Picasso at the Lapin Agile - Leece's Rambling Reviews
Sun, 19 June 2005, 01:23 amWalter Plinge3 posts in thread
Picasso at the Lapin Agile - Leece's Rambling Reviews
Sun, 19 June 2005, 01:23 amPicasso at the Lapin Agile - Leece's Rambling Review.
Black Yak does a wonderful job with a wonderful script.
Picasso at the Lapin Agile had its last night tonight, and we were
lucky enough to be there. Well, not so much lucky as in getting bounced
a Black Yak newsletter by Poss, describing it and thinking "Well,
this sounds really cool, better go see it." Black Yak doesn't need my
plugging this, seeing as it was the last night, but I'm going to anyway.
The first thing was that people who'd booked early in groups got to sit
at caberet style tables, where you could devour munchies with drinks from
the bar. If you were wondering which we were, we were the table with the
most food. I very much approve of plays where you can eat and drink -
makes it a much more enjoyable experience.
Thanks to El's review we knew to rug up warm, the Sun Room isn't far off
the Rechabites's for -Kelvin degrees. The coffee and tea was also great
to have, thanks for arranging that, folks, it went down really well.
But you want to know about the play itself, that's why you're reading
this. The script was bright, funny, clever, pointed and witty. The actors
shone. I and the rest of the audience was rivetted. Lovely accents too,
can't fault them, but not so as to be unintelligible.
I am an artist, (and I'll argue that everyone is as long as you like)
and parts of this play left me gasping...a combination of the original
material and the passion of Samuel Osborne's depiction of Picasso spoke to
me in truths shining, shining.
This was written by Steve Martin, wow, I'd like to see more plays from him,
this was brilliant. It's created more of a warmth in my heart than Travesties ever did, and I like Stoppard!
Why isn't this performed more often? Sure, having a little knowlege
of the age and the personalities certainly would give a regular viewer
more out of the play but a thoughtful theatre company would give you
that in the programme (oh look! they did!)
Anyone can appreciate the lovely scene as Enstein snorts his drink through
his nose when Germaine, played with understated wry humour by Sherryl Spencer predicts amongst other things "The city of Hiroshima will be completely *modernised*!
I certainly agree with El's opinion of Elvis's depiction of Nick Donald...er
I mean Nick Donald's performance, very impressive. Wonderful expressions
on his face throughout his time on the stage.
Barry Carpenter's study of Freddy was really excellent, laid back and
restrained most of the time, some sharp comic moments and
moments every now and then which are umistakeably
the ones which Geramaine likes to be with him for.
Enstein is played with sympathy and humour by Stuart Porter...who
does very amusing things with the blackboard, and a laught that has
to be heard to believed. The scarey thing is that it doesnt' sound
forced!
Isabelle Jeneve's Suzanne is warm and at times firey Gallic
passion and others waif like, and charming all the way. Schmendimen,
larger, unfortunately than life makes us wince and maybe feel a little
pity, if not for him, then for the people he's inflicting himself on, but
Troy Hall also manages to spark a little warmth in us towards him.
Anna Krakowski's Countess was lovely, demure and refined, and walked with an
aristocrat's unstudied grace and poise. Megan Riley, how she did such a
great job of stage managing while also being the sweet young ingenue,
great when she realises Picasso, is not in fact, who she thought.
As an artist I didn't actually have that much of a problem with Sagot,
he seems positively moral when compared to some of the horror stories I
have heard about art dealers. Heck, at least in this play he's actually
PAYING artists, better than some I've heard of. *dark look* And I really
liked Robert Whyte's performance, just the right amount of enlightened
self interest and a lovely spark of humourous $ympathy when the lover$
tiff occur$, and hi$ thumb$ up to the victor i$ pricele$$.
Elliot McCann gave music which didn't need a time machine to send us
to Paris, the Wild West (Mmm! Loved that "DRAW!" scene)
or to Memphis, an excellent score.
The amazing Tim directed this, and seems to have done an amazing job of bringing forth the souls of these half imagined legenary figure through to us with their sometimes contradictory shining truths. Contradictory you say?
Oh, go see Rashimon and then get back to me if you still want to argue.
I won't be here, but you're sure to find some one around here to argue with.
:-)
Some tricky bits with lighting, all capably and atmospherically dealt with
by Nick Donald, who must have access to some sort of time machine to
have given us such a good performance and great lighting too! This must've
been borrowed by Leonie Briggs, to produce such a convincingly turn
of the century wardrobe!
All of the cast are to be commended with the discreet and unaffected way
that they dealt with an unexpected fall from the bar of the wooden mannequin, dealt with entirely naturalistically, and barely caused a blip in the performance. No one was rattled by it. Well played!
There was a definite albeit invisible barrier between the real set and the
audience tables, which was a good thing, otherwise audience members might
try to order from the stage bar! I liked the set very much, very, from one
who's never been there, Parisian cafe. Thanks to Anna, Tim and Barry!
Nooo it's not like they were doing anything else, like, say acting
and directing...Look, don't these people ever sleep?!
Sherrie Peta has great forbearance to submit her Van-Gogh influenced
sheep/strange women painting to ridicule, and Andrea Berry's Picasso
forgery was striking, immediatley recognisable and well executed.
Anita Howard made it all come together in the right places for them all.
One time during the last part of the performance was slightly marring,
loud, resonant footsteps down the left hand side of the theatre.
I don't know if it was audience or crew related, but it was certainly
distinctive! It didn't last long, though, but might be something to watch
out for at future performances at this venue.
It was pretty cold too, towards the back where we were, but we'd been warned, and were well rugged up, but apart from that, I've one thing to say:
If you have access to a time machine or can pierce the 4th dimension
in other ways, I suggest that you go see the performance I was at.
Hmm. It seems that a lot of people took my advice, because it was pretty
much a full house. And deservedly so. Well done folks.
This review can also be found on http://www.lympago.com/cgi-bin/Blah/Blah.pl?b=playreview,m=1119115383,s=0
What I do in the real world http://www.cafepress.com/aliciasmith
Thou lumpish weather-bitten lewdster!
Black Yak does a wonderful job with a wonderful script.
Picasso at the Lapin Agile had its last night tonight, and we were
lucky enough to be there. Well, not so much lucky as in getting bounced
a Black Yak newsletter by Poss, describing it and thinking "Well,
this sounds really cool, better go see it." Black Yak doesn't need my
plugging this, seeing as it was the last night, but I'm going to anyway.
The first thing was that people who'd booked early in groups got to sit
at caberet style tables, where you could devour munchies with drinks from
the bar. If you were wondering which we were, we were the table with the
most food. I very much approve of plays where you can eat and drink -
makes it a much more enjoyable experience.
Thanks to El's review we knew to rug up warm, the Sun Room isn't far off
the Rechabites's for -Kelvin degrees. The coffee and tea was also great
to have, thanks for arranging that, folks, it went down really well.
But you want to know about the play itself, that's why you're reading
this. The script was bright, funny, clever, pointed and witty. The actors
shone. I and the rest of the audience was rivetted. Lovely accents too,
can't fault them, but not so as to be unintelligible.
I am an artist, (and I'll argue that everyone is as long as you like)
and parts of this play left me gasping...a combination of the original
material and the passion of Samuel Osborne's depiction of Picasso spoke to
me in truths shining, shining.
This was written by Steve Martin, wow, I'd like to see more plays from him,
this was brilliant. It's created more of a warmth in my heart than Travesties ever did, and I like Stoppard!
Why isn't this performed more often? Sure, having a little knowlege
of the age and the personalities certainly would give a regular viewer
more out of the play but a thoughtful theatre company would give you
that in the programme (oh look! they did!)
Anyone can appreciate the lovely scene as Enstein snorts his drink through
his nose when Germaine, played with understated wry humour by Sherryl Spencer predicts amongst other things "The city of Hiroshima will be completely *modernised*!
I certainly agree with El's opinion of Elvis's depiction of Nick Donald...er
I mean Nick Donald's performance, very impressive. Wonderful expressions
on his face throughout his time on the stage.
Barry Carpenter's study of Freddy was really excellent, laid back and
restrained most of the time, some sharp comic moments and
moments every now and then which are umistakeably
the ones which Geramaine likes to be with him for.
Enstein is played with sympathy and humour by Stuart Porter...who
does very amusing things with the blackboard, and a laught that has
to be heard to believed. The scarey thing is that it doesnt' sound
forced!
Isabelle Jeneve's Suzanne is warm and at times firey Gallic
passion and others waif like, and charming all the way. Schmendimen,
larger, unfortunately than life makes us wince and maybe feel a little
pity, if not for him, then for the people he's inflicting himself on, but
Troy Hall also manages to spark a little warmth in us towards him.
Anna Krakowski's Countess was lovely, demure and refined, and walked with an
aristocrat's unstudied grace and poise. Megan Riley, how she did such a
great job of stage managing while also being the sweet young ingenue,
great when she realises Picasso, is not in fact, who she thought.
As an artist I didn't actually have that much of a problem with Sagot,
he seems positively moral when compared to some of the horror stories I
have heard about art dealers. Heck, at least in this play he's actually
PAYING artists, better than some I've heard of. *dark look* And I really
liked Robert Whyte's performance, just the right amount of enlightened
self interest and a lovely spark of humourous $ympathy when the lover$
tiff occur$, and hi$ thumb$ up to the victor i$ pricele$$.
Elliot McCann gave music which didn't need a time machine to send us
to Paris, the Wild West (Mmm! Loved that "DRAW!" scene)
or to Memphis, an excellent score.
The amazing Tim directed this, and seems to have done an amazing job of bringing forth the souls of these half imagined legenary figure through to us with their sometimes contradictory shining truths. Contradictory you say?
Oh, go see Rashimon and then get back to me if you still want to argue.
I won't be here, but you're sure to find some one around here to argue with.
:-)
Some tricky bits with lighting, all capably and atmospherically dealt with
by Nick Donald, who must have access to some sort of time machine to
have given us such a good performance and great lighting too! This must've
been borrowed by Leonie Briggs, to produce such a convincingly turn
of the century wardrobe!
All of the cast are to be commended with the discreet and unaffected way
that they dealt with an unexpected fall from the bar of the wooden mannequin, dealt with entirely naturalistically, and barely caused a blip in the performance. No one was rattled by it. Well played!
There was a definite albeit invisible barrier between the real set and the
audience tables, which was a good thing, otherwise audience members might
try to order from the stage bar! I liked the set very much, very, from one
who's never been there, Parisian cafe. Thanks to Anna, Tim and Barry!
Nooo it's not like they were doing anything else, like, say acting
and directing...Look, don't these people ever sleep?!
Sherrie Peta has great forbearance to submit her Van-Gogh influenced
sheep/strange women painting to ridicule, and Andrea Berry's Picasso
forgery was striking, immediatley recognisable and well executed.
Anita Howard made it all come together in the right places for them all.
One time during the last part of the performance was slightly marring,
loud, resonant footsteps down the left hand side of the theatre.
I don't know if it was audience or crew related, but it was certainly
distinctive! It didn't last long, though, but might be something to watch
out for at future performances at this venue.
It was pretty cold too, towards the back where we were, but we'd been warned, and were well rugged up, but apart from that, I've one thing to say:
If you have access to a time machine or can pierce the 4th dimension
in other ways, I suggest that you go see the performance I was at.
Hmm. It seems that a lot of people took my advice, because it was pretty
much a full house. And deservedly so. Well done folks.
This review can also be found on http://www.lympago.com/cgi-bin/Blah/Blah.pl?b=playreview,m=1119115383,s=0
What I do in the real world http://www.cafepress.com/aliciasmith
Thou lumpish weather-bitten lewdster!
Re: Picasso at the Lapin Agile - Leece's Rambling Reviews
Wed, 22 June 2005, 07:55 pmWalter Plinge
You're right, I did forget: I try to write my reviews as quickly as possible after the experience, so it was 1:30 by the time I posted, and for some reason in my euphoric but overtired state I must have missed him. (Gods know how, his performance was memorable indeed!) Mea Culpa!
Ahem, so what I should have said was: Sean Haining, who played Gaston was the epitome of the Parisian grumpy old man. For some reason, I don't quite know why, reminds me very much of scenes in The Triplets of Belleville.
Earthy, humourous (although apparent unaware of his own levity) with a sardonic twist, he is the reminder of mortality and human bodily frailty. But he also reminds that we do not need to go gently into that good night.
He was great! You were all great! Loved it!
Thou yeasty fen-sucked barnacle!
Ahem, so what I should have said was: Sean Haining, who played Gaston was the epitome of the Parisian grumpy old man. For some reason, I don't quite know why, reminds me very much of scenes in The Triplets of Belleville.
Earthy, humourous (although apparent unaware of his own levity) with a sardonic twist, he is the reminder of mortality and human bodily frailty. But he also reminds that we do not need to go gently into that good night.
He was great! You were all great! Loved it!
Thou yeasty fen-sucked barnacle!