Edinburgh Festival Theatre
3 stars
The appearance of bombastic musical Cats in Edinburgh the same week as Jonathan Church and Philip Franks’ touring revival of David Edgar’s adaptation of Dickens’ sweeping indictment of capitalism may seem irrelevant, but the two have more in common than you might think. Both shows, after all, were originally directed by former RSC artistic director Trevor Nunn. Both too, became embodiments of a theatrical spectacle that grew out of Thatcherite excess.
On its 1980 premiere, Edgar’s two part, seven hour epic was criticised by some for the extravagance of something so concerned with Britain’s class-conscious social and economic fabric. 27 years on, such comments sound churlish, even if it does unavoidably resemble the heritage industry musicals that grew in the era’s wake.
The trouble is, what maybe seemed cutting edge three decades ago – characters becoming chorus to narrate their own action and so forth – is now so absorbed into the mainstream as to appear antique both in style and substance. So while the play’s roller-coaster rites of passage is delivered with an ebullient trowel-load of cartoon fairground grotesquery, beyond the bullying, brutalism and economic exploitation, the stage is so busy that Daniel Weyman’s Nicholas never becomes more than a cipher. Things really fall apart, though, when Nick and his rescued sidekick Smike join Crummles’ travelling players at the end of Part One. Real actors love nothing more than making fun of rubbish ones, and here it’s milked to within an inch of its encore.
Terrific ensemble scenes can’t prevent this from being a sentimental facsimile Dickens groupies and the sort of nostalgists for whom the 1980s epic will never die.
The Herald, October 11th 2007
ends
3 stars
The appearance of bombastic musical Cats in Edinburgh the same week as Jonathan Church and Philip Franks’ touring revival of David Edgar’s adaptation of Dickens’ sweeping indictment of capitalism may seem irrelevant, but the two have more in common than you might think. Both shows, after all, were originally directed by former RSC artistic director Trevor Nunn. Both too, became embodiments of a theatrical spectacle that grew out of Thatcherite excess.
On its 1980 premiere, Edgar’s two part, seven hour epic was criticised by some for the extravagance of something so concerned with Britain’s class-conscious social and economic fabric. 27 years on, such comments sound churlish, even if it does unavoidably resemble the heritage industry musicals that grew in the era’s wake.
The trouble is, what maybe seemed cutting edge three decades ago – characters becoming chorus to narrate their own action and so forth – is now so absorbed into the mainstream as to appear antique both in style and substance. So while the play’s roller-coaster rites of passage is delivered with an ebullient trowel-load of cartoon fairground grotesquery, beyond the bullying, brutalism and economic exploitation, the stage is so busy that Daniel Weyman’s Nicholas never becomes more than a cipher. Things really fall apart, though, when Nick and his rescued sidekick Smike join Crummles’ travelling players at the end of Part One. Real actors love nothing more than making fun of rubbish ones, and here it’s milked to within an inch of its encore.
Terrific ensemble scenes can’t prevent this from being a sentimental facsimile Dickens groupies and the sort of nostalgists for whom the 1980s epic will never die.
The Herald, October 11th 2007
ends
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