Author Archives: Sekenbanashi

Funny Girl

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Funny Girl

11 December 2015 (Fri), Menier Chocolate Factory

This is the first big-time revival of the show since its initial run in the mid 1960s, meaning anyone who saw it as a teenager then would now be retirement age. The first question on anyone’s mind is: who’s going to play Barbra? Streisand’s long shadow over the role makes casting extremely tricky; the aborted attempt at a revival a few years ago in the US was to star a Streisand impersonator from Glee, which would have been a disaster – why get a second-hand Barbra instead of a first-rate something else? The situation applies as well to London, where Streisand repeated her success after her sensational Broadway run and just before the hugely popular movie. While it’s true the show ran for a year-and-a-half on Broadway after Streisand left (with the wonderful Mimi Hines), that was before Barbra became a legend and diva nonpareil with the film, to the extent that many people think that the show and songs were written specifically for her (they weren’t). I don’t think even Fanny Brice herself could be cast these days. So when tickets for the revival by the estimable Menier Chocolate Factory went on sale, the entire run was snapped up within 90 minutes by audiences curious to see the original musical and the actress who dared take on La Barbra. The show was announced for a West End transfer before it even opened, which signals a lot of confidence on the part of the producers. I managed with difficulty to snare a seat on a Friday night. Yeah, I was excited. Even this theater’s usual pitiful printed program didn’t dampen things.

The actress who sparked all the excitement was Sheridan Smith, a blonde British shiksa who’s about as far from a Jewish Brooklyn girl as high tea from gefilte fish. Even given the impressive range in her career – her two Oliviers are for Legally Blonde and Terence Rattigan’s wartime-era Flare Path­ – this one seemed a stretch. Still, the word was good, and I was ready for anything. Continue reading →

Pericles (Globe)

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Pericles

11 December 2015 (Fri), Sam Wanamaker Theatre

This was the latest staging at the candlelit Sam Wanamaker Theatre, the first in a series exploring Shakespeare’s four late romances. I can see why this is a lesser known play. It skates perilously on the line between far-fetched and ridiculous: shipwrecks abound, a dead body in a trunk fished from the sea is revived, armor lost at sea washes up on the shore with perfect timing, Pericles miraculously discovers his long-lost daughter (presumed dead) who then discovers her own long-lost mother (also presumed dead), all of whom happen to have ended up on the same sparsely populated island. Shakespeare has never shied from allowing magic and coincidence to do his work for him, but he really got carried away in this one. Maybe that had to do with his collaborator; the excellent program says that George Wilkins wrote the first part and Shakespeare the final three acts. In any case, it led to unintended laughter in the audience in some scenes, such as when the dead woman awakens or when the long-separated family find themselves improbably reunited. It must be hard to say those lines with a straight face. Continue reading →

Sunny Afternoon

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Sunny Afternoon

9 December 2015 (Wed), West End

This was a jukebox musical built around the music of The Kinks, but it was all effectively new for me since I don’t really know the group. The songs are sung in many cases as character material, which worked to an extent. The story was a bit by the numbers and not overly compelling, but it moved along smoothly enough. Continue reading →

Hangmen

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Hangmen

9 December 2015 (Wed), West End

Talk about gallows humor. This is the first new McDonagh play in London in a long while and the first to be set outside of Ireland. He is back to form and then some, scabrous and witty and outrageous. Continue reading →

The Mikado (ENO)

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The Mikado

6 December 2015 (Sun), ENO

I had loved this production four years earlier, and it was just as good the second time around – better, in fact, since I could read the subtitles this time, which helped immeasurably (I wonder if this is how Italians feel listening to opera). Great sets, colorful costumes, broad bright comedy, whimsical choreography, nutty elements like the headless waiters – this production really has it all. Continue reading →

The Homecoming

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The Homecoming

5 December 2015 (Sat), London Trafalgar Studios

A little Pinter goes long way with me, but this was the one play that my friend and I could agree on; I felt I should see it at some point anyway. As with most Pinter plays, it’s too stylized and obscure to make much sense, though the characterizations on their own were interesting. A brother, who has gone off to the US, brings his wife home for the first time after years of marriage and introduces her to his misogynistic widower dad, his hopeless two brothers and his chauffeur uncle. Thrown in the middle of a bullying, macho, frat-type environment, the wife uses her sexual wiles to manipulate all and gain control. Continue reading →

Farinelli and the King

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Farinelli and the King

5 December 2015 (Sat), West End

This was one tough ticket. I had tried for seats several times from Tokyo, but had only managed to get a standing-room seat for the evening show (and even those were eventually sold out). I went to the box office in the morning to see if I could find something better, and ended up snagging not just a seat but a house seat for the matinee – this was apparently the final day of performances, so the producers must have been holding back a number of tickets just in case. Great luck. And I even managed to sell my standing-room ticket to an extremely grateful guy. So all’s well that ends well. Continue reading →

Tonya Pinkins: I’m every black woman

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Hilarious: It seems that the actress Tonya Pinkins dropped out of a New York production of the classic Mother Courage because, as she puts it, her “perspective as a Black woman was dismissed in favor of portraying the Black woman, through the filter of the White gaze”. The production, which has a white director, had been reset to the Congo in contemporary times. I don’t know much about the production, or about the Congo for that matter. But from an Asian perspective, I find it funny that Pinkins thinks that because she’s female and black, she has special insight into the feelings of a Congolese woman trapped in a brutal war. Is there some Black gene that makes all black women worldwide think and feel the same way? I wonder if the fictional woman would even think of herself as “black” given that virtually the entire population of her country is the same; surely she would find her identity elsewhere. Continue reading →

Company

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Archives: Company

17 November 2006 (Fri), Broadway

A revival (still in previews) of the Sondheim classic directed by John Doyle, the English director known for his minimalist approach in which the cast members play all the instruments. I didn’t want to miss this show, one of my all-time favorites, so I ordered the tickets from Tokyo rather than waiting for the half-price booth. I wasn’t taking any chances. I went with a friend who was seeing the show for the first time.

The previous year’s Sweeney Todd, which used the same actor/musician technique, was a revelation. While it hardly replaced the traditional version, it certainly provided a fresh perspective on the show. (Whether it would be enjoyable without having seen the original is an open question.) Company, being an abstract series of loosely related sequences rather than a proper narrative, seemed like an even more appropriate choice for this technique. The various couples interact with other couples in song but not in narrative scenes other than the birthday party that frames the show; that is, outside their specific vignettes, the characters are for the most part commenting on the action rather than participating in it directly. I figured that the use of instruments would work perfectly within this context, providing another means of commenting on the story.

The results were not what I had expected. Continue reading →

The Lieutenant of Inishmore (English/Japanese)

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Archives: The Lieutenant of Inishmore

29 April 2006 (Sat), Broadway

Wild black comedy by Irish dramatist Martin McDonaugh, author of the memorable Beauty Queen of Leenane and The Pillowman. This show considerably ups the gruesome quotient with the most blood I’ve ever seen spilled on stage. An Irish terrorist discovers that his beloved cat has been run over, and utter mayhem breaks loose as he seeks his revenge. Continue reading →