Das Theater

I swear I am doing other things with my life than going to the theatre, yet I have little else interesting to talk about that isn’t complaining about things I shouldn’t talk about professionally.

As with the last post three months ago, I’ve been many places with my newly reignited interest in live theatre. This has included a return to the Festival theatre which surprisingly hasn’t featured yet, a trip to Germany, and a trip down south to watch a bunch of teenagers performing a musical about murdering and cannibalising people who just wanted a shave.

The star ratings are somewhat arbitrary as all ratings are, and nothing was without merit.

Edinburgh

’Carmen’ at the Playhouse

Part of the “Ellen Kent Farewell Tour”, and performed by the Ukrainian National Opera, this was the first of two trips to see opera.

It’s hard to review well-known content in a unmodernised production given the author is long dead and the actual performance was perfectly functional if nothing incredible. It would be ridiculous to give a star rating to classically staged Shakespeare, for example. This is the challenge of reviewing ‘Carmen’. Bizet himself has been dead since 1875.

Nothing to be done, threat or plea.
The one talks well, the other is silent;
And it’s the other that I prefer,
He said nothing, but he pleases me.

“L’amour est un oiseau rebelle” from Carmen by Georges Bizet

In the 2026 world I saw this in, however, it’s hard not to make a “manosphere” comparison. At its heart, it’s a fairly normal story. Boy meets girl, girl does crimes, girl flirts with different boy, boy kills her because he thinks he deserves affection, and the opera seems to blame her for it. Carmen uses Don José - who himself is engaged to another, but who’s counting - for his influence and then clearly actually likes Escamillio. Opera being as it is, that’s basically the full plot.

The actual performance was perfectly serviceable, as would be expected from a renowned national opera company directed by a veteran director. I wanted to see Carmen, and it was definitely Carmen I saw.

It was an interesting choice for them to close the curtain call with the Ukrainian national anthem.

“функціональний” out of 5.

‘Priscilla Queen of the Desert The Musical’ at the Playhouse

I had an interesting seat neighbour for this production, who was clearly enjoying it, and we all knew about it (as she danced along, sang along at one point, chatted to everyone around her). I mention this, because I remember that more than the musical itself.

It’s a jukebox musical, which is already not a strong start, but it lacks coherence in its musical styles, themes, and, frankly, plot. It fails to answer the core question of “who are these people, and why should I care?” because the characters are either incredibly irritating, or just beige - or at least as beige as an Australian drag queen can be. I can’t even call the acting good, because it wasn’t especially so.

Priscilla is also starting to show its age somewhat. It uses 1990s acceptable language which has fallen out of favour with good reason in the interim. I worry that this production, by featuring Adele Anderson, is legitimising the use of the language in the minds of the audiences that are seeing it that definitely skew older. A production of “To Kill A Mockingbird” can use racist language because it’s definitely known that it’s not the right language, it deconstructs it, and we learn from the contrast. In this, it’s much more recent, the knowledge of how the language and what not to do is still very much in flux, and a well meaning person who isn’t surrounded in the culture might take it as guidance. My concern would have been assuaged with signs around the theatre to the effect of “hey mates, the language in this isn’t so fabulous anymore, here’s a write up if you want to know more”.

I enjoyed the way they used the cake nonsense from MacArthur Park. It’s also good that it doesn’t shy away from the incident of queer bashing which happens. It’s just a little uncomfortable that those two things happen almost immediately after one another.

A “see it if you can go for cheap, like a bus you’re driving to Alice Springs” out of 5.

‘Guys and Dolls’ presented by Southern Light at the Festival theatre

The first of two amateur productions, it turns out I just don’t like Guys and Dolls that much. The plot drags in the first half, and stops making sense in the second. The Havana sequence goes on forever and doesn’t achieve much. I just don’t care about craps games. Surely they could’ve just pooled together money to pay to use the garage and not try to trick Sky Masterson out of his money in a way that clearly doesn’t work. Him joining the not-the-salvation-army at the end makes no sense whatsoever. The subplot of Adelaide telling her mother they’ve had even more children is just stupid.

The saving grace was that it was well produced and performed, with no technical issues (except for a mild wardrobe malfunction) and engaging acting.

“You win some, you lose some” out of 5.

‘Waitress’ at the Playhouse

It’s a difficult thing, when something you’re watching is good™ but you can feel is marching into territory you’re not necessarily equipped to handle.

Like a storm advancing where you can smell the oncoming rain, the cloud of abuse in Waitress darkens and breaks into a starkly realistic portrayal all at once. It then ebbs away for a bit while the characters deal with the resultant flooding before rushing back in a different worse form. At the interval, my take was that it was hitting a lot of the hallmarks for abuse, but wasn’t coercive control. I was, I think, proven wrong. Waitress toes a line which clearly touched a nerve with the audience, and it’s up to interpretation whether it achieves it sensitively.

With only the questionable medical ethics dressed up as a romantic affair, it would work. With only the family trauma, it would work. With only the unwanted pregnancy, it would work. With only the spousal abuse, it would work. As a whole, it might be just a little too much.

She kicks him out, which is a win. She threatens him with violence, which is understandable but a little uncomfortable that the audience cheered for it. It falls a little too much into “hurt people hurt people”.

She’s imperfect, but she tries
She is good, but she lies
She is hard on herself
She is broken and won’t ask for help
She is messy, but she’s kind
She is lonely most of the time
She is all of this mixed up
And baked in a beautiful pie
She is gone, but she used to be mine

“She Used To Be Mine” from Waitress by Sara Bareilles

For this, the tenth anniversary national tour, the cast are stunning, the sets are great, and the band is good (though I couldn’t see them because they were hidden behind the proscenium). Carrie-Hope Fletcher really deserved her standing ovation at the end of “She Used To Be Mine”.

A “Musical For A Day You Want To Feel” Pie out of 5.

‘The Marriage of Figaro’ at the Festival theatre

It’s Mozart performed by Scottish Opera. There’s not a lot to say about it. There’s more plot than in Carmen, but I lost track of it in act 4, but that doesn’t really matter because it’s a comedy and was written 250 years ago and in English translation had people laughing.

“A cromulent classic” out of 5.

‘Sweat’ at the Lyceum

The only straight play thus far this year, and definitely a mixed bag. On the one hand, up until the last ten minutes, I was gripped - if a little confused - and you could feel the tension building in a community which is being torn apart by economic reality. It lays bare the hurt that can come from being pawns in the machinations of managers who forget or ignore that there are people behind the numbers on their balance sheets.

The problem comes that the big foreshadowed emotional climax comes, and then the whole show trips into the orchestra pit as it carries on for another ten minutes where they make really sure we’ve noticed the moral.

It is billed as the modern Great American Play, and as the play that predicted the MAGA movement. I don’t think I agree with either of those. The first, because it’s good but not stunning, and needs a dramaturgical pass. The latter, because it takes away from the complex human story of how we’ve ended up here in real life, and how they end up fighting for the last vestiges of the lives they thought they would lead in the play. Some latched onto the promises from Trump that he could bring back manufacturing by sending away the immigrants, but it feels reductive to say that a play that shows one community struggling with a change being forced upon it naturally concludes with what we see now.

“Unions being exclusionary is alas not a contradiction in terms” out of 5.

Germany

Continuing the theme of “going abroad for theatre” because what’s the point in having a salary if not to go on ridiculous side quests, May featured a trip to the Rhein-Ruhr valley. This was mainly for the purpose of seeing Starlight Express, but when buying a theatre ticket also gets you the train ticket from the airport, who am I to say no to interpretive versions of a Shirley Jackson short story.

‘The Lottery’ at the Grillo Theater, Essen

Technically a play, but entirely with narration that is just the short story, for all the world it feels like very slowly revolving interpretive dance. Presented in English using a recording of the author and supertitled in German, this interpretation plays out as an hour of slow motion depiction of daily life, turning into a slow motion depiction of the titular lottery, turning into the slow motion stoning of the winner. Their whole world revolves in slow motion around the eventual lottery.

I wanted a turning point in the staging, or for the pace to very slowly change as the creeping dread turns into real horror. It doesn’t really happen, sticking with the very slow - except for the one girl who moves normally through the world - and I would be interested to talk to the director to know what they were going for.

A piece of paper without a black spot on it out of 5.

‘Starlight Express’ at the Starlight Express Theatre, Bochum

Last year, one of my most listened to albums was the original recording of Starlight Express, because along with “Cats” and “Operation Mincemeat”, I would start work and listen to it through on repeat until the end of the day.¹ I was probably unreasonably nervous about which version of the score we would get. This is (as I’m calling it) Newer Starlight Express, but not New New Starlight Express.² This means we get Crazy and Für Immer³ instead of A Lotta Locomotion and Only You, but there’s no hydrogen going on, and control is still a disembodied voice from above. Having listened to it so much, the start of the overture had me oddly emotional.

There’s not actually much to say about Starlight Express. It is a wonderful time with great skating, some interesting use of lighting drones, even in German it drags you along to a place of knowing roughly what’s going on. There’s Arlene Phillips’ death bridge and some skating acrobatics. The Bochum production is, to me, the canonical version of the show - and one whose days are probably numbered when New New Starlight Express gets translated and adapted for the larger purpose-built stage.

Well worth the trip, and I’m glad that after almost 40 years it’s still drawing domestic and international audiences to a small city in the Ruhr valley otherwise known for coal mines.

“A lotta locomotion” out of 5.

Cheltenham & London

A trip down south for my sister’s final show for her BTEC and my mum’s birthday was next, conveniently slotted between two flare-ups of the summer heat wave.

‘Sweeney Todd’ at the Everyman theatre

I’m not sticking a star rating on this, because it would probably seem a little mean and you can’t argue with a schools version of Sweeney Todd almost completely selling out a not insignificant theatre for three performances. As probably can be expected, quality wildly varying depending on whether the cast member is more of a singer or a dancer. Some of it, absolutely wonderful though - in spite of the professional accompaniment which was more than a little ropey and some odd directorial choices.

I haven’t seen a production of Sweeney Todd before, only the various filmed versions, despite it being one of my favourite musical theatre scores. It struck me for the first time quite how uncomfortable the parade of nonchalant murders in the second act made me feel - probably not helped by it being my literal sister being murdered.

“Not the worst pies in London”⁴ out of 5.

‘Redcliffe’ at Southwark Playhouse Borough

Redcliffe probably has a bright future ahead of it, unlike the futures of its protagonists, ‘cause they were killed for some nebulous homosexuality.

Is that too dark?

Probably.

There’s a million things I know
But there’s always room to grow

“A Million Things I Know” from “Redcliffe” by Jordan Luke Gage

In a post from 2020, I talked about how I couldn’t personally work myself up to deeply caring about Black Lives Matter as a movement because one person can’t care about everything or you’d never achieve anything. One of the examples I gave was how in twelve countries homosexual activity is potentially punishable by death. This statistic is quoted in the text in Redcliffe, which merges a 1700s-inspired-by-a-real-story-but-fairly-modern-in-reality romance that turns into just sheer depression in its second act. You can see it coming, because the show isn’t subtle with its foreshadowing, but it’s still hard when the pivot from fun comedy to desperate courtroom drama happens.

Some of the accents are a little more pirate than real Bristol. I find it a little odd that they’ve taken real peoples’ names - William Critchard and Richard Arnold - and basically reinvented their lives to get to a more dramatic version of the real William’s final act of defiance.

It’s a genuine piece of art, but I couldn’t recommended it unless you’re in the zone for it.

“Important” out of 5.

‘Avenue Q’ at the Shaftesbury Theatre

Finally, we have the revival of Avenue Q. It’s really great.

The changes they’ve made to it to make it more contemporary work pretty well. The cast are muppetting their hearts out. Lucy has legs now. Christmas Eve isn’t just a racist caricature. They have a signature mocktail called a Canadian Girlfriend. THEY HAVE A FURRY SAFETY CURTAIN.

I was a little sad we had understudy Trekkie/Nicky, because the current cast is clearly having a huge amount of fun with one another and I wanted to see the full version of “If You Were Gay” facial expressions and all.

“I think this show might be what one does with a BA in English” out of 5.

On the horizon

The King’s Theatre reopens in the next few weeks as I’m writing this, readding a whole venue for theatre to the Edinburgh theatrical scene. I’ve a couple of shows booked for during August, and then something most Thursday evenings until the end of the year. I will probably lose energy with this, but it’s not happening yet so I’m hopeful for it to continue for a while.