Two London theatre recommendations from this weekend

[lovingboth]

On the train to London, I was reading the Guardian website and saw a five star review for Macbeth starring David Tennant. It gave the dates it was on, but didn't think - as far as I could see - it was important to say at which theatre it was on.

A quick search revealed it was the Donmar Warehouse and the whole run is sold out..

.. except that they release some standing tickets at noon every day. (There's another small release of seats seven days ahead of each performance, but I was too late for that.) My evening was already arranged - see later - so that meant the 2.30pm show.

Setting up an account - it's been years since I've been there and a friend used his membership to get two tickets to everything - and starting to refresh the booking page just before noon revealed that about half a dozen seats were released then. Seventy quid vs fifteen quid for the standing, but they weren't available yet and I might miss out.. I grabbed one, especially as they were middle of the front row vs back of the small balcony.

At the end of the process, just after noon, there was one of the ten to twelve standing tickets left. Going in, there was a very long returns queue outside.

The show is fabulous. Shakespeare's Globe had a very good Macbeth this year, but this is even better. The trick is that you hear it via headphones - each of the actors is mic'd, even though they're very close (even if you're not on the front row - the Donmar Warehouse is a very small theatre) and assorted stereo sound effects are added by an audio engineer.

This means that you can have the actors whisper to themselves or others, and everyone still hears it in a way that's believable that no-one else on stage can. Similarly, assorted effects mean you can do in audio what you'd have to do purely in the imagination or practically. You don't need to have the wryd sisters vanish - they were only heard rather than seen in the first place. Anyone else hoping to win the Olivier for 'best sound design' can give up now: if this doesn't win, I will be utterly astonished.*

The current trend is to rewrite the gatekeeper character's speech when opening the gates of the castle the morning after the murder before. Here, they even lose the joke about alcohol provoking desire but taking away performance, but he does say that everyone has paid seventy quid to listen to a radio play..

.. and on one level that's true because of how important the audio is, but on another it really isn't, because there's lots of physical performance too.

It's on until Feb 10th, and I will be repeatedly refreshing the booking page around noon on at least one date between then and now.

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The evening show was The Time Machine at the Park Theatre very close to Finsbury Park. (That's a new venue to me, having opened in 2013.)

The premise is that one of the trio of actors is HG Wells' great-grandson and the story of The Time Machine wasn't fictional. The biggest laugh came from something an audience member said..

.. as part of the show, it's necessary to have a phone in order to receive a call from the future. The cast borrow someone's phone, and the cast are waiting for the call, when he says "It'd help if the phone weren't switched off.."

.. but it's good stuff. I paid £12.50 per ticket via the Central Tickets site but it was also available via Tkts for around £20, I think.

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* If anyone knows how I can place a bet on it winning, do let me know!

Comments

[ludy]

but he does say that everyone has paid seventy quid to listen to a radio play..

Now he says eighty quid! And makes a “Trump” is an equivalent Swear to “Beelzebub” joke