Fol Espoir WINSTON ON THE RUN Pleasance Courtyard 7 Aug 2012

Review by Cally Barker ArtERY Live Marketing Manager & Promoter

This was my first ever fringe show – in a very hot and stuffy porta-cabin - so it wasn’t hard to imagine how Winston must have suffered, imprisoned at the bottom of a South African mine!  Show was an interesting take on the life of Winston Churchill, one that probably most people don’t even know. 

Highlights for me included the battle and the train ride and also the sound effects, which were impressive.  Perhaps the narrative was a little slow to get started and I found the ending rather flat. 

An energetic and convincing performance from the actor who has the USP of looking like Simon Ward playing Young Winston.

Would suit rural venues but probably best for older audiences who are familiar with Winston Churchill.

Hi All

Just to welcome you all to the Edinburgh Village Hall reviews and blog for 2012!
Soon rural touring schemes and promoters from across the north will be heading to Edinburgh for the festival as part of the 2012 Edinburgh project funded by Grants for the Arts. As well as those schemes and promoters who are part of the Edinburgh project, other rural touring schemes from all over the UK will also of course be up there, and we welcome their show reviews and Edinburgh tips and stories on here too. Reviews of shows seen be posted up here throughout the festival.
Enjoy!

Jen (Cheshire Rural Touring Arts)

Edinburgh Village Hall 2012

Just having a look to see if this blog spot will still work for us in 2012.

Balbir Singh 'Decreasing Infinity' review Jo Thorne Rural Arts ON Tour

Decreasing Infinity- A duet for two male dancers

This piece explored the musical relationship between draws on the relationship between classical Indian Dance and Contemporary Dance.

The piece is accompanied by a tabla player and a beat boxer.

The duet was interesting to watch, I loved the intricacy of the movement and the moments where the dancers were perfectly in unison.  A beautiful section of the piece involved one dancer performing a head stand, while the other dancer mirrored his leg movements with his arms.

Visually a stunning piece to watch overall, however the transitions between sections were not as fluid as they could have been.

This piece would be suitable for Rural Touring if a dance floor was toured, there was little floor work so this would make the work suitable for Rural Touring.

The companies other touring work ‘Play of Percentages’ features 6 female dancers and lots of floor work so may not be suitable for small venues. 

Falling Man review by Small Petit Klein Dance, Jo Thorne ON Tour Rural Arts

18/08/11

SmallPetitKlein in ‘Falling Man’ at Dance Base

I have seen SPK’s work before and ‘Falling Man’ a solo for dancer Tom Pritchard was exceptional.

A beautiful solo depicting a falling man who had been photographed jumping from the World Trade Centre on September 11th. 

The piece was beautifully choreographed and debated the public’s reactions to the approximate 200 people who jumped from the towers and the controversy that surrounded it. Did they ‘fall’ or were they ‘jumping’?

Tom’s solo was engaging and sensitively performed. The manipulation of the spine throughout gave a real sense of flight and falling.

The lighting throughout the piece was also very effective as well as the use of spoken text from the dancer.

A highly moving piece of dance that would be worth programming.

I spoke to the director Thomas Small who informed me the piece could be adapted for Rural Touring and the company would be happy to tour on the Rural Touring Circuit.

Frisky and Mannish review by Jo Thorne Rural Arts ON Tour

17/08

Frisky and Mannish

Pop Centre Plus at the Udderbelly with a large excitable audience!

Easily the best thing I saw at the Fringe and so much fun.

The performance engaged the audience from the moment Frisky and Mannish entered the auditorium.  

The evening involved training the audience to become a pop star.

There were 5 pop tests to distinguish which category you as an audience member should be in.

For example the first category was for ‘Razorlights’, and to qualify as a Razorlight you needed to have good hair! Frisky asked the audience to put your hand on the head of the person nearest you with the best hair. If you had no hands on your head you had to then sit down, if you had one hand on your head you also sat down but if you had more than two hands on your head then you became an official Razorlight.

Other tests included dancing, if you could dance but not sing then you were a Britney! If you had no talent at all then you were a Justin Beaber.

I was a Beaber!

For the rest of the show Frisky and Mannish performed pop songs in comedy ways but with huge amounts of talent! There was a great take on Madonna through her years with the emphasis being on training us as the audience to be ‘versatile’ throughout our pop careers! Other take offs included Girls Aloud, Take That and Adele.

To finish the evening a pop group was created from the audience, Frisky and Mannish created a band with one audience member from each category. 5 men were picked from the audience in the ranging categories to make up ‘Wet Life’ our new pop group (The name was chosen from an audience member who had been writing down ideas throughout the performance). ‘Wet Life’ were fantastic and were instructed to look ‘emotional’ through Take That’s ‘Never Forget Where You’ve Come From’ as well as touch each other inappropriately. We absolutely loved the evening and would recommend the show to everyone. I’m not sure if they would be up for rural touring but if they would we should grab them with both hands. Unfortunately they had to run off for an interview with Radio 1 afterwards so I couldn’t catch them.  Fantastic stuff, I left the auditorium on a high!

Shirley and Shirley- review by Jo Thorne, Rural Arts ON Tour Manager

ON Tour Rural Arts reviews of Edinburgh Fringe 17-19^th August 2011

What an amazing opportunity to be given the chance to attend the Edinburgh Fringe as a Rural Touring Scheme.  We managed to stay with some lovely friends in Edinburgh so could use our subsidy to good use, on shows!! I tried to see a real mix of work and also saw shows that were not designed with Rural Touring in mind but that could be easily be adapted.

The standard overall was of a very high quality, the only disappointment being the BBC 3 Comedy ‘Best of the Fringe’ on the 19^th August.  I have reviewed a mix of the shows below and my promoter will do the same.

17/08/11

Shirley and Shirley

A comedy duo in New College Assembly Hall

A tiny venue with a total of about 25 people in the audience. The atmosphere felt intense but friendly and the audience were comfortable and at ease with each other.

The opening sequence involved Shirley getting an audience member to fill in for the other Shirley as she was ‘late’ for the evening’s performance. This was an entertaining opening as the audience member was dragged out from her seat, taught a dance, had a go at some press ups and then performed it with Shirley for the introduction to the show. This broke any ice there was to break and left the whole audience smiling.

The show involved a series of sketches ranging from 2 minutes- 5 minutes long including: Britains got Talent, A Canadian psychologist, An incestuous brother and sister, a night out drinking sequence with ‘posh’ ladies, Mr Kipling and a take on time.

The Canadian psychologist sketch was particularly funny and used interaction with the audience to sell the psychologist’s ‘skills’. Audience members provided anecdotes for Shirley to improvise around.

Certain sketches were funnier than others inevitably, but overall the standard of the comedy was high. 

The show would be suitable for Rural Touring as there was no large set and the props were very effective and would be easy to transport.  I laughed almost throughout and would recommend the show for Rural Touring. The two female artists had an abundance of energy throughout and deserve great success.