Theatre review: Firebird

After a couple of years away from the venue I return to the original pub theatre for the first time since it moved out of the actual pub: The King's Head is now located in a larger purpose-built theatre a few feet away from its old home - horizontally at least, vertically the new sub-sub-sub basement is a bit more of a trek. The show bringing me back is Firebird, the queer love story of Cold War Russia from Sergey Fetisov's memoir, probably best known here for the recent film version. In fact Richard Hough's stage adaptation is credited as being based as much on Peeter Rebane & Tom Prior's screenplay as it is the book: I've not read the book or seen the film yet, so approached the story of a lieutenant in trouble for touching his privates fresh; but soon got the feeling that Hough is relying on a certain amount of preexisting familiarity with the characters.

Stage-to-screen review: The Sorcerer's Apprentice

Intended as Southwark Playhouse's first big show of 2021, The Sorcerer’s Apprentice went the way of... everything else in recent months, although Richard Hough (book and lyrics) and Ben Morales Frost's (music and orchestrations) musical was among the luckier ones, in that the production got to finish rehearsals and actually perform in The Large. To no live audience, of course, but for a recording that's streaming "as-live" on the stream.theatre platform for the next few weeks. It's based on the Goethe poem that is of course best-known for its adaptation in Disney^TM's Fantasia©, and little suggestions of Paul Dukas' music do find their way into Morales Frost's compositions. But this is essentially a new treatment of the material, starting with a new story that expands on Goethe's simple fable about not trying to run before you can walk.