The Land of the Living

“DISSONANCE FOR DUMMIES may not sound like an appealing description for a concert, but yesterday at the Southbank Centre, the 45 minute rendition of Stravinsky\'s Rite of Spring was preceded by a playful deconstruction of the genesis of this piece making an otherwise complex piece more open. The playful deconstruction was in fact a classical music masterclass split up in humorous sound bites made easily digestible for the most impatient of learners. It was a real success. Looking around, the listeners turned students couldn\'t get enough. Once the actual piece started, the crowd was ready, engaged, and all stayed till the very end (not a given with such an adventurous masterpiece). Congratulations to the Aurora Orchestra who performed this piece by heart led by it\'s energetic conductor Nicholas Collon. Exceptional work delivered by Jane Mitchell who conceptualised the didactic 45 minutes.”

“‘Exciting drama which goes all weird at the end - my type!’ was how my dad summarised R.O.I that we saw together at The Hampstead Theatre last week in his post show review. He’s not wrong – exciting it is – and his text came through at 9.33pm, and those of us who made the mistake of seeing The Lehman Trilogy on a weeknight will be quite delighted to hear that it was 90 minutes of entertainment, wit, and weirdness. That is not to say that it was 90 minutes of easy-to-digest drama – it is incredibly ambitious in its subject matter, but then pitching a 4 billion pound start up on a set of flashcards is too. May, a weirdly charming, earnest and slightly bumbling research scientist has found a way to predict life threatening disease by evaluating genetic code, and she arrives at the cosy venture capital office in San Francisco (bottled Fiji water on arrival, nutribullets used live on set) with scientifically fool proof but morally ambiguous ideas about how to cure cancer and Alzheimer’s. There is a great deal of Black-Mirror-esque material – brain chips and robot homes – and it’s certainly a future that seems possible. The dialogue is witty, funny, and at times despairingly uncomfortable – which is what makes it all the more believable. And I always enjoy a play where there is no clear villain and no one is entirely innocent.”

“Warning ! This review of Heart Wall at the Bush Theatre is going to be effusive as the play spotlit the main loves of my life: a leaky pub, trashy pop music & people who aren’t very good at recognising, let alone talking about their feelings. 23 year old Franky has returned from London to her parents home in a town in the north-west of England. She’s not that happy, her parents are not that happy & their local, The Sun Inn’s karaoke evenings are no longer weekly, but daily. For 90 minutes Kit Withington’s writing made me laugh, smile, shed a tear(s) & smile again. Spiky exchanges between Franky & her old friend Charlene particularly tickled me. Charlene now drinks red wine. Not because she likes the taste, but because it gives her black teeth & she reckons she looks at least 26 when she’s got black teeth. Go & see this, with a pal or a parent & then dissect it over pints in a pub afterwards. Talk about the characters fears & feelings. That way you can indirectly talk about yours.”