Tag Archives: Joe Hill-Gibbins

“Measure For Measure” at the Young Vic

13 October 2015 Edward Lukes

It requires a director as bold as Joe Hill-Gibbins to revel in the oddness of Shakespeare’s ‘problem’ play. Taking licence with the tragi-comic text and its complex moral questioning, this production is radical in the true sense of the word: a far-reaching, thoughtful interpretation that strips it of context and relies on emotional realism.

On the Saturday matinee I attended, Ivanno Jeremiah was unable to perform as Claudio, so first a big thank-you to Raphael Sowole, who stepped up and allowed the show to go on. It’s not ideal conditions but one absence did little to detract from how forthright Hill-Gibbins’ vision is. And, besides, the supernumerary cast of sex dolls more than manages to fill the stage.

That’s right – inflatable sex dolls, which are inevitably what the production will be remembered for. This is a shame since, while irreverent fun, they are not the best thing on offer. With live video recording projected onto the stage, this show gets up close and personal. And, with some help from Hans Memling’s apocalyptic artwork, arresting imagery is everywhere, with a pulsating soundscape from Paul Arditti adding to the atmosphere.

Paul_Ready_Zubin_Varla_and_Natalie_Simpson_in_Measure_for_Measure_at_the_Young_Vic._Photo_by_Keith_Pattison — Paul Ready and Zubin Varla

Best of all are the performances. The cast, like the text, is slimmed down and works hard. Romola Garai is brilliant as an indignant Isabella, as is Paul Ready as a cool Angelo – both performers root out the essentials of their characters. There are also strong roles for Cath Whitefield’s Mariana (although why she should be a fan of pop star Pink baffled me) and John Mackay’s Lucio, whose joke with the Duke has far more mileage than usual. It’s with the Duke, given a towering portrayal by Zubin Varla, that Hill-Gibbins should get most credit. This ‘power divine’ is displayed in his twisted benevolent best – a Rasputin gone right, with an injection of tension that suggests his plans could go awry. The conclusion, shuffling the cast into a deranged and confused photo opportunity, makes quite a picture for this flash-bang-wallop of a show.

Until 14 November 2015

www.youngvic.org

Photos by Keith Pattison

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“Little Revolution” at the Almeida Theatre

18 November 2014 Edward Lukes Leave a comment

All hail Alecky Blythe, of London Road fame and Queen of verbatim theatre, whose new work Little Revolution is currently playing at the Almeida. When rioters ran amok in the capital in 2011, Blythe took to the streets with her Dictaphone and recorded what they said to her. Having editing the interviews, she presents an intimate take on events, using performers who listen to the recordings, via headphones, on stage and recreate the dialogue.

The verbatim technique isn’t easy; there’s a danger subjects appear manipulated and there can be an air of worthy documentary. The masterstroke here is that Blythe joins the performers, repeating her own questions and copying all the stutters, nervous laughs and hesitations that are the mark of real conversations. Blythe is enormously endearing, an innocent abroad with a microphone, mocking herself as much anyone, truly making the show.

Little Revolution is surprisingly funny. Comments no playwright would ever dare to get away with come straight from people’s mouths: a trio of young girls straight out of Little Britain, middle-class angst and a German journalist too clichéd to be believed. There’s little menace, more a sense of confusion as people try to work out what is going on. Blythe doesn’t delve deeply into the causes of the riots – although plenty of ideas are raised, none is explored – instead, attention is given to the effects of violence on an already fractured community.

That London is divided by gentrification isn’t exactly news. But Joe Hill-Gibbins’ tight direction appreciates that Blythe’s work brings this important issue home to us. The focus is local campaigning that kicked in just after the riots. Wealthy hippies try to help a looted shopkeeper, while mums on a council estate campaign to ‘decriminalise Hackney youth’. There’s friction between the groups, epitomised by a street party courtesy of Marks & Spencer, but though arguments are presented swiftly the play is never simplistic.

The cast is good, Imogen Stubbs and Ronnie Ancona standing out through their stage presence. More noteworthy is a ‘community chorus’ joining the professional actors and used by Hill-Gibbins to create a sense of scale and a casual feeling. Again this stems from Blythe. She likes people and her interest is contagious. Dramatically reconfiguring the Almeida space further enforces a sense of informality and investigation to create an atmosphere quite unlike your regular night out at the theatre.

Until 4 October 2013

www.almeida.co.uk

Photo by Manuel Harlan

Written 12 September 2014 for The London Magazine

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“Edward II” at the National Theatre

17 November 2014 Edward Lukes Leave a comment

Director Joe Hill-Gibbins made his debut at the National Theatre last night with a radical version of Christopher Marlowe’s Edward II. He’s the King whose murder with a red hot poker makes him the medieval monarch schoolboys remember. This crazy collage of show revels in incongruous touches, using our current National anthem and the hokey cokey in its soundtrack, and wrenches the personal from an explicitly political text. Best of all, it boasts a lead performance from John Heffernan that must not be missed.

Hill-Gibbins’ inventive staging is bracing – a bag of tricks that updates Marlowe with a defiantly energetic touch. Projecting live films onto the walls, including scenes in an inside-out room (reminiscent of a Rachel Whiteread sculpture) that the audience cannot see into, gives a sense of intimacy and conspiracy. There are touches that will ruffle feathers – brash, bold and sexy – including the longest snog I’ve seen on a stage for a while. But the production is never obtuse; the court and its conflicts are consistently presented as a game played by debauched egoists.

The “base, leaden Earls” are deliberately overblown, outraged by the explicitness of Edward’s love for his minion Gaveston rather than questions of social status. Two roles, transformed into female parts, stand out, with Kirsty Bushell as Kent and Penny Layden as Pembroke, displaying sympathy toward the King that injects pathos. The biggest problem is for Edward’s wife Isabella. Vanessa Kirby proclaims her love for the King, between drags of her fag and swigs of bolly, well enough, but the production focuses so much on Edward’s homosexuality that it denies tension between the two of them.

Gaveston, the “ruin of the realm”, is performed by Kyle Soller with magnificent dynamism – when he kneels to the King it’s as if he’s about to start a race. In Soller’s performance the morbid playfulness of the production genuinely unnerves. But the suffering is all Edward’s and the scenes of his torture, filmed and projected throughout the final act, makes this a gruelling role that establishes Heffernan as an important actor. Despite the manic action around him, Heffernan has the power to create a stillness and deliver Marlowe’s poetry magnificently.

Until 26 October 2013

www.nationaltheatre.org.uk

Photo by Manuel Harlan

Written 5 September 2013 for The London Magazine

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“The Glass Menagerie” at the Young Vic

3 November 2014 Edward Lukes Leave a comment

Joe Hill-Gibbins’ production of Tennessee Williams’ ‘memory’ play, The Glass Menagerie, is one you won’t forget. Introduced as a play that gives “truth in the pleasant disguise of illusion”, Hill-Gibbins and designer Jeremy Herbert develop Williams’ emphasis on the theatrical with crystal clarity.

With a curtain that goes down as well as up and musicians integrated into the action, the workings of the story are exposed to all, entrancing us with its telling.

Not that this illusion is really all that pleasant. Our narrator Tom relates the tale of his escape from home but never disguises the fact that he is abandoning his mother and sister. Leo Bill plays this unsympathetic character, who haunted from the start. It is a surprisingly physical portrayal with a palpable sense of anger and despair.

The urgency of Tom’s leaving is well established by Deborah Findlay and Sinead Matthews in the roles of his mother Amanda and sister Laura. The danger of their self-illusion is subtly conveyed and is all the more powerful for the way it creeps up on you.

Even in Williams’ day, the chivalry of the South was a thing of the past. Nowadays, Amanda’s delusions and Laura’s timidity can seem not just deluded but silly. Findlay does well to establish her character’s ideas without alienating the audience. This is a lesson Matthews has chosen to ignore. Some actresses play Laura with a stubbornness about her fantasy life that is missing here. But, in neglecting this, Matthews is all the more moving and as fragile as the glass animals she collects.

The play’s fourth character, Jim the gentleman caller, is “an emissary from the world of reality” and arrives through a door marked with a star. Kyle Soller gives an excellent performance, fitting Tom’s description of him perfectly and adding a sincerity that cannot fail to move. He becomes central to Hill-Gibbins’ sensitive direction of this masterpiece and in bringing emotion to the fore leaves us as haunted as the characters left abandoned in their fantasy world.

www.youngvic.org

Until 15 January 2011

Photo by Simon Annand

Written 22 November 2010 for The London Magazine