Luke Alexander's blog

I knew absolutely nothing about Welcome to Thebes before I went into the National Theatre production earlier this week, and I thoroughly recommend this approach to get the most out of it.

Since that essentially invalidates this mini-review, I’ll keep it nice and short.

The play, a new work from Moira Buffini, takes the location of Thebes as shorthand for a jumble of classical and contemporary themes.  At its most basic level, Welcome to Thebes brings us a collision between the dense, symbolic action of classical tragedy and the visceral reality of the aftermath of modern conflict.  In doing so, it manages to provide a fresh alternative on both.

It is in its relocation of conflict-torn Thebes to a post-war African state, complete with the vocabulary of Truth and Reconciliation, where the play will lose the patience of some of its audience.  And, indeed, the script does occasionally lapse into cliché from which the superb cast cannot quite rescue it – particularly in the characters of the insane Prince Tydeus and the cabinet / chorus of gossiping middle aged women.

Others may criticise the liberties Buffini takes with her apparent source material – the story of Antigone.  But, even as an over-sensitive Classicist, this didn’t bother me – and it came across as an authentic retelling, retaining the sublimest themes without fixating on accuracy in details which were, at any rate, perfectly fluid two and a half millennia ago.

Highlights included: the ever-present and aptly comic Tiresias, highlighting the themes of blindness, foresight and destiny which stood up well against its classical source material; a superb interpretation of the arrogance of democratic Athens which never quite dipped into parody of American imperialism; and forceful, poetic writing delivered by a well-chosen cast.  The decision to place Thebes in the hands of a democratically elected Euridyce is bold, but pays off.  And the character of Theseus is nothing but a joy to watch.

Certainly a recommended theatre trip, particularly for those with a classical bent.  But don’t go expecting Sophocles or Ford Coppola.

Greek tragedy has an extremely public dimension which can be very difficult to imagine today.  Performances were in the open air, in front of the entire citizenry, generally as part of a religious or public festival.  In Athens, the home of Western drama, public performance was intrinsically linked to the concept of democracy during the period in which it flourished.

What better location is there, then, to put on a dramatic performance of one of the most famous plays in Greek drama, than in the very public, semi-political performance space at More London, the Scoop, next to City Hall.

The play itself is arguably one of the most accessible of Greek drama, and the company have updated it masterfully.  With a fantastic, passionate new translation from Stella Duffy which maintains the play’s direct emotionality as well as the poetry of its language, it feels as fresh as ever, and the crucial context of ‘us and them’ comes through strongly.  Re-inventing the chorus as a horde of duplicitious journalists sounded like a terrible idea, but I needn’t have worried: it was handled wonderfully, and was a clever way to emphasise the importance of reputation and public action.

The acting was very good, with some well-judged humour which didn’t detract from the gravity of the piece.  Jason and Medea were both given the chance to argue their case without vilification as the audience’s empathy shifts uneasily between them throughout the performance.  Jason’s doublespeak was spot-on, while Medea bubbled with rage throughout.

If there is a criticism to be made, it is that the company makes slightly overenthusiastic use of the rather sparse set.  Characters jump in and out of the main action in a slightly disconcerting way, and the points where characters are seated in the audience were a little offputting, and created a confusing grey area around who was supposed to be part of the action at that time.

That minor quibble aside, I would thoroughly recommend anyone to head down to the Scoop for this fantastic free event.  I cannot imagine a better use for the location than a festival of free classical drama in the middle of the summer, with a beer tent and gastro-pub style roast potatoes, no less.  Would be 4 stars if I’d paid, but it’s an unmissable 5 stars for free – particularly if you’ve never seen Greek drama before.

(Do also check out the children’s performance of Jason and the Argonauts beforehand.  It looked great, though I wonder how many of the parents who chose to keep their kids on for the Medea performance knew what was going to happen in the latter.)

The choice of shows at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe, not to mention the countless events going on at the same time as part of the other festivals, is overwhelming enough to induce a Buridan’s ass style paralysis in anyone. Even armed with a full set of reviews and recommendations, the sheer scale of the enterprise means that you are depressingly likely to miss at least ten or twenty ‘unmissable’ shows.

Indeed, for many first-time Fringegoers, the quest for these Platonic shows – undiscovered gems of theatre and comedy lurking in some 20-seater venue unnoticed by critics – can frustrate their enjoyment of the shows they do see.

When I visit the Scottish capital for my annual dose of culture, laughter and drinking overpriced beer in cramped cellars, I now tend to to visit with a very stringent set of expectations, to avoid exactly this problem.  I visit at the beginning of the Festival, in preview week, to minimise financial discomfort, and I take full advantage of every free ticket and chance to jump the queue (including this year’s excellent Friends of the Fringe priority hut).

And crucially, I accept that of the 20-odd shows I’m likely to fit in, the ones I will enjoy most are likely to be those I already know are going to be good… along with everyone else at the Fringe.

This year, those shows were Daniel Kitson’s standup at The Stand, his theatre show ‘The Interminable Suicide of Gregory Church’ at the Traverse, Hoipolloi’s Hugh Hughes in… 360 at the Pleasance, the Penny Dreadfuls in The Never Man, Analogue’s Beachy Head and The Hotel (directed by the Fringe’s genius loci, Mark Watson).  These are all very solid recommendations, but then they were always going to be.  The only returning act I couldn’t get that enthused about this year was NIE’s My Life With The Dogs, which seemed like a very insubstantial trailer for the far more affecting and entertaining trilogy of European stories which ran from 2005-7.

What made this year’s Festival such a particular delight, however, was that with the exception of the slightly depressing show bought up by the Footlights this year (they are never as good as I think they should be), every single show I saw was genuinely great.

From solid if mildly unoriginal shows like political drama Party and BBC3-before-you-know-it sketch show Clever Peter, to people I really should have heard of like You Need Me, whose superb Certain Dark Things is my theatre pick of the Festival, and the adapted BBC radio play Success Story, most of these are undoubtedly going to find the audiences they deserve.

There are two particular shows, however, that I really feel deserve audiences they may never receive, either because they’re in odd venues or becaues they’re simply not going to receive the constant critical attention that a Fringe show requires to succeed (I may do a post on the role twitter etc might play at some point in the future).

The first of these is CoolFun, on at 12.30 pm at the White Horse on the Royal Mile.  If your motivator for heading to Edinburgh is to find the ‘next big thing’ in stand-up, you could do worse than heading down to this Free Fringe event (which means it costs nothing), which features four extremely talented young stand-ups – Nish Kumar, Ed Gamble, Tom Neenan and Jez Scharf  – three of whom are also appearing in Mark Watson’s ensemble piece The Hotel.

A mix of straight, confident observational stand-up, poetry and song, it’s hard to imagine a better Fringe deal than this for free.  When I attended, on the first day, they played to a full house – though I got the impression a number of those present were related to the performers.  If there is any justice, the rest of their run will be just as well attended.

When I saw Funny, at 6pm at 7 Holyrood, on the other hand, I was one of about ten people in the audience.  Although woefully mis-described in the Fringe brochure, Funny is an excellent combination of subtle, sharp political satire, comedy, stagecraft and balls-out acting.  The peice takes its central conceit as the (apparently) true story that US interrogators looked into stand up comedy techniques as a way to ‘break’ prisoners during interrogation.  Following one such intelligence specialist, his comedian mentor and his more traditional colleague, the play takes us through some bitingly relevant yet timeless discussions, presenting them in a mix of excellent dialogue and extended comic sequences (there’s a version of the Aristocrats joke which may be worth the price of admission alone).

While it has its flaws (I found the ending a little lacking, and the comedian character could have been more convincing as a funnyman), this was a fantastic demonstration of what the Fringe can do with a small space, a clever script and a dedicated cast.

Some fantastic shows up at the Fringe this year.  Perhaps it’s that I’ve been going up for a while now, and know a little more what to look for, or perhaps it was simply that the quality of this year was just higher than previous years.

More details on all the shows I loved later, but some top tips to start with:

• Certain Dark Things (Theatre, Underbelly, 9.05pm)
• Daniel Kitson (Comedy, The Stand, midnight)
• The Interminable Suicide of Gregory Church (Theatre, Traverse, various times)
• Hugh Hughes in… 360 (Theatre, Pleasance Courtyard, 7.05pm)
• CoolFun (Comedy, White Horse, 12.30pm)
• Funny (Theatre, Assembly @ 7 Holyrood, 6pm)