September 30, 2008
It's all about the sardines. Never has a plate of fish been as troublesome as it is in Nothing On, whose first act we see three times in Noises Off, Michael Frayn's staunchly favourite comedy. Noises Off is the farce to end all farces. It follows a troupe of actors from The Technical to The Last Night of a tour. Between actors, crew and director there is plenty of scope for strained relations and misunderstandings.
I suspect that most of the audience packing the Playhouse already knew the play, but then the plot isn't really the point. The twist, the main reason for its well-deserved fame, is that the second Act is seen from behind: onstage is backstage, as the actors try valiantly to go on at the right time while sorting out their tangled lovelives and hitting each other with the fire axe.
David Gilmore's production rightly celebrates Act Two and the ensemble play it beautifully, juggling props and pratfalls with split-second timing. The pace does not let up for an instant, and the scene-changing break must come as a welcome relief. If there were an award for Best Use Of A Cactus this production would win it.
The other thing Noises Off is celebrated for is the doors. Including the downstairs window there are 10 exits from the stage, and designer Robert Jones has excelled both from in front and behind.
Act Three has the potential for anti-climax after the preceding shenanigans, but here the character acting came strongly across. Maggie Steed played Dottie with a manic and mischievous glee, disrupting everything she could and delighting in it. Ben Hull's oily estate agent and philosophically vacuous actor were both superb, and his fixed grin as it all goes so badly awry haunts me still. Laura Matthews gets a lot of mileage out of her lost contact lens, and it's not easy to grab the audience's attention when there's so much competition on stage. In fact all of the 9-strong cast is superb, both convincing and physical, and on opening night Liza Sadovy won a round of applause for stylishly catching a flying bucket and mop, lobbed at her across the stage.
It's not a deep play, and you get the sense it's easy stuff for actors who between them have played Lady MacBeth, sung in opera, and acted in soap operas, most of the Shakespeare canon and Red Dwarf. Perhaps they're just adept at making anything look easy! But they're obviously having fun, and it's infectious. There's no twee and happy ending, which perhaps isn't surprising since we never get to the final Act of Nothing On. But it's entertaining, funny, dark if you think too hard, chaotically busy and doesn't resolve itself neatly - a bit like life really. Go if you can!
I suspect that most of the audience packing the Playhouse already knew the play, but then the plot isn't really the point. The twist, the main reason for its well-deserved fame, is that the second Act is seen from behind: onstage is backstage, as the actors try valiantly to go on at the right time while sorting out their tangled lovelives and hitting each other with the fire axe.
David Gilmore's production rightly celebrates Act Two and the ensemble play it beautifully, juggling props and pratfalls with split-second timing. The pace does not let up for an instant, and the scene-changing break must come as a welcome relief. If there were an award for Best Use Of A Cactus this production would win it.
The other thing Noises Off is celebrated for is the doors. Including the downstairs window there are 10 exits from the stage, and designer Robert Jones has excelled both from in front and behind.
Act Three has the potential for anti-climax after the preceding shenanigans, but here the character acting came strongly across. Maggie Steed played Dottie with a manic and mischievous glee, disrupting everything she could and delighting in it. Ben Hull's oily estate agent and philosophically vacuous actor were both superb, and his fixed grin as it all goes so badly awry haunts me still. Laura Matthews gets a lot of mileage out of her lost contact lens, and it's not easy to grab the audience's attention when there's so much competition on stage. In fact all of the 9-strong cast is superb, both convincing and physical, and on opening night Liza Sadovy won a round of applause for stylishly catching a flying bucket and mop, lobbed at her across the stage.
It's not a deep play, and you get the sense it's easy stuff for actors who between them have played Lady MacBeth, sung in opera, and acted in soap operas, most of the Shakespeare canon and Red Dwarf. Perhaps they're just adept at making anything look easy! But they're obviously having fun, and it's infectious. There's no twee and happy ending, which perhaps isn't surprising since we never get to the final Act of Nothing On. But it's entertaining, funny, dark if you think too hard, chaotically busy and doesn't resolve itself neatly - a bit like life really. Go if you can!