Jeffrey Bernard is Unwell at the Richmond Theatre
By Carolin Kopplin
Work frequently interferes with my drinking.
Immortalised by the great Peter O’Toole Jeffrey Bernard is Unwell has been revived several times since it won the Evening Standard’s Best Comedy Award in 1990. Robert Powell has now taken over the sceptre and very successfully so. He inhabits the tour-de-force role of the charming and witty yet excessive Jeffrey Bernard and entertains his audience reminiscing about past friends, acquaintances, and a few ex-wives whilst being trapped overnight in his favourite Soho pub The Coach and Horses on Greek Street. From Bernard’s colourful contributions to the Spectator’s Low Life column, fellow Fleet Street legend Keith Waterhouse created this funny and occasionally poignant play now expertly directed by David Grindley.
Robert Powell is supported by four players who portray some of the more or less important people in his life – Mark Hadfield, Peter Bramhill, Amy Hall and Rebecca Lacey. Among the people we get to meet are Dennis Shaw whom Bernard tried to have arrested for being boring, the redoubtable Muriel Belcher, who owned an exclusive club in Soho, and could be hilariously rude to unsuitable customers, Jeffrey’s ex-wives and some of his gambling friends who will not refrain from using their newly born triplets - "who's the lady?" or organize cat races to satisfy their gambling needs.
The play is a bit long and repetitive
at times but it is very entertaining and well worth seeing if you
want to have a good time. The stage set looks so comfy that you
don’t want to remain in the stalls but join Jeffrey at the bar to
watch his egg-trick close up.
Until 11 June 2011
Richmond Theatre, The Green, Richmond, Surrey, TW9 1QJ
Box
Office
0844 871 7651
Jeffrey Bernard is Unwell at Studio Salford
By Caroline MayJeffrey Bernard was one of the free spirits of fifties Fitzrovia, a drinking chum of Dylan Thomas, Francis Bacon, Lucian Freud, John Le Mesurier and the bohemian circle which later converged around the Coach and Horses pub in Soho. His sordid goings on were chronicled in The Spectator’s “Low Life” column from 1975 till his death some 20 years later, and fellow journalist and imbiber Keith Waterhouse dramatised some of these anecdotes for a 1989 hit show originally starring Peter O’Toole.
Jeffrey, played by here by Phil Dennison, finds himself accidentally locked into the Coach and Horses overnight, and passes the time by reminiscing about the colourful characters he’s encountered over the decades (played by a quick-changing, quick-witted cast of four).
The first thing to say is that this is an absolute tour de force by Phil Dennison, who has us spellbound for two hours with his authentic but beguiling portrait of the seedy, alcoholic raconteur. The whistling teeth, sunken cheeks and trembling hands are small but telling details. The conversational and confessional style of the piece are so well-suited to the intimacy of Studio Salford - fittingly a room above a pub - that Mr Dennison’s Jeffrey seems to address every member of the audience individually, holding us with his glittering eye like a slightly more convivial version of the Ancient Mariner.
The supporting cast - Edward Barry, Simon Griffiths, Zoe Matthews and Samantha Vaughan - bring to life the assorted pub landlords, angry editors, bar-room philosophers, gamblers, boozers and wives that Jeffrey engages with during his sozzled and slightly existential existence.
However when Keith Waterhouse tops and tails the action with a rhapsodic tribute to our eponymous hero by his old Soho friend, the poet Elizabeth Smart (played by Kirsty Fox), we realise that the play is a love letter from Waterhouse, not just to Jeffrey, but to the whole drinking, smoking, betting, fighting, womanising, throwing-up, throwing-out, passing-out, long-past culture of London W1.
Gayle Hare’s production for Organised Chaos is a fantastic achievement from a clearly confident young company and well worth seeing.
Evenings: 17-20 Nov @ 8pm
Tickets: £7 (£5 conc) from www.studiosalford.com
Studio Salford (Above The Kings Arms)
11 Bloom Street
Salford, M3 6AN)
Some Stories by Cheap Seats at the Blacks Members Club in Soho
By Carolin Kopplin
Cheap Seats was founded by Alistair McDowall and Lucy Oliver-Harrison in 2004 and is a company dedicated to new writing and on finding new ways to engage with the audience. Some Stories is stepping away from conventional theatre spaces and embarking on a collaborative process which is meant to immerse the audience.
At the box office the audience is divided up into two groups – A and B. Each group is then taken to their first room which is approximately the size of a small living room. There is a very intimate atmosphere as the audience is seated close to the actor who then tells his or her story. All four stories are connected by the common thread of children, loneliness, and death.
I was part of group A and our first play turned out to be Lily on the Stairs directed by Oliver Lyttelton: Lily Graham (Audrey Schoellhammer) is calling neighbours, friends and organisations – anybody - only to leave messages on their respective answering machines. She never manages to talk to a person and nobody ever seems to return her calls. But Lily desperately needs someone to talk to.
Blue Rabbits, directed by Ned Bennett, is the title of a story that a lonely girl thinks up. As a „slow learner“ Andy (the excellent Flora Spencer-Longhurst) is never invited to any parties, her school mates just mock her. Therefore, Andy has been making up stories instead of friends. Eventually, she is invited to a party – Mike’s birthday party. Andy carefully prepares her outing – her father would never allow it – but when she knocks on the door none of the other guests have yet arrived.
In sophie is sophie, directed by Elizabeth Sands, Sophie (Rachel Finnegan) is talking to an invisible guest, a little girl. Sophie used to have a twin brother, Edward, who suffered a fatal accident when he was ten years old. Her mother completely withdraws from the world after Edward’s death as he had always been her favourite thereby leaving Sophie to fend for herself which she obviously cannot do at such a young age. At last Sophie gathers up the courage to approach her mother.
White Blood Cells was the last play I saw and the most disturbing one. A man with a bandaged hand (Mark Weinman) tells us the story of how he received his injury. He used to enjoy driving to places where no one had ever seen him before. The reason becomes clear as the story progresses and the protagonist breaks into a house. He has a nice meal, stealing his food from the refrigerator, and then even prepares a sandwich for the owner’s little boy whom he tells that he is a friend of his father’s.
All four stories are fascinating and deeply disturbing and the acting is first rate. This is a production well worth seeing.
Blacks
Members’ Club, 67 Dean Street, Soho, London W1D 4QH
13th June at 6pm & 8.30pm
Tickets: £5
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