Tezza's Theatre Place

Micha Colombo as Prospero.  Photo by Adam Trigg. How important is gender these days? Worry not, this is a review not a political commentary, but gender has recently been at the forefront of news around the world. The thing I, it’s not a new phenomenon, back in William Shakespeare’s day, only men were permitted to act on stage – bringing up the vision of a burly bearded bloke in a dress playing the teenage Juliet. Recently, the National Theatre put on a very well received version of  Twelfth Night  with a female Malvolio. Groundbreaking Lazarus Theatre Company have taken this idea a stage further with their version of  The Tempest , the first of their three production series at the Greenwich. The story is the same. Prospero (Micha Colombo) has been usurped as Duke of Milan by an alliance of her sister, Antonio (Peace Oseyenum), Alonzo (Nicolas Salmon), King of Naples and Sebastian (Nell Hardy) the King’s sister. Thanks to the intervention of a friendly noble, G...

https://www.londontheatre1.com/news/197480/review-ballistic-kings-head-theatre/ Ballistic: Jack – Photo by Tom Packer Did you know, in the first 60 days of 2018, there have been 18 gun-related incidents in American High Schools? Now that’s a lot. Every year, someone goes on the rampage in a school, a park, at their work or out of a hotel window. It’s become so commonplace now that, whilst we are shocked by the images on the news, we still watch them as part of our evening’s viewing. Afterwards, the politicians and pressure groups come out with their standard cliches and the perpetrator joins the long list of such people – normally described as a loner with a love of porn and video games – who we sort of forget, unless their name comes up in a pub quiz. The reality is we never entirely know the person themselves or their motivation for doing what they did. The same cannot be said of the vengeful lad in Alex Packer’s show  Ballistic  at the King’s Head Theatre. Him, we get t...

https://www.londontheatre1.com/news/179160/review-the-wasp-jermyn-street-theatre/ Lisa Gorgin and Selina Giles in The Wasp – Photographer Andreas Grieger I suppose I was very lucky at school. Although being short, wearing glasses and having ‘FA Cup’ ears, I don’t remember ever being bullied about theses things. Though I did get my ears fixed and once ‘lost’ a pair of NHS glasses as I hated them, so maybe things did get said after all. The point is, that whatever may have happened it was obviously pretty mild and so I’ve forgotten about it. I’m one of the lucky ones. For some people school is a place they go to to be tortured either mentally, verbally or physically. For them, school doesn’t end when they hit 16 and leave. For them, these events may live in their mind for years to come, and this is the premise behind Morgan Lloyd Malcolm’s play  The Wasp  at the Jermyn Street Theatre. Outside a nondescript coffee shop, two women sit and drink tea. Heather (Selina Giles) is...

https://www.londontheatre1.com/news/178118/review-of-dessert-at-southwark-playhouse/ Dessert: L-R Stuart Milligan, Teresa Banham, Graham Turner – photo credit Catherine Ashmore As the Bible says in 1 Timothy 6, verses 9-10 “ those who want to be rich, however, fall into temptation and become ensnared by many foolish and harmful desires that plunge them into ruin and destruction. For the love of money is the root of all kinds of evil. By craving it, some have wandered away from the faith and pierced themselves with many sorrows. ” Yet, we all do want money. Millions are spent every week on various lotteries. The strange thing is, that wherever we end up on life’s rich list, there is always someone who we envy for having more. And occasionally this envy can spill over into action as demonstrated by Oliver Cotton in his play Dessert at the Southwark Playhouse. In a rather nice country house, four people are enjoying a dinner party: Sir Hugh Fennell (Michael Simkins) and his lovely w...

https://www.londontheatre1.com/news/151683/review-of-139-copeland-road-a-really-superb-production/ I am really bad with horror stories. I don’t like scary movies and can still remember, and am frightened by the ‘nursery’ rhyme at the end of the first – and best –  Nightmare on Elm Street . My other problem is one of theatrical FOMO – Fear of Missing Out. So, when asked if I fancied going to review an immersive horror show called  139 Copeland Road , I naturally decided to put myself at risk of nightmares and go along to it. 139 Copeland Road  is a real house in South East London where a bad thing happened in 1974 when the occupier Mary Collins and her two children were burned to death in a very unusual house fire. Since then, the property has remained empty and picked up a certain reputation in the neighbourhood for strange phenomena occurring within it. But now, forty-two years after the original fire, a leading psychic is trying to find out if the reputation is des...

https://www.londontheatre1.com/news/150919/review-sam-shepards-fool-for-love-found111/ Adam Rothenberg and Lydia Wilson – Photo Darren Bell There are times when going to the theatre can be a confusing experience. While a production is engaging and holds the attention, when it finishes, there is a sense of ‘what did I just see’ and you leave the theatre wondering if you had missed something or were maybe not intellectually up to the ideas of the playwright. I mention this, as I encountered this phenomenon last night at the Found111 presentation of Sam Shepard’s Fool For Love. In a run down Mojave Desert motel, May (Lydia Wilson) is sat at the end of the bed looking upset and not making eye contact with tall cowboy Eddie (Adam Rothenberg). Eddie is trying to placate May and reassure her that he will not be leaving her again. Not only is he promising her that he will stay but he is trying to convince May that she should move to Wyoming and set up home with him. The two obviously ...

https://www.londontheatre1.com/news/150674/mums-the-word-the-hen-and-chickens-theatre/ I never went to a boarding school. Age eleven I was down the local comprehensive five days a week and returning to my loving home for dinner in the evening. However, those that did go through the public school system often say it had a profound effect on their lives and they made relationships that lasted forever. I used the word relationships there deliberately for, as can be seen in Robert Hughes’ new play  Mum’s the Word  at the Hen and Chickens Theatre, you can’t always call these coming together of people friendship. The ‘Wine and Dandy’ bar in Soho and Jess (Danielle Williams) is sat at a table by herself, a waiter approaches and kisses her. Even in Soho, this overly familiar type of behaviour would normally be considered odd, but the waiter is in fact, Jess’s boyfriend Aidan (Lewis Clarke). Tonight though Aiden is just a waiter as Jess is meeting some friends – well when I say fr...