Theatre review: Wolf Cub

Ché Walker wrote Wolf Cub in Atlanta, in the aftermath of Donald Trump's election in 2016. While people around the world wondered how it could have happened, for Walker it seemed obvious the seeds were sown decades earlier, by another Republican President who was a celebrity before he was a politician, who used polarising language to turn Americans against each other and demonise the poor and minorities. Crucially for this story, Ronald Reagan also survived an international scandal, in which in order to interfere with a foreign nation's election results, both arms sales to Iran and an influx of drugs into the US were fair game as fundraisers. Wolf Cub tells the story of the Reagan (and Bush) years through the experiences of Maxine (Clare Latham,) who when Reagan first comes to power is a nine-year old living with her father in the rural South. Her mother having apparently fled years earlier, she's left alone to deal with her father's physical and emotional abuse.

Theatre review: Doubt, a Parable

The Catholic Church is famous for its choirboy-abusing priests, but a lesser-known fact is that there’s also a system of religious beliefs attached to it. John Patrick Shanley’s Doubt, a Parable uses the former to look into questions of the latter, in a story set in a New York convent school in 1964. Headmistress Sister Aloysius (Stella Gonet) is a stern disciplinarian who’s fiercely opposed to change, ball-point pens, the song “Frosty the Snowman,” and either teachers or students actually enjoying their lessons. Her mission to crush all the joy out of young teacher Sister James (Clare Latham) has to be interrupted as she needs her help to investigate the school priest Father Flynn (Jonathan Chambers,) whom she suspects of taking an inappropriate interest in the pupils. The school has just taken on its first-ever black student, and Flynn seems keen to get particularly close to him.

Theatre review: Don't Smoke in Bed

At the office where I used to work several years ago, a (white) woman on maternity leave came back in one day so everyone could see the new baby she'd had with her (black) partner. An older colleague was absolutely smitten with the baby, and her compliments included "Isn't she beautiful? And she hardly looks black at all!" It's a gobsmacking comment that came to mind during a look at how things are for interracial couples - and their mixed-race children - in America, as Aurin Squire advises Don't Smoke in Bed. In fact smoking, in bed or elsewhere, is something Jamaican-American Richard (Greg Lockett) and Irish-American Sheryl (Clare Latham) have just agreed to give up together when they start a series of interviews with an (unseen by the audience) reporter on a webcam: The New York Times Sunday magazine is doing a feature on various couples in their bedrooms.

Theatre review: The Talented Mr Ripley

When I first started following The Faction's work, it was with a highly physical, creative and pared-down (both in terms of production style and text) version of Macbeth. Over the years the visual, physical trademarks have remained, but Mark Leipacher's company seems to have developed a slavish devotion to the original text. This year's season opened with a Romeo and Juliet that suffered from its fear of editing out a single word, but this seems to now extend even to the company's own original writing: Leipacher adapts and directs Patricia Highsmith's novel The Talented Mr Ripley, a production with a lot of nice ideas and a stellar central performance; but a script that can't seem to accept that capturing a novel's every nuance isn't possible in a stage play. The adventures of Tom Ripley (Christopher Hughes) and their consequences therefore make for a disappointing evening.

Theatre review: Romeo and Juliet (The Faction / New Diorama)

An unusually Shakespeare-heavy start to the year continues with what's become something of a tradition: The Faction's rep season at the New Diorama, which usually includes one of the better-known Shakespeares. The fact that director Rachel Valentine Smith was on good form in the recent Reptember season made me a bit more optimistic than I would normally be about a play I've never liked: This year's rep opens with Romeo and Juliet. Two leading Verona families have been mortal enemies for generations, for reasons nobody seems to even remember. When the Capulets host a party, Romeo Montague's (Christopher York) friends convince him to crash, in the hope that he might get over his unrequited love for Rosaline. It works, but only because Romeo quickly falls for someone else instead - his enemy's only daughter, Juliet (Clare Latham.) And unlike Rosaline, she's actually noticed he's alive and feels the same way.