Theatre and Issue 568

Unconquered, The

Betts on two horses

29 Jan 2007

Steve Cramer Tell me a little about the origins of The Unconquered. The central character’s a girl, I understand, who is brutalised for standing up to reactionary forces?

Stage Whispers

29 Jan 2007

There’s something about a Robert LePage production which is quintessentially of its director/devisor. One need only sit for a few minutes in a LePage production to see its strengths shining through as the product of a particular mind working with…

Baby Balloon

Tron Theatre, Glasgow, Tue 6-Sat 10 Feb; North Edi

29 Jan 2007

TODDLER THEATRE Parents sneaking out the door with a crying baby is a familiar sight at children’s theatre shows. Dragged along with an older sibling to a show too scary, confusing or just downright dull for tiny tots to endure, toddlers aren’t…

Risk

Tron, Glasgow, Thu 8-Sat 10 Feb, then touring

29 Jan 2007

NEW WORK If you believe what you see and hear in the media, there are gangs of hoodies lurking around every street corner in Britain these days. In truth, of course, teenagers have always been demonised for the kind of mischief that they get up to.

Another Little Piece of My Heart

Oran Mor, Glasgow, Mon 5-Sat 10 Feb

29 Jan 2007

NEW WRITING ‘Long live Janis Joplin.’ With this declaration, Suzy, one of the two central characters in Liz Lochhead’s new piece nails her colours to the mast. Now, before we go into the various clichés about flowers in hair, or untimely ends, bear…

The Rise and Fall of Little Voice

29 Jan 2007

REVIVAL Judy Garland said to her daughter: ‘Be a first rate version of yourself, not a second rate version of someone else.’ The title character of Little Voice seems to have it the wrong way round; she’s unsure of herself but first rate at imitating…

* Hitlist

Hitlist

29 Jan 2007

All My Sons Arthur Miller’s early classic is given a high quality revival at the Lyceum under the direction of John Dove. The story of an ostensibly ordinary American bourgeois family with a secret connected to the tragic loss of their son, this piece…

Bevellers, The

The Bevellers

29 Jan 2007

REVIVAL No amount of ‘City of Culture’ or ‘Glasgow Smiles Better’ labels can conceal the stereotypical view of Scotland’s largest city. This less than perfect reputation runs deeper than sovereign-wearing bams swallying Buckie. As a follow up to…

The Ministry of Burlesque presents High Tease

29 Jan 2007

CABARET Burlesque, a word used with some specificity by this six-year-old company, is a quite separate form from music hall or vaudeville although it has many traditions in common. Granted, many of the turns are the same - comics, singing, dancing…

Charley's Aunt

Theatre Royal, Glasgow, Mon 12-Sat 17 Feb, then to

29 Jan 2007

WEST END TOUR It’s probably to the detriment of Brandon Thomas’ Charley’s Aunt that, a couple of years after its premiere in 1892, another play featuring two young men willing to engage in a bit of deception and disguise in order to gull elderly…

Caucasion Chalk Circle

Dundee Rep, until Sat 3 Feb

29 Jan 2007

CLASSIC We’ve got so wrapped up with having our own National Theatre in Scotland that we’ve been apt to forget of recent times that there’s also a pretty formidable one south of the border, still obliged by its remit to visit us once in a while. The…

Woman in Black, The

The Woman in Black

29 Jan 2007

WEST END TOUR These days, the reckoning of the commercial sector in the theatre runs that if it isn’t a musical, it won’t play. Yet, the living, breathing, if at the same time undead contradiction to this truism still seems to have ghostly legs…