchAdo @NBroadsides

William Shakespeare Headlong HOME, Manchester 30 April 2019 – 4 May 2019; 2hr 30min ‘Speak suddenly – be brief’ could be the motto of John Haidar’s production of Richard III. The pace never lets up and the story-telling is plain and to the point. Chiara Stephenson’s set is simple and picks up the theme of mirror reflections from the text, with a raised ‘gallery’ at the back. It has the feel of a Shakespearean stage, and with much of the acting from the front, right in the audience’s faces, this has the immediacy of thrust-shape production. The story is bloody (plenty of the imitation stuff) and records one vicious killing after another by the monster whose name it bears, until his final comeuppance. Richard III may have his apologists today, but his representation in this scenario is one of the most revolting portrayals of an historical figure ever created. That is Shakespeare’s line and it’s no use running away from it. And yet … there are a few opportunities, just a few, for us to chuckle at his outrageousness and to wonder what makes his psychology what it is. Tom Mothersdale, in a virtuoso performance of the role, seizes these to give his Richard a certain insinuating charm, and in this adaptation of the play, Haidar makes his last desperate rejection by his mother (Eileen Nicholas) a moving and even harrowing encounter. There are strong performances by all the 10-strong principal team, with hers and Leila Mimmack’s standing out among the women. Mothersdale excels among the men, which is the way the text is written, but Stefan Adegbola as Buckingham makes a strong character study of his role, too. Every heinous crime by Richard is marked as a theatrical shock, the ‘mirrors’ reveal the haunting ghosts of Richard’s victims, the Battle of Bosworth is well evoked - by the sound of a ticking clock (time running out), the electronic score and lighting. The final fight is as vivid as anyone has a right to expect. Bill the Bard would have recognised this as being in the spirit of the play he wrote, I would think – and rather liked it. #Headlong #RichardIII #TomMothersdale #HOMEMcr

Willy Russell Theatre by the Lake, Keswick, and David Pugh and Daffyd Rogers Production Lowry Quays, Salford 30 April 2019 - 3 May 2019; 2hr 15min. Visits Bradford Alhambra, May 6-11 We've been educating Rita since Willy Russell's play was first staged in 1980, and have delighted in watching the feisty Liverpool hairdresser growing in character as she relishes literature on an Open University course while her grumpy tutor Frank's world crumples. This latest national tour stars Stephen Tompkinson as Frank, whose drinking habits are slowly ruining his career and personal life, while his pupil Rita, (Jessica Johnson), is on the brink of a new life immersed in literature, plays and poetry. Tompkinson, famous for TV, film and theatre from DCI Banks and The Yorkshire Detective to Drop the Dead Donkey and Brassed Off, is the star of this new tour. He slips easily into the role of the rumpled, crumpled and bitter academic whose life changes when hairdresser Rita breezes into his study and challenges his attitudes to life and learning. Though less well-known, Jessica Johnson as Rita is a whirlwind of talk at 100mph and holds her own in a two-hander that demands two hours on stage for both characters and quick cut-and-thrust of banter and revealing personal insights. Tompkinson, as Frank, is an academic who gradually comes alive again as Rita's naive enthusiasm for learning challenges his cynical view of students and university management. Rita is working class, wants to move on and feels held back by her background. But as Rita's world expands into summer schools, wider horizons and challenging texts, Frank's declines as his fondness for alcohol and failing personal relationships leave him lonely, finally packing up his books and moving on. Both actors are good foils for each other, and Johnson's Rita is a sassy character with a little more edge than usual: quicker, snappier and very believable. Tompkinson makes Frank's decline a sad story to watch, the man being his own worst enemy - just as Johnson's Rita makes mistakes taking on new friends and repeating other people's opinions, forgetting to think for herself. Their on-stage sparring is clever, witty, well-timed and sharp. A great set, book-lined, hints at the 1979 era in which the play is set with its typewriter (no computers then), BT telephone and mismatched desk and chairs. If you don't catch this run, the national tour moves to Bradford next and it is well worth the journey. #StephenTompkinson #JessicaJohnson #Lowry

Peter Shaffer English Touring Theatre and Theatre Royal Stratford East Lowry Quays, Salford 23 April 2019 - 27 April 2019; 2hr 40min inc interval Peter Shaffer’s dark and complex play, about passion misplaced or displaced, is one of those gifts that keeps on giving. No matter how many times you enter into its intricate workings it never fails to reveal some new facet of the story or invite you to take different sides with its characters. Audiences introduced to Equus when it was first performed in the 1970s certainly find themselves looking at it anew here, especially when set in an age in which TV was regarded as an anti-social medium, and its commercial jingles were the memes of their day. The story concerns a psychiatrist’s attempt to treat a teenager accused of blinding six horses. Although based on a real incident, it constructs its own kind of detective story around his examination of a deeply-troubled mind. As the analyst, Zubin Varla is the latest in an illustrious line of actors to tackle the demanding central role. His Professor Dysart is a nervy, incessantly-smoking professional who gradually comes to a disquieting evaluation of his own psyche. Opposite him, Ethan Kai gives an equally-absorbing performance as the teenage Alan Strang. In the ‘role’ (or fetlocks?) of one of the horses, Ira Mandela Siobhan is especially effective, with dramatic side lighting giving him the physical outlines and musculature of a thoroughbred. The stillness of some of the scenes is punctuated by searing moments of theatre, used sparingly but with astonishing effect amidst Georgia Lowe’s clinical, cell-like setting. The climax becomes a theatrical exorcism of sound, light and smoke effects that heighten the psycho-sexual imagery of a play that has never been for the faint-hearted. In any age, Equus remains as pungent a drama as those menthol cigarettes on which Dysart depends. #Equus #TheLowry

Eleanor Bergstein Triple A Entertainment Group Palace Theatre, Manchester 22 April 2019 - 27 April 2019; 2hr 20min inc interval Of course it was always going to make a terrific stage show. It’s the film with everything, including watermelons. Despite being a fan, I’d never seen “the classic story on stage”. What could theatre add to the film? Well, atmosphere for starters; being in a live theatre packed with people having (sorry) the time of their lives is always uplifting. And there's the thrill of those core anxieties: can anyone really follow Patrick Swayze? Will Baby be as Baby-like? Will 'the lift' work? Well, no, yes and yes. Then there's the sheer, magnetic energy of it all, hopefully. Certainly the musicians and singers can belt out the songs and the dancers defy gravity and normal joint articulation. But I had a nagging feeling we were being a little short-changed. The direction was choppy and story exposition was sometimes clunky, at times almost lost in confusingly brief flashes. And Johnny? We’ll get to Johnny shortly. The stand-out performance for me was by Lizzie Ottley as Lisa, the daft sister, giving a performance of the Hula song she could well be expected to repeat at every party until shaking her maracas is no longer an option. Big pants were a theme, but she rocked hers the best. Kira Malou, as Frances “Baby” Houseman, managed with great skill her dance ineptitude and symbolic growth into personal confidence both on and off the dance floor. She had the curls and the cardigan, the courage and the convictions. And so to Johnny. Michael O’Reilly is making his professional debut on this tour and like Mr Swayze when he made the film, is a dancer who also acts. Unfortunately in the case of Mr O’Reilly, it shows. He and his accent seemed to flag as the production rolled on, but the occasional woodenness would have been forgiven if his dancing hadn’t drifted off the boil too. Of course the lift was a triumph, but he was supposed to be majestic in the rest of the finale, and despite the whooping and hollering of the audience, he didn’t really pull it off. By contrast, the dancing of Simone Covele as Penny was hugely impressive; her legs deserved their personal ovation at the end. It was good to see the musicians get their own encore too – Colin Charles as Tito and the rest of the band were strong throughout. Beyond the individual performances, does the story still fly in 2019? The patriarchal family dynamics are unthinkable today, and writer Eleanor Bergstein and director Federico Bellone have dealt with this by adding depth to the relationship of the parents, softening Dr Houseman (Lynden Edwards) and giving Mrs Houseman (Lori Haley Fox) more definitive character. The themes of class, money, power and the relentless passage of time and taste are handled very lightly, which is a shame. These threads gave the film its heft, and it's a little cowardly that they virtually disappear here. That said of course, we had a great time. It was Dirty Dancing, Baby came out of the corner and finally did the lift. All’s well with the world. @DDOnStage #DirtyDancing #TheLift #NobodyPutsBabyInACorner

Laura Wade National Theatre co-production with Theatre Clwyd and Fiery Angel Lowry Lyric Theatre 23 April 2019 - 28 April 2019 and Theatr Clwyd 30 April 2019 - 4 May 2019; 2hr 40 min inc interval An example – an extremely successful one - of a new-ish strand of British theatre spearheaded by mainly female creatives, Home, I’m Darling arrives at The Lowry after sold-out runs at the National and West End and winning this year’s Olivier award for best new comedy. Laura Wade’s clever creation gets the laughs but it’s more serious than that - it’s also a portrait of a woman in the grip of a life-restricting obsession. Judy (the pretty wonderful Katherine Parkinson of The IT Crowd and Humans) is apparently a doting 1950s housewife, descaling the kitchen taps and fetching hubby Johnny’s (Jo Stone-Fewings) slippers. They are, says Johnny, offensively happy. But it isn’t long, as Judy gets the laptop out of a kitchen cupboard, before it’s clear she is living in a fantasy world. We’re actually in the 21st Century, in which Judy has lost a high-powered job and retreated into a make-believe version of a post-war world she has never experienced. Her weapons against the real world around her include a duster, cocktail mixer and high heels, choosing to live a 50s life as authentically as she can, skipping and twirling around her perfectly clean and tidy home. It can’t last, of course; there’s eventually no escape from life as it is, underlined with devastating effect by Judy’s formerly hippie mother Sylvia (an applause-generating turn from Susan Brown) who demolishes her daughter’s make-believe in a fierce outpouring on why the 50s were really a terrible time to be alive, with no central heating, no abortion and no place for the gay or handicapped. There are a few twists and turns before the final - something of a cop out I think - very upbeat ending. Alan Ayckbourn could well have written more or less this same script back in the 70s and 80s - in fact he pretty much did across his extensive output, also anticipating the tricksy set and time-shifts - and he wouldn’t have been so forgiving. His women suffered more, but we’re in the age of #MeToo now…. #katherineparkinson #theITcrowd #humans #OlivierAwards #AlanAyckbourn #NationalTheatre #TheatrClwyd