Theatre review: The Albatross 3rd & Main

I must admit that looking back at the blurb for The Albatross 3rd & Main I had no idea what made me decide to go see it; I strongly suspect I looked at how quiet the start of the year was and just added something to pad it out. US writer Simon David Eden directs and designs his own play about a dilapidated general store in the middle of nowhere*. Gene (Hamish Clark) is in debt following a divorce and a gambling problem, and has put the store in the name of his assistant, brain-damaged ex-boxer Lullaby (Andrew St Clair-James) to stop it from being repossessed. So he's tempted by an offer from hyped-up Spider (Charlie Allen,) who arrives with a dead golden eagle in a box. The bird collided with his car, and as it has great religious significance to various Native American tribes, Spider wants to use a contact of Gene's to sell the carcass on the black market.

Theatre review: Almost, Maine

Earlier this year we saw Our Town arrive in North London, a rare visitor to these shores but one of the most performed plays in America. It seems in the last decade it's acquired a new rival though, John Cariani's Almost, Maine having apparently already notched up over two thousand productions in the US despite only premiering in 2005. I can see how it would be popular for local and amateur companies - it's another slice of small-town Americana with a large collection of characters, although as the majority of scenes are two-handers Simon Evans' UK premiere production can manage with just three male and three female actors playing all the roles. A portmanteau rom-com along the lines of something like Love, Actually, Almost, Maine takes place in a cold winter in the titular Northern Maine town - although as its name suggests it's almost-but-not-quite a town, a vaguely-connected community that's never quite got its act together enough to formalise its borders.