Summer Loving
If you, like us, are not cardcarrying thesps, checking the OUDS website daily for your theatrical updates, then pay close attention to this guide to Oxford drama for Trinity term. Not all information for the term is available yet, but what has been announced looks a great mixture of the new and the reliably goodquality. It has been said that every Oxford student play is either Pinteresque or actually by Pinter – and the Burton Taylor willingly conforms, with The Lover in first week.
Other renowned playwrights come in the form of Chekhov, Pirandello, Friel and some chap called Shakespeare, spread throughout the summer. David Mamet appears to be the satirical playwright of the day at the Burton Taylor this term, with Oleanna in second week and Speed the Plow in fifth.
Behn, Bejan and Baker are amongst a bevy of less predictable choices, with plenty more out there to choose from, including some Oxford new writing talent from Christina Bejan with Etrangere, and Mary Lee Costa’s modern adaptation of Macbeth, The Twilight’s Last Gleaming.
For those of you who would like a little light relief from the term’s heavy academic pressures, the Oxford Imps upsize from their usual haunt The Wheatsheaf and move to the heady heights of the Old Fire Station in eighth week. Their blend of infectious good humour and spontaneous skits are guaranteed to raise a smile on the face of even the most jaded finalist. Another Oxford name to watch out for is Dominic Mattos, who puts on his ‘sit-down comedy’ show Dom at the BT at the end of term.
Dominic has had previous comedic success with both his gloriously high camp performance in The Critic in 2004, and as one of the Ugly Sisters in the Oxford University Light Entertainment Society’s Cinderella pantomime. However, running between the Burton-Taylor, The Old Fire Station and, of course, The Oxford Playhouse of a Saturday night won’t ensure that you see all that Oxford has to offer in the next eight weeks.
During Trinity several colleges take advantage of the (possibility of) fine weather, and open up their grounds to artistes. Players (in the strictly thespian sense) from Univ proffer Coward’s Nude With Violin in fourth week; Corpus Christi provide us with The Merchant of Venice in third; and the intrepid theatregoer is spoilt for choice when both Queens and Merton stage A Midsummer Night’s Dream, in fourth and seventh weeks respectively.
Christ Church’s Charlie and the Chocolate Factory is not to be missed for a foray into the delightfully childish, whilst Magdalen grapple with chaos theory and thermodynamics in Stoppard’s Arcadia. Although outdoor theatre has more potential for unforeseen hitches than most dramatic endeavours, don’t be afraid to pack a blanket and a picnic – and perhaps an umbrella just to be safe – and head off to those cloistered quadrangles for some summer thespian magic.
21st Apr 2005