Pay what you want tonight. This “scratch night” concept, which previews works in progress to an audience and lets them decide how much the cost of their ticket should be, has become a trend in Manchester’s theatre scene. The Lowry and Home theatres offer similar events. The feedback given by an audience is so valuable for a theatrical work to mature. It’s a platform for the theatre-makers and artists of the future. The writers and performers tonight demonstrated real potential in becoming upcoming practitioners of their individual craft. Compering tonight’s event was the funny and personable, Ross Carey. Four acts took to the stage in front of a supportive crowd to present their work - my thoughts and comments for each one are below.
Chicken Limbo by Josie Cerise
It was New Year’s Eve and four friends met up with one another: Zoe, Jules, Rob, and Ed. It was about time they caught up with one-another, but there was an elephant in the room. Rob said: “Cheers to friends… and absent ones”. They all knew Jonnie, who recently committed suicide. The past was exposed and secrets were revealed in a play about friendship, loss, and mental health.
The length and pace of the play felt just right, it doesn’t need to be much longer than it is now, when it develops in the future. It was a strong one act play because it was topical in its exploration of men’s mental health. You got to see how the suicide of a person affects friends and family. One character would rather accept Jonnie had no choice in killing himself over the opposite. It was a unique perspective I hadn’t given thought to before. Chicken Limbo referred to a childhood event in Jonnie’s life, some kind of variation on the game of limbo. There are other connotations that come from the play’s title, like how chicken can mean coward, perhaps a reminder of the horrific stigma around mental health. Limbo is associated with uncertainty, something unfinished and incomplete – ideas poignantly applicable to the context of the play. The script is nicely balanced out with modern observational humour like the “Live, Laugh, Love” gag and “Dawson’s Creek in Chorley” joke. Music from the character’s teenage years can be developed more as that has the potential to be emotionally moving. This has so much scope for creative growth.
Cock On The Wall by Brontë Appleby
Without a programme I’m having to guess this, but I think this was a fictional stand-up comedy piece with Appleby playing a character called Evie Pollard. It was about Pollard’s life after moving to the UK from Africa. Her father was a Human Rights Activist and her mother, a vicar. We learn about how Pollard met her ultimate enemy, Piers Morgan, making an epiphany that she was just as much of a “****” as he was.
The comedy script was structured around various life lessons Pollard had learnt including: how Greggs is the best place in the world, teenage girls are brutal, and that logic doesn’t get through to ignorant white men. This was a smart and funny stand-up gig. Appleby’s enthusiastic, talkative, and geeky performance style was what made this humorous. It would be great for her to explore varying levels of performance energy, going forward, to make what she says more impactful. Her material was up-to-date but the script could benefit from being cut down and simplified slightly. Appleby is very much in control of the audience’s attention.
Steam Out by Yeap Theatre
What do you get if you cross a game show with Big Brother and a sauna? Steam Out by Yeap Theatre. The premise was the audience had to vote for two different types of people, from a list, to enter the sauna and talk to one another. Except what they had to say wasn’t for the easily offended, the script took actual (regularly outrageous) comments that had been said by real life people. This was experimental theatre which deconstructed bigotry, political correctness, and social politics.
Let’s talk about who got the chance to go in the sauna. On the list were groups of people who faced various kinds of oppression and those who did not face as much oppression. The audience voting was not secretive it was done openly by putting our hands up. We were told very simply to make a choice, nothing else. Basically, this visible act of audience voting interestingly exposed much of the politics and attitudes within the room. Those, for one reason or another, with status in the audience manipulated the situation into a game of picking the favourite person or doing what’s considered the morally right thing to do. I’m all for supporting those who face oppression, just to clarify, all I’m saying is I found it fascinating how this piece of theatre revealed: i) what the audience were thinking and ii) how we can implicitly influence the actions of other people. This game was only played once at the start, but it can certainly be played a few more times in later versions of this work. It’s a captivating idea. The sauna scene played out in a naturalistic style. The rising steam looked visually beautiful, it was an effective contrast to the intense conversation which was taking place.
Music by Oli Sykes
Sykes performed a few original songs and covers. He was a guitarist and singer. After a slight shaky start, which he recovered well from, Sykes showed potential to develop as a music artist in the future. His nerves will settle more, the more regularly he performs.
His voice was light, delicate, and whispery – this was soothing to listen to. It would be nice for him to connect more to the emotion of the songs, to give his voice more colour and strength. Sykes’ style is very much acoustic pop and that suits his voice. The performance of the upbeat songs, for some reason, felt rather like the other ballads he played. So that contrast in energy, in his performance of songs, needs to be clearer. Next time, more stories behind his own songs would be nice to hear, he had a natural interaction with the crowd which can be played with more. He had his eyes closed for much of the songs, nevertheless we could still connect to Sykes’ songs about romantic and family love.
I love these kind of events because we get to see the inspiring evolution of fresh performances and forthcoming artists. If you’re a lover of theatre, why would you want to miss this?
Reviewer - Sam Lowe
on - 8/5/19
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