Britannicus
Sat, 17 Nov 2001, 12:30 pmLeah Maher10 posts in thread
Britannicus
Sat, 17 Nov 2001, 12:30 pmOK Amanda, you asked for it;
Britannicus
Friday 16 November 2001
The Blue Room Studio, Northbridge (that's in Perth)
Naked Emotion, directed by David Meadows
Out of respect for David Meadows and completely secure in the knowlege that he would do the same for (to?) me, I am going to wite a completely honest reveiw of Britannicus. The following represents the veiw only of the author. Feel free to let fly with that mud.
Britannicus is real theatre. Theatre at it's core and most basic form. People, words, a story. No big fancy box set and flouncy costuming self conciously distracting the audience from the actors. It is an actors peice, stark and uncompromising.
And it was done very very well. It is a heavy peice, and while I loved it to death, if it had gone on any longer than an hour I beleive it would have started to lose some of it's audience. The translation is wonderful, lyrical and at times harsh. It never lost me once, but you have to listen all the time. It does not allow you to relax in your concentration and as such it's a little bit tiring. And people, READ THE "THE PLAY" BLURB ON THE PROGRAM, otherwise you won't have a hope in hell of following what is going on.
While the actors all aquitted themselves just marvellously, I did have a few small quibbles and one very large one. Angelique Malcolm was just perfect as the highly strung and guilt ridden Agrippina but the echo in the studio made it difficult to understand her when she spoke both loudly and quickly at the same time. I think I lost about half of one of her scenes simply through bad accoustics. Amanda Chesterton was beautiful (and the clevage crown is very safe) but I felt that in a peice which was striving for naturalism and unity in movement, some of her actions and movements where stiff and jerky. They stood out from the other actors and it was distracting. As soon as she walked on you felt the whole audience think "Dancer" at the same time.
My large quibble should not be interpreted as a critisism of the actor involved, but the casting. I love Anthony Harwoods' work. I never saw him in anything he didn't shine in and a lot of times, almost steal. Until last night. I felt he was very miscast as Nero. I know how he hates to be type cast as the nice one, and the best friend, but he looks so sweet and audiences just like him instantly, and trust him. I just didn't get the seeds of the tyranny and madness that were to follow in Nero from him. At the end in the reportage scene and the final haunting and beautiful moment of his mother attempting to assure herself that he would be alright, the horror at his actions didn't seem justified by the charcter we had had presented to us.
This was never more evident than in the scene between June and Nero. Amanda was just too strong. She stood like a compass point while Nero flapped around her. The total impression was one of her strength and his ineffectuality (OK, probably not a word), which put June in a position of power that just didn't work in the context of the story. This may be what David was going for, I don't know, but it didn't make any sense to me, particularly as in the cast list June is listed as "a pawn".
The other actors were great. Mark Blades was slimey and smug, Keziah Gillam sort of seemed to serve as the audience point of view. I'm not sure if this was the point. If she was supposed to be a trouble maker, I didn't really see that. Tony Petani was very hip tragic hero (although I didn't feel the chemistry was altogether there between himself and June after the huge beat up their perfect love had been given) and the great director himself was, as far as I was concerned, in danger of stealing the show, (small though his part was), by his utterly realistic portrayal of a small minded beaurocrat (and it wasn't just the costume. Seriously, think of a stereotypical public servant and double it. Where on earth did you get those glasses, David?). I have always admired David for his sense of stillness and utter reality; a feeling that he was allowing the audience to come to him, not going to them.
The direction made for a natural and completely unself concious peice. I was a little confused though as to why Nero faced the wall in the poisening scene, particularly when much was made of his facial expression at the time. I would have liked to see his face. I also didn't like the way Narcissus moved in the same scene. I understand the reportage was supposed to be played out mechanically, but the contrast of the way Britannicus had acted out his part of the story and the was Narcissus did was a little jarring.
The best compliment I can give this show was that it was just so good I felt that it deserved careful and long thought by every member of the audience. I myself am still thinking about it; about how seven actors, dressed in almost all black on an almost completely blank stage could have kept me mesmerised for an hour; but it did, competely. The ensamble is seamless, the acting is great, the story is interesting and it's just so very brave. Go and see it.
And, as I feel it is a peice that derverves lengthly and serious discussion, come back to your computers afterwards and disagree with me. Please.
Britannicus
Friday 16 November 2001
The Blue Room Studio, Northbridge (that's in Perth)
Naked Emotion, directed by David Meadows
Out of respect for David Meadows and completely secure in the knowlege that he would do the same for (to?) me, I am going to wite a completely honest reveiw of Britannicus. The following represents the veiw only of the author. Feel free to let fly with that mud.
Britannicus is real theatre. Theatre at it's core and most basic form. People, words, a story. No big fancy box set and flouncy costuming self conciously distracting the audience from the actors. It is an actors peice, stark and uncompromising.
And it was done very very well. It is a heavy peice, and while I loved it to death, if it had gone on any longer than an hour I beleive it would have started to lose some of it's audience. The translation is wonderful, lyrical and at times harsh. It never lost me once, but you have to listen all the time. It does not allow you to relax in your concentration and as such it's a little bit tiring. And people, READ THE "THE PLAY" BLURB ON THE PROGRAM, otherwise you won't have a hope in hell of following what is going on.
While the actors all aquitted themselves just marvellously, I did have a few small quibbles and one very large one. Angelique Malcolm was just perfect as the highly strung and guilt ridden Agrippina but the echo in the studio made it difficult to understand her when she spoke both loudly and quickly at the same time. I think I lost about half of one of her scenes simply through bad accoustics. Amanda Chesterton was beautiful (and the clevage crown is very safe) but I felt that in a peice which was striving for naturalism and unity in movement, some of her actions and movements where stiff and jerky. They stood out from the other actors and it was distracting. As soon as she walked on you felt the whole audience think "Dancer" at the same time.
My large quibble should not be interpreted as a critisism of the actor involved, but the casting. I love Anthony Harwoods' work. I never saw him in anything he didn't shine in and a lot of times, almost steal. Until last night. I felt he was very miscast as Nero. I know how he hates to be type cast as the nice one, and the best friend, but he looks so sweet and audiences just like him instantly, and trust him. I just didn't get the seeds of the tyranny and madness that were to follow in Nero from him. At the end in the reportage scene and the final haunting and beautiful moment of his mother attempting to assure herself that he would be alright, the horror at his actions didn't seem justified by the charcter we had had presented to us.
This was never more evident than in the scene between June and Nero. Amanda was just too strong. She stood like a compass point while Nero flapped around her. The total impression was one of her strength and his ineffectuality (OK, probably not a word), which put June in a position of power that just didn't work in the context of the story. This may be what David was going for, I don't know, but it didn't make any sense to me, particularly as in the cast list June is listed as "a pawn".
The other actors were great. Mark Blades was slimey and smug, Keziah Gillam sort of seemed to serve as the audience point of view. I'm not sure if this was the point. If she was supposed to be a trouble maker, I didn't really see that. Tony Petani was very hip tragic hero (although I didn't feel the chemistry was altogether there between himself and June after the huge beat up their perfect love had been given) and the great director himself was, as far as I was concerned, in danger of stealing the show, (small though his part was), by his utterly realistic portrayal of a small minded beaurocrat (and it wasn't just the costume. Seriously, think of a stereotypical public servant and double it. Where on earth did you get those glasses, David?). I have always admired David for his sense of stillness and utter reality; a feeling that he was allowing the audience to come to him, not going to them.
The direction made for a natural and completely unself concious peice. I was a little confused though as to why Nero faced the wall in the poisening scene, particularly when much was made of his facial expression at the time. I would have liked to see his face. I also didn't like the way Narcissus moved in the same scene. I understand the reportage was supposed to be played out mechanically, but the contrast of the way Britannicus had acted out his part of the story and the was Narcissus did was a little jarring.
The best compliment I can give this show was that it was just so good I felt that it deserved careful and long thought by every member of the audience. I myself am still thinking about it; about how seven actors, dressed in almost all black on an almost completely blank stage could have kept me mesmerised for an hour; but it did, competely. The ensamble is seamless, the acting is great, the story is interesting and it's just so very brave. Go and see it.
And, as I feel it is a peice that derverves lengthly and serious discussion, come back to your computers afterwards and disagree with me. Please.
RE: Britannicus
Sat, 1 Dec 2001, 05:16 pmI saw a very brave performance to an extremely small house on Thursday night. (The only reason I could be there was because we cancelled our performance that same night due to poor bookingsÂ…Thursday nights leading up to Xmas in Perth are just not a viable option, it would seem.) And it doesnÂ’t help that audiences from the earlier performance, Savage Grace, are too exhausted by that show to want to attend another difficult tragedy on the same night...
ItÂ’s never easy to perform for a disappointing house, but there still seemed to be a good energy coming from the players, so I imagine it would be even stronger on a good night.
A few criticisms could be largely excused by the very poor acoustics in the venue, although some seemed to cope better than others. I often find it difficult to follow ‘classic’ texts anyway, it takes me a while to attune to the language, and so I really struggled early on to make sense of the story when the clarity of the text was lost in the harsh acoustic reverberation. (Also, I was personally hot, tired, and not able to concentrate as well as I perhaps should have, so I am loathe to criticize the show too much for what might’ve been my fault as an unfocussed audience member.)
The other venue problem was the banging door to the outside hall, but once I accepted that as an inevitable glitch I tended to ignore it. It was less distracting to hear crowd noise outside the venue each time it opened, then it was to hear actors going “SSHHH” and reminding me that the noise wasn’t meant to be there. It only drew attention to the problem.
I thought Mark Blades made every effort to allow me to understand every word; and David Meadows, although much softer-spoken, was also very clear and natural. A very truthful, unadorned performance.
I had a bit of trouble in some of Tony Petani’s lines…they sounded muffled, but I don’t think that was because of any mumbling on his part. It just seems to be a danger for him with softer, deeper bass tones to his voice (say as opposed to Angelique or Mark, with higher, sharper registers) in the resonance of that hall. If I could EQ his voice I’d be saying, “turn up the treble”; so he needs to be aware of the extra effort needed for clarity. But I liked his character of Britannicus (although I must admit to being confused for much of the play about the specific plot agendas, the characterization and personal moments all seemed to ring true.)
Amanda Chesterton was convincing as June, the love interest but political pawn. I got the gist of her tragic turmoil, but I didn’t quite understand the extent of her relationship with Brittanicus (I told you, I was finding it hard to concentrate on text). There was a ‘coolness’ between them that made it difficult for me to understand the extent of the tragedy; I guess I was expecting a passion that just didn’t seem to emerge. Or was that the point?
Likewise, Angelique Malcolm was well cast as Agrippina, mother of the emperor, caught in the political schemes. I got a good sense of a woman trying to manipulate her circumstances but never able to control or trust her family; strong and scheming herself, but ultimately powerless to her tyrannical son. Unfortunately, as mentioned before, poor acoustics and the need to concentrate on the language in her opening speech meant I lost a bit of the gist early on, but she was much stronger once my ear was more attuned.
Keziah Gillam was competent and clear, but just not a character that really stood out in comparison to the others on stage. A hard role for an actor, adequately handled, and always giving clear support to the other more dominant characters.
I didnÂ’t have a problem with Anthony Harwoods' casting as Nero. Maybe heÂ’s developed his character since Leah saw the show? But he fit my image of a spoilt brat emperor being young and not-so-outwardly a tyrant, but abusing his power nonetheless.
So I didnÂ’t mind the scene dynamics of Nero and June, when AmandaÂ’s character status seemed stronger than NeroÂ’s. The point is that Nero held the power, regardless of the lesser strength of character, which just made June more tragic.
I did find a few staging moments a bit odd. When Nero is sliming up to June and invading her personal space I got a sense of two dancers showing me the emotion rather than two characters actually feeling the scene. And there were a few moments where actors turned their back to the person they were speaking to that made me think of the classic TV soap climax before we cut to an ad break. I also donÂ’t know why Nero was facing upstage for his whole speech near the end. Fine to start that way, creating tension, but disappointing for me as an audience not to see the actorÂ’s face as the tension built/developed.
I thought the opening poses were all very interesting and contributed well to introducing the characters, and I really liked the style that emerged toward the end, of several scenes happening at once, split across the stage. But there wasnÂ’t enough of this style throughout the bulk of the play. I wouldÂ’ve liked to see more staging like this.
ItÂ’s certainly not an easy play, and the venue leaves much to be desired, but I agree that there is a lot worth going to see.
Craig
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