Sunday 12 December 2010

Mini Review 7

URASHIMA TARO AFTER SHOW TALK

This provided good insight to the background of the production and gave a welcome fact the the play is an ongoing process and is not yet finished. The actress and director shared a vast knowledge of puppetry and their desire to improve the show, which was met fondly by an audience in agreement that alterations are a must.

Mini Review 6

URASHIMA TARO

An interesting attempt to share a different cultures legend. Fascinating puppetry, unfortunately let down by a story line lacking in speech and coherency. The basis of a good production is there but some development is definitely needed.

Main Review 2 - Lily Through The Dark

Lily Through The Dark
Permormed at The University Theatre at BSU
Reviewed by Darryl Harris

My original thoughts about seeing a play in which the central character was a puppet were that I would too mature for such a production. I couldn’t have been more wrong. This production challenged typical theatre by using puppetry but in such a way that it covered the taboo subject matter of death by pure creativity.
The characters were played extremely well by the company and drew the audience into their imaginary world. The attention to details in the puppets movements was particularly impressive, along with the actors commitment to making this production seem reality. The set, comprised of a pile of tatty books, provided a beautiful visual aid to The Deadlands, where the play was based. The books were innovatively used to create structures such as bridges which showed that the production team had thought about the visuals of this play. The play was extreme spectacle to watch due to the costumes and obviously the set.
The only set back to this production was one particular actress who played the part of Mother Moon; although she played the almost “supernatural” part convincingly, she had a tendancy to end all her sentences with an upward inflection in her voice. After a while, this became annoying because her voice almost tended to sound more like singing than actual words.
The subject itself, I found to be very interesting because you wouldn’t necessarily put a young girl’s suicide together with the use of puppetry. In my opinion, this was genius, as it took some of the hard edge of the “hard to talk about” subject and replaced it with creativity.
I would definitely recommend this play for a variety of ages as both adults and children will be astounded by the puppetry and visual orgasm of a set.