Category Archives: Theatre

Steptoe And Son, Theatre Review. Playhouse Theatre, Liverpool.

Photograph by Steve Tanner. Dean Nolan, Mike Shepherd as Steptoe and Son.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *

Cast: Mike Shepherd, Dean Nolan, Kirsty Woodward.

Albert and Harold Steptoe, national comedy legends that were bought to B.B.C. television by the incredible writing of Ray Galton and Alan Simpson, two men bound to each other through blood, despair, apathy and a small measure of distant attachment. No one could have predicted how much the two men would change the television viewing habits of the nation as they settled down each week to watch the Steptoe and Son.

Steptoe And Son, Theatre Review. Playhouse Theatre, Liverpool. full post

(427 words, 1 image, estimated 1:42 mins reading time)

Scotty Road-The Musical, Theatre Review. Unity Theatre, Liverpool.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *

Scotland Road is one of the most iconic and celebrated roads in Liverpool, it has been home to a community who have looked at its heyday with a certain fondness and others have looked at it with begrudging respect that it held so many people together despite any backlash from other areas that ran it down. People have lived there; worked there and grown up there, it is only right that eventually a musical would be based on Scotty Road.

Scotty Road-The Musical, Theatre Review. Unity Theatre, Liverpool. full post

(477 words, 1 image, estimated 1:54 mins reading time)

The Girl I Left Behind Me, Theatre Review. Unity Theatre, Liverpool.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * * *

There was a time when to see a woman in trousers was to court scandal and above all intrigue, the ridiculous thought that the masculine clothes they chose made them any different to anyone else would be laughed at today and quite rightly so. Jessica Walker takes her audience down on a well creased and ironed road to when the music halls were abuzz with the fascination of the women who dressed as men in the well researched and brilliantly put together, The Girl I left Behind Me.  

The Girl I Left Behind Me, Theatre Review. Unity Theatre, Liverpool. full post

(403 words, 1 image, estimated 1:37 mins reading time)

The Loneliness Of The Long Distance Runner, Theatre Review. Playhouse Theatre, Liverpool.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *

Cast: Elliot Barnes-Worrell, Doreene Blackstock, Curtis Cole, Dominic Gately, Savannah Gordon-Liburd, Luke James, Jack McMullen, Richard Pepple, Alix Ross, Sean Sagar.

Alan Sillitoe’s The Loneliness of the Long Distance Runner was written in the dying days of National Service in Great Britain; this coupled with the thought of young offenders’ prisons which became a one-stop shop for hope being abandoned may have been on a lot of people’s minds when the national riots of 2011 scarred and divided the nation.

The Loneliness Of The Long Distance Runner, Theatre Review. Playhouse Theatre, Liverpool. full post

(431 words, 1 image, estimated 1:43 mins reading time)

Jigsy, Theatre Review. Royal Court Theatre, Liverpool.

Les Dennis in Jigsy.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * * *

Seen through the eyes of one man, a jovial lecture from one of the kings of Liverpool comedy as he reminisces about the old days on stage and the old ways of his beloved home city, Jigsy has seen them all, drank with the best and poked gentle and perhaps deserving fun at some of them too.

Jigsy, Theatre Review. Royal Court Theatre, Liverpool. full post

(422 words, 1 image, estimated 1:41 mins reading time)

Rita, Sue and Bob Too!, Theatre Review. St. Helens Theatre Royal.

Dannielle Malone, Paul Opacic, Nikki Sanderson in Rita, Sue and Bob Too! Photograph by Ian D. Hall

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *

Cast: Tina Malone, Nikki Sanderson, Paul Opacic, Dannielle Malone, Mickey Finn, Elyn Kennedy, Paul Malone.

In 2011 Andrea Dunbar’s Rita, Sue and Bob Too! had a sell out run at the St. Helens Theatre Royal, as it comes round again it is easy to see why this portrayal of Margaret Thatcher’s council estate Britain is such a popular and long lasting hit production.

Rita, Sue and Bob Too!, Theatre Review. St. Helens Theatre Royal. full post

(442 words, 1 image, estimated 1:46 mins reading time)

Inspector Norse, Theatre Review. Unity Theatre, Liverpool.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *

Cast: Maggie Fox, Sue Ryding.

For anyone who remembers the excellent and surreal comedy that The Goons, provided radio listeners in the 1950’s, the two women that makes up the strangely compelling and brilliant Lip Service Theatre Company are very much in a similar and genuinely thrilling mould.

The Unity Theatre last had Maggie Fox and Sue Ryding in the outstanding production of Withering Looks and this latest sideways look at Nordic Noir drama, the very funny Inspector Norse (Or the Girl With Two Screws Left Over) is yet another reason to catch these two intelligent women who seem to be able to delight audiences with ease and with one raised eyebrow.

Inspector Norse, Theatre Review. Unity Theatre, Liverpool. full post

(359 words, 1 image, estimated 1:26 mins reading time)

The Sacred Flame, Theatre Review. Playhouse Theatre, Liverpool.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *

Cast:   Sarah Churm, Jamie De Courcey, Robert Demeger, Katrina Innes, Margot Leicester, Al Nedjari, David Ricardo-Pearce, Beatriz Romilly.

When is a murder not murder? It seems in the world of post First World War senselessness and when all those involved and affected by a loss of someone much loved, it can be easier to brush the whole sordid affair under the carpet.

The Sacred Flame, Theatre Review. Playhouse Theatre, Liverpool. full post

(434 words, 1 image, estimated 1:44 mins reading time)

Cold Call, Theatre Review. Unity Theatre, Liverpool.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *

Cast: Ross McCall, Holly Wilson-Guy, Matt Austin, Tom Hosker.

After wowing critics and audiences alike in September with her one-woman spectacular Wolf Red, Elinor Randle has turned her hand once more back to directing and in the biting satirical play Cold Call; she again strikes the perfect balance between brilliant absurd humour and worrying 21st century behaviour.

Cold Call, Theatre Review. Unity Theatre, Liverpool. full post

(363 words, 1 image, estimated 1:27 mins reading time)

Treasured, Theatrical Review. Liverpool Anglican Cathedral.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating *****

Cast: Nicola Bentley, Nick Birkinshaw, Laura Campbell, Brian Dodd, Christopher Hollinshead, Brendan Ball, Louise Bennett, Bill McGarry, Barry Powell, Jean Silcock, Okechukwu Ugonna, Stephen Wooder, Barbara Whitehead.

One hundred years on from its fateful maiden voyage, the Titanic, the greatest ship that the world had ever known, still has the power to enthral, educate and leave people stunned and shattered by what they learn.

Treasured, Theatrical Review. Liverpool Anglican Cathedral. full post

(376 words, 1 image, estimated 1:30 mins reading time)