Events Review

A Midsummer Night’s Dream

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Brighton Open Air Theatre, Wednesday, June 13

THERE are fewer love stories more tangled than this. Hermia loves Lysander, but Hermia’s father wants her to marry Demetrius.

Demetrius has stolen the heart of Helena, and all this is whipped into a frenzy in a mysterious forest by the mischievous Puck with casual use of mind-altering magic.

Meanwhile, a bumbling gaggle of tradesmen rehearse a play for a Duke’s wedding.

One particular addition that allows this production to play out in a league of its own is its use of Gàidhlig (Scottish Gaelic) throughout the script.

The naturally otherworldly texture of the ancient language (that I presume few in the audience were fluent in) added atmosphere and mystery to a script that few would try and improve.

Each group of characters and their world were represented by a different style of folk song, from melancholy harmonies to bouncing drinking songs from England and Ireland.

Some of the more delicate refrains were unfortunately lost to the rush hour traffic, but that’s just part of the deal when carving out a theatrical idyll in the middle of a city.

There wasn’t a single weak link in the cast of six, who wove their way through the audience throughout the performance to amusing effect.

Madelyn Smedley brought most of the laughs as the lovelorn yet sassy Helena, dealing with being flung into the moat around the stage, whether accidentally or not, with great comedy.

When all comes to a head in the magical and chaotic forest, the play descends into hilarious and perfectly choreographed fights bringing plenty of gasps from the audience.

But, despite the disorder unfolding onstage, all was brought together with muted, classical costume and set design in a palette of cream, brown and green with inventive use made of a colander, and some hilariously Asterix-esque pigtails for Flute’s character in the shambolic performance for the Duke.

Once again the Brighton Open Air Theatre hosts a great Shakespeare production.

Featuring a brilliant cast with musical skill along with their comedic timing, the performance came to a close with a standing ovation thoroughly deserved.

Lois Zoppi

Coming Soon

Collabro

Pavilion Theatre, Worthing, Tuesday, April 9 2019

MAMMOTH tours truly are a thing of beauty. You can tell a lot about how hard a band works based on the number of tour dates they’re willing to give themselves in one solid run.

Collabro have now hit my radar as one of these bands, as the classically trained singers have just announced a whopping 51 date tour.

The half a century of dates will take them far and wide across the UK, to theatres and concert halls the country over, all in the name of finding their way back to the capital.

The ‘Road to the Royal Albert Hall’ tour kicks off in South Shields, near Newcastle, after which the group will go from county to county, across boarder into Scotland and Wales, and even over seas - sort of - as they make the small trip across The Channel to the Isle of Wight.

This, of course, will all culminate in the band taking to the stage at the historic Royal Albert Hall to end the tour.

To give you some idea; there are 51 dates on this tour, held between the first show on February 10, to the last on April 20, 2019, Thats over a half a ton of shows in just 70 days. That itself deserves a round of applause.

Given the amount of days taken in on the tour it would have been incredible if the band had somehow left out Sussex from their trip round the UK. They visit our sunny coastline as they enter the final leg of the tour.

Just 11 days before the culmination of the tour, Collabro hit the Pavilion Theatre in Worthing.

Hopefully the relentless tour cycle won’t have tired them out the the extend that they can’t deliver the show fans will be expecting.

With their proud, booming voices, which can cover anything from hit musical numbers to operatic masterpieces, the Pavilion is the perfect scene to set up one heck of a performance.

There arena area of the venue may be all seats but there’s sure to be plenty of opportuntiy to get out of them and sing in full force as the 2014 Britain’s Got Talent winners set out to enthral and capture the hearts and minds of the crowd.

There’s no telling yet what the setlist may entail, there’s plenty of time for the group to decide on that, but one thing is for sure: if Collabro bring their A game to this show, and this tour, then Worthing won’t know what’s hit it.