13th Apr2015

Olivier Awards – Theatre

by timbaros

images-358Theatre’s big night took place last night at London’s Royal Opera House and it was Sunny Afternoon – a musical about The Kinks musical group – that took four awards at the ceremony. A View From The Bridge, which started it’s life at the Young Vic and which is now playing at The Wyndham Theatre, took three awards including one for Mark Strong for Best Actor. In the highly contested Best Actress in a musical, it was Katie Brayben taking the gong for playing songwriter Carole King in the newly opening musical Beautiful. The show ended with special award winner Kevin Spacey singing Bridge Over Troubled Water with Memphis the Musical’s Beverly Knight.
Complete winners below.

SPECIAL AWARDS
Sylvie Guillem and Kevin Spacey

BEST ACTRESS
Penelope Wilton for Taken At Midnight
Theatre Royal Haymarket

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BEST ACTOR
Mark Strong for A View From The Bridge
Young Vic & Wyndham’s Theatre

BEST ACTRESS IN A MUSICAL
Katie Brayben for Beautiful – The Carole King Musical
Aldwych Theatre

BEST ACTOR IN A MUSICAL
John Dagleish for Sunny Afternoon
Hampstead Theatre & Harold Pinter Theatre

MASTERCARD BEST NEW MUSICAL
Sunny Afternoon
Hampstead Theatre & Harold Pinter Theatre

VIRGIN ATLANTIC BEST NEW PLAY
King Charles III
Almeida Theatre & Wyndham’s Theatre

THIS MORNING AUDIENCE AWARD
Wicked
Apollo Victoria Theatre

MAGIC RADIO BEST MUSICAL REVIVAL
City Of Angels
Donmar Warehouse

BEST REVIVAL
A View From The Bridge
Young Vic & Wyndham’s Theatre

BEST ACTRESS IN A SUPPORTING ROLE
Angela Lansbury for Blithe Spirit
Gielgud Theatre

BEST ACTOR IN A SUPPORTING ROLE
Nathaniel Parker for Wolf Hall and Bring Up The Bodies
Aldwych Theatre

BEST DIRECTOR
Ivo Van Hove for A View From The Bridge
Young Vic & Wyndham’s Theatre

BEST NEW COMEDY
The Play That Goes Wrong
Duchess Theatre

BEST ACTRESS IN A SUPPORTING ROLE IN A MUSICAL
Lorna Want for Beautiful – The Carole King Musical
Aldwych Theatre

BEST ACTOR IN A SUPPORTING ROLE IN A MUSICAL
George Maguire for Sunny Afternoon
Hampstead Theatre & Harold Pinter Theatre

WHITE LIGHT AWARD FOR BEST LIGHTING DESIGN
Howard Harrison for City Of Angels
Donmar Warehouse

BEST COSTUME DESIGN
Christopher Oram for Wolf Hall and Bring Up The Bodies
Aldwych Theatre

BEST SOUND DESIGN
Gareth Owen for Memphis The Musical
Shaftesbury Theatre

XL VIDEO AWARD FOR BEST SET DESIGN
Es Devlin for The Nether
Duke of York’s Theatre

BEST THEATRE CHOREOGRAPHER
Sergio Trujillo for Memphis The Musical
Shaftesbury Theatre

AUTOGRAPH SOUND AWARD FOR OUTSTANDING ACHIEVEMENT IN MUSIC
Ray Davies for Sunny Afternoon
Hampstead Theatre & Harold Pinter Theatre

OUTSTANDING ACHIEVEMENT IN AN AFFILIATE THEATRE
Bull
The Maria at the Young Vic

BEST NEW OPERA PRODUCTION
The Mastersingers Of Nuremberg
London Coliseum

OUTSTANDING ACHIEVEMENT IN OPERA
Richard Jones for his direction of The Girl Of The Golden West, The Mastersingers Of Nuremberg and Rodelinda
London Coliseum

BEST NEW DANCE PRODUCTION
32 Rue Vandenbranden by Peeping Tom
Barbican
&
Mats Ek’s Juliet And Romeo by Royal Swedish Ballet
Sadler’s Wells

OUTSTANDING ACHIEVEMENT IN DANCE
Crystal Pite for her choreography in the productions of The Associates – A Picture Of You Falling, The Tempest Replica and Polaris
Sadler’s Wells

BEST ENTERTAINMENT AND FAMILY
La Soirée
La Soirée Spiegeltent

Category : Theatre
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07th Sep2014

Before I go to Sleep – Film

by timbaros

before-i-go-to-sleep-picture-kidmanChristine wakes up everyday remembering nothing. She lives with a man who says he’s her husband, but she doesn’t remember him. One day she discovers the shocking truth about him, and the family she used to have, in the new film Before I Go To Sleep.

Nicole Kidman plays Christine. Ten years ago she was involved in an incident and ever since then she’s not been able to remember anything – she’s got amnesia. Everyday she looks at the photographs her husband Ben (Colin Firth) has put on the bathroom wall to help her spark memories of her life before the incident. Ben has even added post-it notes to the wall pointing to him that say ‘this is your husband’, and every morning, and at night when he comes home from his professor job, he tells her ‘I’m your husband.’
Christine uses a videocamera given to her by Dr. Nasch (Mark Strong) where she has recorded a message to herself explaining to herself her identity. Meanwhile, Dr. Nasch calls Christine everyday to remind her to play the videocamera so that she understands who she is and what is happening to her. Everyday his phone call to her is the same ‘Good morning Christine, this is Dr. Nasch. You won’t remember me but I’m helping you in your recovery. Go to your closet and have a look at the videocamera in the bottom drawer and look at the videodiary…. Do this and I will call you back in a few minutes.’
Christine still thinks she’s ten years younger than she actually is, but over the course of the movie she starts to remember bits and pieces of her previous life, with some help from Dr. Nasch. Is he helping her in her recovery or is he playing with her mind? Christine, at some point, remembers that she had a son, and she asks Ben about it. He confirms this but says their son died four years ago. But is he hiding some of the facts from her so as not to hurt her, and perhaps hiding something more? Christine then remembers a friend of hers, Claire (Anne-Marie Duff), who she meets up with and who confesses to Christine that she and Ben had an affair years ago. This revelation confuses Christine even more and it’s at this point that she questions her life and the people around her and who she can and cannot trust. It’s up to Christine, on her own, to figure out what exactly happened to her, and who is the identity of the man she lives with?
Before I Go To Sleep is based on the book of the same name by Steve J. Watson, adapted for the screen and directed by Rowan Joffé. We’re never too sure whether Christine is crazy and doesn’t understand the events around her situation and that she thinks she’s a victim of a conspiracy, or if she’s being exploited by the men around her and needs to figure out a way to escape. And this is the film’s strong point, not knowing what is what and who is who until the end of the film when the incident that caused her to have amnesia is explained. Kidman, who is in every scene of the film, is confused and lost, living in a claustrophobic world, wearing no makeup – with many closeups, she’s playing a character in search of her character. Firth is perfect as Ben, Christine’s husband who made the decision to check her out of the hospital where she was being treated (not in the film) for amnesia and care for her at home. Kidman and Firth both worked together in last year’s The Railway Man, a film that had tepid reviews. They’re better together in this film. Mark Strong is excellent as Dr. Nasch – he’s Christine’s lifeline, and the man who tries to keep her sanity. But at the ending of Before I Go To Sleep it creates a jigsaw puzzle that makes it difficult to understand the men’s motives, especially Ben’s motive, why he did what he did to her, and especially who exactly is Dr. Nasch. So there are more questions than answers when the film is finished. I would recommend reading the book to get a better grasp on the story as the finale of the film will just confuse and frustrate you.

 

Category : Film
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03rd May2014

A View from the Bridge – Theatre

by timbaros

images-160I had no idea what I was about to see when I went to A View From The Bridge. I had never seen the play before, nor have I seen the 1962 movie, and I’ve never read the book. Little did I know that I was in for a devastating theatre experience.

Red Hook is a section of Brooklyn that is not particularly known as a destination place. It sits on the waterfront right under the Brooklyn Bridge. It’s an area where people pass over going to other and nicer neighborhoods. Today it’s an expensive area due to it’s location, but back in the 1950’s, which is when A View From The Bridge takes place, it was a run-down, smelly, poor, dangerous and derelict part of Brooklyn. As Red Hook is right on the water, it attracted lots of illegal immigrants bound for America and the opportunities the country had to offer them, and the availability to find work, whether you were legal or not. Hence A View From The Bridge take it’s story.
Eddie Carbone (an incredible Mark Strong) is a proud man. He works on the docks, lives in a simple house with his wife Beatrice (an amazing Nicola Walker) and their niece Catherine (a brilliant Phoebe Fox). Eddie and Catherine appear to be a bit too close and affectionate with each other, enough so to ring alarm bells in Beatrice’s head. To make matters more complicated, they agree to house two of Beatrice’s cousins from Italy, Marco (Emun Elloitt) and Rodolpho (a handsome and sexy Luke Norris), illegally, as the men don’t the proper papers to work in the U.S. So the five of them live together in Eddie and Beatrice’s cramped house. Rodolpho and Catherine take an interest in each other. Catherine is already a  young woman at 18, and according to Beatrice, able to make her own decisions about her life and what she wants. Eddie, however, sees it differently. He wants Catherine to stay as his little girl, to stay home and take a secretarial job. And the love that Eddie has for Catherine is not normal. Things come to a head when Catherine tells Eddie that her and Rodolpho plan to get married. As his jealousy overcomes him, Eddie turns the cousins in to the immigration authorities in order to get rid of Rodolpho. and after he does so all their lives will never be the same.
After A View From The Bridge was over, I was simply blown away. Not just by how strong and real the story was, but by the acting on stage at the Young Vic. It is one of the best acted plays I have ever seen. Strong as Eddie is a man’s man, but still with a soft spot for Catherine, and Strong is just mesmerizing. His is an award-winning performance. Fox as Catherine is also a revelation. Playing a young woman about to blossom and at the same time maintaining a daddy’s little girl image is what Fox does, brilliantly, and it looks like she is putting in very little effort to play the role, she’s that good. Walker is perfectly cast as Beatrice, not having been touched by Eddie yet still very much in love with him, considering the circumstances, which she’s all too aware. Elliott and Norris play their roles very well. Elliott doesn’t have much to do but it’s Norris who brings to his a role a bit of innocence and sexiness and makes it very believable how Catherine can fall in love with him and how Eddie can be very jealous of him. Michael Gould plays a narrator who provides clarity on what’s happening and what’s about to happen, creating even more suspense throughout the show.  The set is also part of the cast. It is a very shallow shell of a swimming pool, built this way to capture what’s going to happen at the end.
There’s really not much more to say about A View From The Bridge, except that it will be one of the most amazing theatre pieces you will see in a long time. It’s playing at the Old Vic up until June 7th.
Category : Theatre
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