GBR Occasional Mid-Week Show Review - Richard Herring's Leicester Square Theatre Podcast

The latest leg of my “must go and see more shows” resolution took me and a few friends back to the Leicester Square Theatre for the recording of Richard Herring’s latest podcast. And there was no way There was no way I wasn’t going to enjoy it.

What’s not to love? Richard Herring, Armando Iannucci and Graham Linehan all on stage having a bit of a chinwag, delivering anecdote after anecdote of their comedy careers. Sprinkle in the odd current affairs debate, an ongoing argument on who created Alan Partridge (it was definitely Herring), and a selection of their current favourite tweets, and you have yourself a hell of a Monday evening out.

It left me wondering a couple of things.

First was why Iannucci and Linehan don’t appear in front of camera more often. They’re both hilarious people, but we knew that already. I didn’t realise how well they delivered one liners though. I didn’t know of Armando Iannucci’s capacity for voices and characters (he does a mean impression of the capital letter “P”). I didn’t realise Linehan had quite a stage presence. I suspect the answer for why they don’t appear in front of camera more lies in necessity. Why would they need to put themselves out front, when they can happily spend their time coming up with hilarious stuff and getting paid for it without being recognised too often in McDonald’s?

The second thing I wondered was where Richard Herring’s strengths lie. This is a guy that has never found a medium he doesn’t love. Online or offline, he tries it all, and usually with inventive formats. Few amongst us would have thought a podcast of Richard Herring playing snooker against himself in his basement whilst simultaneously commentating on the game would work. But it does. Cos it’s Richard Herring, and he makes things funny. This was the first time I’d seen him take on the role of interviewer, and he did it pretty well. Kept the conversation going and varied it, brought out some great stories, even inserted his own one-liners without stealing the spotlight.

So why isn’t he more widely appreciated? Why doesn’t he appear with greater regularity in more mass media? I don’t know. I’m not sure he does either.

This was hilarious. And interesting.

Go listen to it now (along with Herring’s other podcasts in the series).

http://www.comedy.co.uk/podcasts/richard_herring_lst_podcast/

GBR Occasional Mid-Week Show Review - The Woman in Black

“We’re off to see The Woman in black next week.”

“Oh, so you’re the ones who haven’t seen it yet.”

Thus was the response of a family friend on hearing of the next instalment of the GBR Occasional Mid-Week Show Review.

First a book, then a West End play, then a film starring Harry Potter, this has gone through a few incarnations. Its decades long stint on the West End has probably raked in a few bob, and with most locals having now seen it at least once (ourselves excluded of course) the crowd was packed mainly with tourists and school trips.

Which was the first problem. There was at least one lot of drama school teens intent on having their own screaming competition. Even at things not intended to scare. The lights going down at the end of a scene elicited a round of shrieks. An inadvertent shadow on stage prompted a few howls. Each followed by a round of giggles. To their credit, it didn’t seem to affect the actors. But it did me. I found myself transformed into the old, disapproving guy at the front of the bus.

That’s not to say there weren’t moments where screams were justified. The reason Mrs GBR and I turned up to this in the first place was because most people we’ve spoken with about it said it is one of the scariest things they’ve seen. And there were one or two (ok, I admit it, three) points where my heart raced and I was begging the actors not to go through the doorway.

But (a little like The Ask in fact) this is a play that’s been mis-sold, and possibly over-sold. Yes, it was scary in parts, but it didn’t have the constant fear and tension I was expecting. Hard to create on stage of course. On screen, it’s easier. Close ups, special effects, hurried glimpses - none of it’s available on stage. Instead, they had to rely on the shock factor - the sudden bang and whatnot - which they employed well. But I won’t go around town telling people this is the scariest thing I’ve ever seen. Possibly the scariest thing I’ve ever seen on stage, but that bar is set rather low.

The strength of the play for me was more in the chemistry of the characters, and the clever way in which they work the stage and the script. There’s only two actors (not including the Woman in Black herself), and they bounce off each other impressively and with energy.

The structure of the play is novel. Not entirely unique - the idea of watching actors on stage pretending to be actors on another stage is replicated in a few places (like Noises Off) - but it’s fun to watch all the same. There were fairly predictable plot developments, and not really any twists that shake you, but it’s tightly written and convincingly delivered, so it certainly holds your attention and keeps you entertained. If it wasn’t for the school trip screaming competition, I’m sure I wouldn’t have rolled my eyes once.

No GBR ratings for the Occasional Mid-Week Show Reviews, but I’d recommend going to see this (if you’re in town and happen to be one of the population not to have seen it yet). It’s a lukewarm recommendation, and be prepared to be annoyed by a school-trip somewhere, but the quality of the acting and the handful of heart racing scares are worth the ticket price.

GBR Occasional Mid-Week Show Review - Noises Off

Blurry poster. Soz.

Time for the next short instalment of the GBR Occasional Mid-Week Show Review (I know you’ve been waiting for this, don’t pretend you haven’t).

Last night saw the third instalment of my resolution to watch more shows this year. It’s the first one I didn’t pick myself, my wife taking the risk of introducing me and a couple of our friends to something new. Well, I say new, it was Noises Off. It’s a show that’s been done for years, but only recently returned to the West End.

It’s comedy farce. Huge amounts of slapstick timing, double entendres, misunderstandings, and physical comedy. Nothing massively new, sure, but it doesn’t need to be. Take an old genre or concept and do it well, and you can end up with something brilliant.

And this was. The characters are huge cartoons, performed with confidence and commitment. They’re packed with personality quirks that build and get funnier as the show goes on, introduced at exactly the right times for maximum effect.

The danger with farce is that it can get boring, I think. It can all be laid out in the first ten minutes, and then slip into repetitiveness. Not here though. The tempo built slowly but surely to a breathless crescendo at the end.

Downsides? Not many to be honest. There was a lot going on at all corners of the stage, so I felt as if I missed some of the funny in places. But can I criticize a show for packing too much in? Frankly, it just makes me want to go back and see it again so I can try and pick up more of the action.

Also, despite watching this from start to end, and talking about it much of the way home, I still can’t figure out why this is called Noises Off. I’m probably being dumb. There’s probably a pretty obvious reason. But again, criticize a show for an opaque name? Nope, not going to do that. Ignore this last paragraph.

I enjoyed this, a lot. If you get a chance, go see it.

Now, what show to see next in my “year of shows”? Think I’m going to rely on a recommendation for the next go. Seemed to work out this time out.

GBR Occasional Mid-Week Show Review - The Fitzrovia Radio Hour

The Fitzrovia gang

That’s right. A year and a couple of months in and I thought it about time to rock your world with a new GBR feature. The occasional mid-week show review.

This is a result of the 2012 edition of my New Year resolutions. I decided to try and go see more shows, at least one a month. After all, I live in one of the cultural capitals of the world, so it seems a bit rude not to get out once in a while.

In January, I went to see Stewart Lee’s stand up show, Carpet Remnant World. It was brilliant. Just brilliant. Go see it if he’s touring with it anywhere near you.

Last night saw Feb’s instalment of my new show-watching quest. I went off to see the Fitzrovia Radio Hour. Two shows in to the resolution, I got to thinking “if only there was some way to tell people about these shows, encourage them to go see the ones I enjoy and warn them off the ones I don’t.” And then of course I remembered my 2011 New Year resolution, which was to start a blog.

And thus was born the GBR Occasional Mid-Week Show Review. *ta-daaa!*

I’ll keep it short - we’re all busy people and this isn’t a Sunday after all.

The Fitzrovia Radio Hour sees five performers don period evening wear and perform a series 1940s/50s short radio plays in front of a live studio audience. It’s complete with a mind-boggling array of sound effects emanating from all sorts of fruits and household objects.



Action!



I loved the idea, so I was kind of predisposed to liking this before I sat down. And I wasn’t disappointed. The performers were amazing. They built on the scripts with off-mike farce. Comical expressions, a sprinkling of slapstick, and a dollop of double-entendres had us chuckling and clapping even when they weren’t holding up the “applause sign.”

My one worry was that it may drag a little. It’s a radio show after all. But the energy on stage was relentless and left me a little out of breath by the end. There was so much going on and the performances were so tight that my eyes darted back and forth for the duration.

I thought I’d love this because it’d be so quintessentially British and period. I thought it’d create the sort of atmosphere that’d have me coming over all Agatha Christie. And it did. But that’s only half the story.

Go see this if you can.

No GBR rating for these show reviews though I’m afraid. After all, they’re not books, right?