Comedy: Richard Herring – Christ on a Bike, Leicester Square Theatre

In the interests of accuracy, the full title of this show is Christ on a Bike: The Second Coming, neatly acknowledging the fact that it was first performed ten years ago when Richard Herring, an atheist strangely preoccupied with the minutiae of Jesus’ life, was 33, the same age as the object of his obsession when he died.  The show was resurrected, Lazarus-like, for last year’s Edinburgh Festival and I caught it towards the end of a five-week  London run which it appears did not get the audience it really deserved due to the freezing weather (perhaps God expressing his disapproval?) and the disruption of Christmas.  Oh, the irony. 

I like the high-concept nature of Herring’s recent shows; they have an overarching theme which provides a narrative and makes them feel more theatrical than the average comedy gig but room is allowed for digressions, ad libs and the odd bit of more traditional stand up material.   Here, he combines a Dave Gorman-style lecture (complete with slides) with an imaginary bike race in which he sets out to prove that he is better than Jesus, even going so far as to suggest that he may be the new Messiah.  I couldn’t help thinking that this would have worked better in the original show when they were the same age, but Herring just about gets away with it, perhaps due to the family resemblance.

I think I laughed more at COAB than I did at Hitler Moustache, a particularly notable achievement given that I had been weeping openly in Pizza Express less than an hour beforehand (I am nothing if not a horrible cliché of a woman).  The show opens with a series of quick-fire jokes which sees Herring likening the son of God to the Fonz, executing a neat water into wine joke and questioning how many communion wafers one would have to eat in order to consume an entire Jesus.  It’s also good to see his frequently used line ”I’m not saying that I’m the new Jesus…that’s for other people to say” and his recently discovered childhood stories in a fitting context.

At the centre of the show is a routine built around the epic list of names and “begats” at the beginning of the New Testament.  First, Herring demonstrates impressive powers of recall by reciting the entire thing from memory before revealing the “secret” – a ludicrous acronym even more convoluted than the one used by his driving instructor character in Fist of Fun.  By the time he went on to deconstruct the genealogy of Jesus with increasing levels of incredulity and rage, particularly at the presence in the list of someone with the improbable name of “Booz”, I was laughing so much that I could hardly breathe.  The close textual analysis of the Ten Commandments, revealing God to be in need of a good editor, could seem hackneyed in the hands of a lesser comedian but is perfectly placed and brilliantly delivered.

When compared to Herring’s other recent shows, you could argue that Christ on a Bike feels less satisfying: it doesn’t have the political punch of Hitler Moustache or the sweet sentimentality of Headmaster’s Son.  Nevertheless, it is one of the funniest comedy shows I have seen for ages.  I like to think that Jesus can take a joke, and I’m sure He would approve.

Tags: Christ on a Bike, Richard Herring

Mea culcha

Removes dustsheets.  Blows away cobwebs.  Opens window to let some air in.

Oh, poor neglected blog.  I’m so sorry for abandoning you, leaving you with only dated cultural insights and depriving you of my witty prose and pithy observations.  The excuses are many and varied: work went mental, I went on holiday (twice), I did a comedy writing course which took up most of  my spare time but I also got to a point where I wasn’t looking forward to any of the things I had booked to see as much as I should have been, thinking only about where I was going to find the time and motivation to write about them afterwards.  In fact, I didn’t book to see a couple of things I quite fancied because the whole thing just got a bit overwhelming.  I’m sure you will agree that this is not a good state of affairs, so as the backlog of posts grew ever larger I was forced to give myself a few months off.

I’m not quite sure what I’m going to do with this blog in the future but, for completeness, here is everything else I saw in 2010 that I didn’t get around to writing about.  I went to more comedy than anything else, partly because of the course I was doing but also because there were a lot of well-reviewed Edinburgh shows that finally made it to town. 

Comedy

• Russell Kane – Smokescreens and Castles, Bloomsbury Theatre
• Laughter Lounge with Russell Kane (MC), Richard Herring, Greg Davies, Andrew Maxwell, Tim Key, Tom Deacon, Kevin Eldon & David Baddiel, Indigo2
• Bill Bailey – Dandelion Mind, Wyndhams Theatre
• Jon Richardson – Don’t Happy Be Worry, Soho Theatre
• Tim Minchin & His Orchestra, O2 Arena
• Nine Lessons & Carols for Godless People, Bloomsbury Theatre

Music

• Philharmonia Orchestra – Laidov’s The Enchanted Lake, Tchaikovsky’s Piano Concerto No. 1 & Shostakovich’s Symphony No. 5, Royal Festival Hall
• Harry Shearer & Judith Owen’s Holiday Singalong, Purcell Rooms
• Suede, O2 Arena
• Philharmonia Orchestra & Jarvis Cocker – Peter & the Wolf, Royal Festival Hall

Theatre

• Bedlam, Globe
• Legally Blonde, Savoy
• West Side Story, Palace, New York
• Season’s Greetings, National

I also had tickets for three other plays which for various reasons I didn’t manage to see.  I’ve never done this before, so am wondering if it was symptom of my general ennui, or perhaps just sheer ineptitude.  To my great shame (especially at the  last one), they were:

• Deathtrap – I’d had a really shitty day at work and just wasn’t in the mood, especially as I had heard it was a bit scary and am an utter wuss
• Shirley Valentine – my friend bought me tickets for my birthday but I was ill on the day so she took someone else instead
• Hamlet – there was some confusion over the start time, for which I take no responsibility, so we missed it

So, in summary, please don’t abandon me.  I have really enjoyed writing these entries and being a (very minor) part of the community of theatre bloggers and I will definitely be back, although perhaps not with my previous over-zealous dedication to writing about absolutely everything I see as that way madness lies.  2011?  Bring.  It.  On.

Tags: Bedlam, Jarvis Cocker, Jon Richardson, Legally Blonde, Nine Lessons and Carols for Godless People, profuse apologies, Richard Herring, Russell Kane, Season's Greetings, Suede, Tim Minchin

A Bit of Fry and…Fry

I’m not sure that I have yet had the chance on this blog to fully express just how much I heart Stephen Fry.  I feel about him like young people feel about Justin Bieber or Robert Pattinson.  OK, maybe not quite like that but, without wishing to sound like one of those people who is desperate to prove they liked someone before you did, I have been a fan for many years and was definitely on the bandwagon before he attained national treasure status.

However, before last month the only time I had seen the Frymeister in person was in the first class carriage of a Virgin Pendolino to Euston (I got on at Liverpool Lime Street and he at Stafford).  This was a very nerve-wracking experience because I spent the entire journey in terror that he was going to show himself to be a graceless oaf and all my long-held illusions would be shattered.  Fortunately, he was perfectly charming and even returned the slightly demented smile I gave him on my way back from the toilet.

When a smattering of live dates were announced to coincide with the release of The Fry Chronicles, the second volume of his autobiography, there was no way I wasn’t going to be there and so it was that I found myself spending successive Monday evenings in the company of the divine Mr F in two of London’s finest Halls, the Royal Festival and the Royal Albert.  Both evenings covered similar ground although the first felt more like a formal book reading, with a lectern and a number of lengthy extracts from the tome in question, and the second a more relaxed affair, complete with armchair and chaise longue.

The book, which I have now read, begins with our hero being released from prison and ends with him on the verge of both TV stardom and a cocaine habit.  I can think of no other showbiz autobiography in which the writer is so hard on himself, but he seems determined to show all aspects of his personality: insecurities, inadequacies and all.  It is sad to see how uncomfortable he is in his own body and the extent to which the outwardly confident persona hides a deep self-loathing.  He hinted at this in the live shows, telling of the difficult relationship he has with sugar in all its forms.  However, the highlight for me was hearing the story, complete with impression, of his first meeting with Hugh Laurie, to whom the book is dedicated and with whom he felt an instant “collaborative love”.     

The Albert Hall shows were much-hyped due to the Twitter factor but, despite a veneer of interactivity, the questions submitted by his “disciples” mainly served as prompts for anecdotes from the book.  Not that this is a bad thing – to be honest, I was a little concerned at the prospect of someone who suffers from low self-confidence taking to the stage without any real idea of what he was going to talk about.  I was surprised by how nervous he appeared – that thing he does where he pushes his fringe out of his face was much in evidence – and how moved he seemed to be by the reception he received.  I suppose you can have people telling you you’re a national treasure, but every so often you need to see it to believe it.

Tags: Stephen Fry, Stephen Fry Live, The Fry Chronicles

Dance: Shoes, Sadler’s Wells

Although the bumpy bits on my chest and tidy trouser area would suggest that I am female, I have never really understood the obsession some women have with shoes, finding it very difficult to get excited about a well-proportioned heel or a beautifully sculpted instep and barely able to tell the difference between Barratts and Blahnik.  So it wasn’t a fascination with footwear that led me to Sadler’s Wells but rather the lure of a new work by Jerry Springer: The Opera co-creator Richard Thomas.  It seemed an unlikely marriage of composer and material, but after incurring the wrath of fundamentalist (with the emphasis on the mentalist) Christians, you can see why Thomas might have found less controversial subject matter attractive.
 
I know very little about dance, having been thrown out of ballet class at the age of seven for having weak ankles, but very much liked the choreography in most of the routines; everything I loved about Stephen Mear’s work on Sweet Charity is on display here along with one of the original Menier cast members, the strikingly beautiful and impossibly bendy Ebony Molina.   All of the dancers looked pretty amazing to me, particularly given that they were required to perform in all sorts of footwear, from fetish heels to Crocs.  The singers were also great, especially Jerry Springer‘s Alison Jiear: her voice is incredibly powerful and clear and she has a real comic talent.  Unfortunately, the acoustics of the Sadler’s Wells auditorium meant that the words were more than a little indistinct: hopefully this will be sorted before it transfers as I caught a few snippets of witty lyrics but felt like I missed a lot more.

No expense had been spared in the staging of Shoes, with its cast of four singers and twelve dancers – the set featured a giant stiletto sandal (designed by shoe supremo Beatrix Ong) which served both as a staircase and a slide, three-dimensional projections and different trucks for each of number, so the fact that a West End run has now been announced for 2011 is not surprising.  The first half was stronger on the whole than the second but both had their moments: I particularly loved the story of a Hush Puppie wearing adulterer told to a Portishead-esque soundtrack, the hilarious tale of a pair of cursed wedding shoes staged inside a  giant picture frame and the gospel-tinged ode to shopping on the high street.  

There were a few Jerry Springer moments, particularly the Evita-like Imelda Marcos number in which two bodyguards acted as a chorus and  the series of interjections examining shoe and foot-related clichés but, although I accept there’s only so much you can say about shoes, I would have liked a bit more of an edge.  Ultimately, although I wasn’t really sure what the point of the whole thing was, Shoes made for an entertaining evening which made me embarrassed that I can barely walk in high heels, let alone dance in them.

Tags: Alison Jiear, Richard Thomas, Sadler's Wells, Shoes, Stephen Mear

Theatre: Clybourne Park, Royal Court

My bank manager is going to be having some serious words with the man behind There Ought To Be Clowns.  Having decided that, in order to avoid bankruptcy and destitution, I could live without seeing Clybourne Park, I made the mistake of casting my eye over a review of an early preview on his ace blog and decided that perhaps I ought to reconsider.  And I am very glad that I did, because a couple of days later it opened to an avalanche of four- and five-star reviews and tickets were suddenly harder to get hold of than a jellied eel.

Clybourne Park feels like two one-act plays held together by the common threads of property and race.  The first half is set in the 1950s and opens on a middle-aged couple discussing at length the meaning of the word “Neapolitan” in an ice cream context.  It soon becomes clear that they have suffered a shattering tragedy leaving them with a grief which the wife, played by the marvellous Sophie Thompson, masks with a tightly wound cheery exterior whilst the husband (Steffan Rhodri, giving a performance of such pent-up anger that I feared he may be heading for an aneurysm) withdraws from the world.  Eager to move as soon as possible, they are selling their house to a black couple and in doing so have upset the neighbours, particularly the bespectacled, be-bow-tied Karl.  Having given a splendid performance as Watson in Sherlock, Martin Freeman here takes a further step towards erasing the memory of Tim Canterbury, allowing Karl’s prejudice to gradually emerge from behind his neighbourly bonhomie. 

In the second half, the action shifts to the present day; the house is a dilapidated shell and a young white couple want to knock it down  to build a new home in its place.  The neighbourhood is now occupied by middle-class black families keen to protect their heritage and the situation is reversed.  The act climaxes in an absurd racist joke-off between Freeman’s increasingly exasperated husband and the self-assured representative of the residents (Lorna Brown), from which no character emerges with any credit.  The acting is much more naturalistic than the first half (seemingly a conscious decision of director Dominic Cooke) but still the characters are not listening to each other and the same ignorance and prejudice is displayed: everything has changed but nothing has changed.

Reading the foregoing, you would be forgiven for thinking that this all sounds very worthy but not a lot of fun, much like the overrated Oscar-magnet Crash, which explores similar issues.  I have thus far failed to give any sense of how laugh-out-loud funny the play is.  Some of the laughter was certainly born out of the discomfort of the overwhelmingly white audience but it was more than that: the writing is sharp and darkly hilarious, the characters are well-realised and the performances are pretty much perfect.  The ensemble cast is so strong that it’s very difficult to single out any individual, but I especially enjoyed Lucian  Msamati’s scene-stealing asides.  I could have lived without the ghostly goings-on at the end, but this is already forgiven: Clybourne Park achieves the rare feat of being both thought-provoking and entertaining and deserves all the awards which will invariably be heaped upon it.

Tags: Clybourne Park, Lorna Brown, Lucian Msamati, Martin Freeman, marvellous actresses, Royal Court, Sophie Thompson, Steffan Rhodri