Writer: Zia Ahmed Director: Sameena Hussain Ella, a Yorkshire-born actor and Haseeb, a London-born poet, meet when he attends one of her drama workshops. Haseeb stays behind to ask Ella to repeat her tongue twisters, and flirting (obviously) ensues. They quickly fall for each other in the flashing montage that follows, kissing in clubs, sharing controversial opinions on hot chocolate over dinner and giggling on tube rides. Eva Scott and Usman Nawaz’s endearing performances deliver tangible chemistry. The honeymoon phase doesn’t last long. On top of dealing with the stresses of life as an artist in a bustling city, juggling…
Author: The Reviews Hub - Yorkshire & North East
The Reviews Hub - Yorkshire & North East
The Yorkshire & North East team is under the editorship of Jacob Bush. The Reviews Hub was set up in 2007. Our mission is to provide the most in-depth, nationwide arts coverage online.
Writer: Claudia Rankine Director: Natalie Ibu The play opens in an achingly trendy apartment as a wealthy construction magnate, Charles, and his society hostess wife, Virginia, are preparing to greet a rising black photographer, Charlotte, with a view to commissioning work from her for his foundation. The walls are covered in representations of famous works of art, all documenting the suffering of black Americans. Also present is painfully trendy art dealer, Eric, who is keen to make the match between artist and patron. Charlotte’s work is to photographically recreate racist atrocities. He advises them that she is protective of her…
Book, Music and Lyrics: Jim Steinman Director: Jay Scheib The entire city is burning. You can see the flames like the inside of a mad jukebox. Lost Boys stalk the streets, those jungle markings on their chests… Jim Steinman first conceived the idea that would eventually become Bat Out of Hell in the mid 60s, a dream finally brought to stage in 2017. A dystopian retelling of Peter Pan, where a bunch of young anarchists have been frozen forever at age 18 following the Chemical Wars. Despotic head of the police state, Falco (Rob Fowler) regularly clashes with leader of…
Writers: Sophia Hatfield and Lisa Cagnacci Director: Lisa Cagnacci The Stephen Joseph Theatre in Scarborough has been supporting its excellent production of Jane Eyre with a series of events making up a Brontë Festival. The only one of these that takes the form of an actual dramatic performance is I Am No Bird, a one-hour reimagined Brontë story by Stute Theatre in association with the Stephen Joseph Theatre and Brontë Parsonage Museum which slots in for five performances at the end of the run of Jane Eyre. Performed by three talented actor-musicians, it’s pleasant enough, but doesn’t really add much…
Writers: Henry Lewis, Jonathan Sayer and Henry Shields, with Penn and Teller Director: Adam Meggido What makes Mischief’s latest show, Magic Goes Wrong, work so well is the things that go right. The inept patter of the magicians and the tricks that miss the mark are amusing enough, but it’s when a routine ends up with an unexpected bullseye that you realise that this is a really slick show. Even some of the disasters are pretty clever: the Great Sophisticato, reproducing his father’s dove act, covers the stage in feathers and reveals a very dead goose, but the innocents in the…
Director: Toby Ward The range of work presented by Opera North in the Howard Assembly Room is exemplified by following up the jazz-come-Cuban music of Roberto Fonseca with the Ensemble Pro Victoria presenting music from Spain’s Golden Age. This lasted from the establishment of the monarchy over the whole country ruled by “los reyes catolicos”, Ferdinand and Isabella, in 1492, to 1659. The peak of achievement came in the long reign of Philip II in the second half of the 16th century. If the Ensemble Pro Victoria failed to emulate Fonseca’s capacity crowd, an unusually appealing programme produced an enthusiastic…
Writer: Lucy Moss and Toby Marlow Director: Lucy Moss and Jamie Armitage Choreographer: Carrie-Anne Ingrouille Dazzling, delightful and quite often deliciously irreverent, Six the Musical is most definitely ‘extra’ and you already know you’re going to love it. Intently high-octane, quelling any doubts that this is an illuminative pop concert rather than a musical, this edgy and entertaining evening is a glittering kaleidoscope into the lives of the six wives of Henry VIII. The girls are fierce and full of bravado driven by a gloriously clever idea. The show is current and cohesive and there are history lessons to be…
Roberto Fonseca is a pianist who unites jazz with the music of his native Cuba. His one long set at the Howard Assembly Room alternated the rhythms of Cuba with dazzling improvisations, backed up by two equally stunning musicians in his trio, bassist Yandy Martinez-Rodriguez and drummer Raul Herrera. The trio makes an immediate impact with the opener, based around a two-chord figure for piano and/or electric bass, but going through myriad changes, dynamic rather than rhythmical, with Herrera already making his mark as a terrific drummer. Two or three numbers in, Fonseca and Herrera left the stand and Martinez-Rodriguez…