Drama
The Mikado is one of those works of musical theatre that you either love or hate. There's no denying the songs are amusing and will leave you whistling as you exit. Like another of their creations, HMS Pinafore, this opera has Gilbert and Sullivan's idiosyncratic brand of mawkish sentimentality galore. This time, however, we're not in Victorian Britain, but halfway across the world in Japan.
Or are we? Nanki-Poo, Yum-Yum, Ko-Ko and Katisha, who live in the town of Titipu, might be denizens of the Land of the Rising Sun, but seem to be stoutly English at heart.
In the film version of The King and I, Yul Brynner played a Thai man. Similarly, the Oxford University Gilbert and Sullivan Society's production of The Mikado takes a page out of the masters' libretto and engages in colour-blind casting, with all the 'Japanese' roles played by Caucasians.
Will Edwards plays Nanki-Poo, a young man whose heart is aflutter for the beautiful Yum-Yum (Kirsty Anderson). There is one catch, however. Nanki-Poo cannot savour this delectable dish, for Yum-Yum is engaged to her guardian, the tailor Ko-Ko (Adam Smyth) and flirting is punishable by death. Edwards and Anderson capture the troubled couples' dynamic well, especially through songs such as 'Were you not to Ko-Ko plighted.' The pair both give strong performances, which personify love's young dream thwarted by societal mores.
The set was impressive without being excessive, with Willow Pattern China design forming the colour scheme for the production. Effort had also gone into the costumes, which are a cross between staid Victorian and Kabuki; reflecting the faux Orientalism that Gilbert and Sullivan intended.
While the Mikado might not be to everyone's taste, every once in a while, I like to laugh, cry, and be entertained, and this production generally delivered.
It is worth watching, if only for Katisha's magnificently rousing number at the end - you'll be surprised how agile an elderly lady can be.
The Mikado may be silly and sentimental, but that's what Gilbert and Sullivan is all about: a riot of colour, song, and spectacle that uplifts the soul and adds a bit of Eastern promise to our English shores.
Punters in Far From the Madding Crowd, the infamous 'thespy pub' of Gloucester Green, must be eyeing this term's theatre season brochures with delight. Despite the looming threat of exams, an impressive array of revivals and new writing has been programmed.
The biggest and most high-profile event of the term is the Oxford Greek Festival 2004, taking place in 2nd and 3rd weeks. The largest arts event the university has ever run looks like it has something for everyone, from Greek tragedy at the Playhouse to political drama at the Union, comedy at the BT, and a children's play at the OFS. The headline event, Trojan Women, is a bold new interpretation by Avery Willis of Euripides' anti-war classic, with a modern slant and a political twist. The Three Little Wolves and the Big Bad Pig at the OFS is really designed for six-year-olds, but the blend of comedy and cuteness is bound to have theatre-mad students flocking.
Gilbert and Sullivan fans are spoilt for choice, with The Mikado in first week and The Topsy Turvy World of Gilbert and Sullivan on for one night only at the Playhouse. In 4th week the OFS theatre hosts The Real Thing, Tom Stoppard's remarkable comedy about love and philosophy. And a week later, one of the term's most keenly-awaited plays hits the same theatre: Frank Wedekind's sexually charged Lulu.
The real strength of this term is in the smaller and more 'arty' shows. Love of the Nightingale and Conversations After A Burial look like interesting work for the first half of term, as less well-known work by big names Timberlake Wertenbaker and Yasmina Reza. Following the success of Sarah Kane's shocking play Blasted last term, Lucy Burns is directing one of Kane's other great works: the visceral and violent Phaedra's Love at the BT.
Not for the faint-hearted, but a potentially mind-blowing theatrical experience. It shares a slot with one of the few pieces of new writing this term: David Cochrane's intriguingly-titled Faust of the Collonade.
The term ends with a bang at the OFS: Steven Berkoff's deeply irreligious Messiah: Scenes from a Crucifixion. Mel Gibson can keep The Passion of the Christ: Berkoff's play is an intelligent, witty re-invention of the Easter story.
Of course, summer in Oxford wouldn't be complete without the usual complement of garden shows. The pick of the bunch looks to be James Methven's production of Twelfth Night in Oriel, starring Gethin Anthony as Malvolio and Elisabeth Gray as Olivia.
Whether you're looking for light relief or stress-purging catharsis, this Trinity looks a rich and varied term. Have fun.
"Who can measure the heat of a woman's heart when tangled in a women's body?" A question Virginia Woolf posed in her 1929 essay A Room of One's Own, and one which elucidates a conflict the author demonstrably felt the effects of.
In her sensitive adaptation of the work, Claire Dalton shows an awareness not merely of the obvious feminist concern for Woolf as an intellectual indicated by such an inquiry, but of the more subtle implications for Woolf as a person and woman herself. She has clearly considered her characterisation of the troubled writer and not simply sought to convey the text's literal message. Thus, thankfully, the production is raised far above the level of mere oration. Dalton artfully brings a light touch to a potentially dry medium (the performance being in lecture format) effortlessly invoking a Woolf that is delightfully sardonic, whilst not losing an underlying sense of controlled passion.
The subject matter probably inherently lacks truly universal appeal; not everyone, I'm sure, caring about the plight of women written out of history by men without the financial nor social wherewithal to write themselves back in [cough, chauvinist pigs!] However, Woolf's controversial belief in the necessity of the androgyny of genius can still provide much to think on. To an extent the production can be enjoyed as a period piece, Dalton perfectly capturing the understated eloquence of a certain era with an engaging off-the-cuff delivery style which seldom seems rehearsed.
Whilst A Room of One's Own may not be everybody's cup of char, it is delightfully executed. Beyond the evident appeal to Woolf fans (and English students who, comme toujours, have neglected their holiday reading) there is much here to take pleasure in for the literarily minded. Not just for girls.
22nd Apr 2004