Fidel's Cigar

        It is 1958 and Fidel Castro (David Lamb) is making a return to the country whose army exiled him. He meets Che Guevara (Scott Sheridan), a physically weak man with strong ideals on how to depose the ruling army and lead a peasants’ social revolution. Castro, Celia Sanchez (Shubhadra Young) and Che soon captured the hearts of the 11 million Cubans.
       Later Che found that the Bolivians were suffering similar hardships and decided to fight on their behalf. Despite being told by Castro that they had neither the men nor the finances for such a fight, and a stern warning from the Bolivian leader (Matt Levett?) that he was not wanted, Che and his fearless female agent Tania (Hannah Greenwood) led a small army into the damp, disease-ridden jungles of Bolivia. He was captured and executed.
      Castro was determined to rid his island of the American armed presence, and with the help of Khrushchev and the USSR, he succeeded. However, in 1991 when the USSR fell apart, Castro was left to defend an embargoed Cuba alone. Rationing returned and families starved.

There are two stories blended together, to make this fascinating tale, that of Castro and the other of Guevara. The two main actors had astonishing resemblance to the two leaders. Adding the account of Arturo’s (Sean Hawkins) family and the tragic life of his child, Maria Isabel (Shannon Rae) gave more depth to the suffering.
There was a scene of a Santeria (like a black magic exorcism) when Jameli - ??(Chantelle Jamieson) was cleansed.
This review is only touching the surface of the multiple fascinating facets of this show.
The set was a typical Cuban courtyard (designer Tamsin Raistrick), strongly enhanced with inventive lighting design (David Szoka) and newsreel clips from the era. David Presant’s sound design was crisp and added horror and atmosphere to the happenings. There was no nudity, but there were sexual references and realistic graphic violence. The costumes (Michelle Ward) and properties (Bianca Pereira) were well-researched and sourced.
The presentation was a blend of storytelling, AV, quality Latin American singing and dancing (Lisa Scott-Murphy – sorry, but I don’t know who so magnificently played the blue and white dancer / midwife) with fast moving action covering the auditorium, lighting gantry and stage.
This show had many powerful performances, was fast paced and enthralling. It deserved a better-sized audience. High recommended.

This play was particularly complex, covering a period of around 40 years. There were about 16 actors, all with foreign names, so keeping track was a little difficult. I lived through this era, knew most of the characters being portrayed and still found it difficult to keep up, hence the history lesson to help others.

The speed of my review? This play only had a couple of nights left to run, so speed was to their advantage. From my point of view, I start work at 7.15 and so I write the reviews in the morning, before this time. Should I do it later? Perhaps, but there mayl be another show tonight.

Even at this stage, please feel free to write your own comprehensive review, people often add a full review after mine. If you want to write a critique instead of a review – feel free, better still write yours before mine, this show started on the 11^th.

I suspect that the anonymous writers on this site are the jealous or peeved people left out of reviews. I notice this is the first thing that you have written on this site in 3 years of membership - welcome.

You are both right - They are often ADVISED not to take on additional shows outside of their course, but the school cannot stop them doing so if they choose. The advice is often put in a very stern manner leaving the impression that it is an order.

Absit invidia (and DFT :nono:)

Jeff Watkins

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