Real Magic – a study in stuckness for our time (Belfast International Arts Festival 22-23 Oct) #BIAF19

We’re living through a period of British, Irish and European politics in which no matter how the question or answer is phrased, there is deadlock. We’re stuck in a loop of borders, backstops, proposals, resignations, prorogations, defections, deadlines, and yet they all lead to no deal and another round of futile pushing the large square peg into the small circular hole.

Outside of Brexit – if anything can truly be untainted with the dark, Dante-like black hole that absorbs much of the joy from modern living – our economic system in the west bounces from boom to recession and back, with the poor remaining poor, the rich remaining comfortably affluent, and the vulnerable being taken advantage off by the powerful, while the stock market swings, house prices wobble and even bankers have their bad days among the good.

So the scene depicted on the simple stage by three artists from Sheffield-based Forced Entertainment is very familiar. Their setting is a gameshow. A simple task. Childs play for one person to think of a word and another to guess what it is. Having three chances seems fair to everyone. And then they swap around. And the loop is rerun, never twice the same, yet never deviating from the predictable result, never cognisant of the detail of previous rounds, yet the ripples affect their mood and behaviour.

Real Magic is a study in stuckness, devised in 2016 before the UK truly became stuck in a quagmire everyone wants to leave but seems set to remain in buried up to its neck. A study in being trapped in a decision loop unable to break free from the mistake you’ve made before. Of messing up on purpose. Of having the answer on a plate but still throwing away victory from the jaws of defeat. Of the power of asking questions. And the power of answering them.

It’s an exhausting experience for the three performers: chicken suits and theatre lights are a sure-fire way to lose weight through perspiration. It’s also an exhausting experience for the audience, who are witnesses to this 90-minute looping, unable to break through the fourth wall to rescue the situation, equally trapped in this piece of endurance theatre.

Each spirited performer has their own personality and set of traits. Claire (Marshall) is the tactile one, and the most frustrated. Richard (Lowdon) is over-enthusiastic, the most visibly disappointed as his failure, and the most likely to throw in a sci-fi reference. Gerry (Killick) is the most playful, the most easily distracted.

Just as the cast play with emphasis and different ways of voicing each round, canned applause , laughter and some very sinister techno interrogation music play with the emotional disposition of everyone in the theatre. (The sound was designed by the director Tim Etchells.)

There’s an absurdity to the situation that makes some audience members giggle and guffaw. Others begin to sigh as they realise that they have lost count of how many circles of hell there are in this artistic version of water torture. Some lean forward, feeling the changing waves of energy as the performers vary the speed and intensity of their scene. And some lie back in their seats and relax, smiling at the perplexing confusion (“the only winning move is not to play” as the the movie WarGames taught us all). After a period of figuratively rolling my eyes and checking my watch, I found myself grinning through my brokenness, willing the performers on as they discovered new ways to bash their heads off the wall and fail to solve the impossible equation in front of them.

Much like Brexit, I can’t spoil the ending. The reality is that the ending is out of our control, and yet our hearts already know what is going to happen and nothing can change it!

Real Magic is part of Belfast International Arts Festival and will be performed – 100 minutes, no interval – in The MAC on Tuesday 22 and Wednesday 23 October at 7.45pm. Check out my festival preview for details of other performances to look out for.

The Old Curiosity Show – imagination runs riot in this dark and deathly triptych (Amadan in The Vault as part of EastSide Arts Festival)

John Patrick Higgins writes words. Long ones and shorter ones. But lots of them at a time. They ooze out his pores. Seemingly unstoppable. He speaks with rich simile and a finely-tuned sense of criticism. But his written words are even sharper, loose in the sense that they’re not so honed to be frugal, but paint unanticipated and at times shocking scenes.

A previous script by John Patrick Higgins gave voice to a man whose mental health was in turmoil. His latest work is more upbeat, albeit in a dark and somewhat deathly fashion.

The Old Curiosity Show is a triptych of gothic, somewhat rude, tales of the unexpected. And the free-flowing imagination suits the style of Amadan, an ensemble who revel in edgy and physical theatre that imposes upon the audience’s space and sensibilities, while delighting in the wonder of proper clowning about and their bouffon style of theatre.

The first vignette sees a well-to-do gentleman (played by Jude Quinn like an amalgam of elderly and deceased unionist politicians) step into Sweeney Todd’s barber shop (played by Helen Ashton) for a spot of restyling. While there’s an inevitability to the bloody razorblade action, what leads up to that moment and the reaction of finger-licking Mrs Lovett (Gemma Mae Halligan) provide drama and intrigue.

Amadan’s style invests heavily in posture, glances, and the physicality of performances. This was the first show, after years of attending productions, in which I’ve heard Quinn utter a line on stage. Before this week, mumbles and moans had always been sufficient. But the team wrap Higgins words around their miniature set and simple, reusable props to ramp up the absurdity and milk every line and pun for its laughs. This is the finest of controlled madness.

One melodramatic tableau is quickly threaded into the next and a governess picks up a job from a prickly parent to mind two young charges in a ghostly setting, before a deadly cleaner arrives to clean up a mess, aided by a giant pigeon seagull who had one audience member laughing nearly to the point of laying an egg.

Three actors create 26 characters so when a cast member appears around the side of the backdrop, you’re never quite sure how their base costume will have been accessorised, how their new teeth will affect their facial expression, and what they’ll be carrying. And when they open their mouth, Higgins’ creativity adds another level of mystery.

The Old Curiosity Show was a one-off performance by Amadan in The Vault as part of EastSide Arts Festival. Hopefully it will soon return to delight and surprise further audiences.

Photo credit: Campbell Photography

Belfast Girls – transplanting an online character to the stage (The MAC until 23 June)

The MAC’s Luminaire Club is back with its cabaret-style tables and drinks service, producing a less formal and stuffy theatre environment. The now familiar tunnelled set with its rich array of lighting creates an intimate atmosphere that shows can exploit.

The Belfast Girls – Bernie Greene (Michael Mulcahy) and her friends Betty (Christina Nelson who also directs) and Michelle (Jazzmin McClure) – fancy a week away from Andytown in the sun. But when Bernie’s DLA is threatened, and boyfriend Shankill Joe’s affections wander elsewhere (though he always seemed shifty with an odd love for Bundoran), a dark cloud drifts over her tanning plans. The plot is flimsy and realistically just a vehicle for localised parody songs and some situation comedy as Nelson and McClure pop in and out of a range of secondary characters.

Extending a Facebook/YouTube sketch character into a 90-minute show is clearly difficult, particularly when the central actor’s unenthusiastic dancing skills are as laboured and lethargic as Bernie’s stiffened movement at her PIP assessment. The dialogue is puerile, the only effect of the constant expletives is to pad out sentences, and every “wee tramp” or “hoor” seems to be repetitively “talking shite”.

Nelson’s crotch-grabbing Shankill Joe is particularly memorable, and McClure’s Anne-Marie (Bernie’s posh, bobbed sister) adds a little villainy (though Mulcahy’s script allows the jeopardy to be revealed and then resolved in a single scene). Well-produced videos entertain between scenes, an enhancement to last year’s Waterfront run.

Aside from the lighting, the show’s strongest elements are the songs: I’m a Barbie Belfast Girl is well-crafted, the Venga Boys’ We’re Going to Ibiza parody betters the original, while the final reprise of How Dare You Speak To Me Like That got the audience up on their feet and singing.

Belfast stages have been blessed this week with two light-hearted shows that engender a febrile, hen party-like atmosphere in the audience. The Grand Opera House bar sensibly stays closed before and after The Real Housewives of Norn Iron’s interval, whereas the round table layout and the lure of the bar overpowered the plot leaving some MAC audience members wandering in and out.

The transaction with these shows seems to be offering simplistic entertainment in return for putting money into actor’s pockets. That’s not to be sniffed at, and it’s a long-established genre that owes a lot to James Young and many other fine performers who have graced club stages over the years. But what does it achieve?

The ladder that venues wish replenishing audiences to climb up may be somewhat mythical. But if it exists, I see little aspiration in extended sketch shows, never mind some local pantomimes, to hook people into anything more ambitious than splitting a few sides. It may keep the lights on in venues at a slow time of the year, but does make them more viable in the longer term? Contrast this with It’s a Wonderful Wee Christmas at the Theatre at the Mill last December which managed to shine a tight spotlight on mental health at the same time as serving up the funny bits. It proved that it is possible.

Belfast Girls continues its run at The MAC until Sunday 23 June.

Bathroom – the parable of the claustrophobic circus comedy performers #bff19

Following ‘the Situation’, two circus artists Regina and Ronald are trapped for their own protection, living in their upstairs bathroom, locked into a cycle of performing routines and recording them to satisfy the gas mask-wearing visitor Slav from the Council who also provides food to hoist up in a bucket.

As Bathroom unfolds, the audience discover that the novelty of snuggling up on a mattress perched on slats over the bath, cooking on a stove, and storing milk in the shower, is wearing thin. As the weeks turn into months and the agile couple’s first anniversary of incarceration is celebrated, the strains of tiny house living become more and more apparent.

Angelique Ross and Ken Fanning play the angsty and creative Regina and Ronald. A lot of tricks and routines, and even a spot of trapeze work, are crammed into the performance space. A lot of bodies are squeezed into the bath and shower. The physical comedy demonstrates the performers’ strength and control.

While Fanning keeps the inventive yet ultimately risk-averse Ronald following the rules, Ross plays Regina as a somewhat sex-starved self-starter who sees beyond the somewhat artificial boundaries of their confinement and longs to test just how dangerous the hunting Prototypes are.

Fanning claims that the script was devised after the couple endured a week-long residency in the very same bathroom. The single location is certainly built to generous East Belfast standards, though that still means that cinematographer Neil Hainsworth shot a lot of it standing in the bathtub with a light attached to his head. Each scene is a video diary of a day, though some end rather too abruptly.

The opening soundtrack features an unusual yet fitting clarinet and double bass duet, and woodwind instruments feature throughout the 90-minute film which includes a joyous song about overfishing.

Away from the dystopian set-up, Bathroom is a metaphor for the manner in which artists trap themselves against the increasing demands of their decreasingly generous funders, finding themselves forced into producing greater quantities of less creative and rewarding work, often selling out in order to survive. The ‘Council’ could be the Arts Council or any number of other funding bodies. The artists could be extended beyond circus to stretch across the breadth of the arts.

Bathroom is a celebration of circus and proves that the art-form can succeed as effectively under a hot tap as a under a big top. Its light-hearted, unpretentious visualisation of circus mentality is very entertaining, and its allegory overcomes any looseness in the plot.

Shown in the Movie House Dublin Road as part of the 2019 Belfast Film Festival, keep an eye on the film’s Facebook page to hear about future screenings.

Photo credit: Neil Hainsworth

Expedition Peter Pan – a surreal treatise on the importance of play and the idiocy of too-serious adults (Het Laagland at The MAC until 13 March) #bcf19

Do adults have to eschew playfulness in their pursuit for monetary reward and career progression? Should children fear the day that will come when they must set down their toys, tidy their imaginations into a cupboard, and put childish ways behind them?

Dutch theatre company Het Laagland’s Expedition Peter Pan reveals five grey-suited office-workers haunted by their childhood pleasures. Lego bricks spontaneously appear in one woman’s hand and pockets; another literally has marbles in her mouth (don’t try this at home!); one man sneezes toy knives out of his nose; the others can’t stop finding toy cars or paper airplanes in their office environment.

“I don’t think you understand the seriousness of this situation” says one of the supposedly inflicted suits. But the more they try to suppress these fun memories and behaviour, the more they are teased and tormented by this infant paraphernalia.

The dialogue is fast and furious; the staccato speech broken up with an occasional burst of singing (truly the best performance of out-of-tune harmony singing in the EU!) and a fabulously uplifting song and dance routine to finish.

The school children attending my performance reacted without prompting to challenge one performers’ suggestion that they didn’t contribute to society, retaliating with strong shouts to the contrary. A lovely moment of provocation and reaction. “Grow up, mature and come back when you’ve something to contribute” he chides them with almost Trump-like arrogance.

Thirty or so bedside tables are scattered across the stage, and the audience aged seven and above soon discover the magic contained within and the playful nature of the nightlights sitting atop.

The final third of the show makes obvious the Peter Pan reference in the title after a quick and rather good lesson in the aerodynamics necessary for flight. For each of the well-defined characters, the preoccupation with toys is revealed to have more deep-seated insecurities

Remote controlled furniture, exploding rockets, Miami Vice references (which sail over the heads of the children to the adults in the audience), zombies, and a beautiful journey up into space.

Five skilled physical comics actors deliver a zany and sometimes surreal treatise on the importance of play and the idiocy of adults who take themselves too seriously.

Playing to school groups throughout the day, you can still book tickets to catch Expedition Peter Pan in The MAC on 13 Wednesday at 7pm as part of Belfast Children’s Festival.

Photo credit: Willy Sybesma

Michelle & Arlene: Love in Las Vegas … yet deadlock at Stormont (Accidental Theatre until 12 May)

Michelle & Arlene: Love in Las Vegas is the third instalment of Rosemary Jenkinson’s satirical adventures of the former First and deputy First Ministers as they seek to find political agreement. The fine foemance have previously spent time in Ibiza and travelling through Europe, but you don’t need to have seen the previous episodes to pick up the story.

Passing through Belfast recently, former President Bill Clinton has invited Michelle O’Neill and Arlene Foster to leave behind their party colleagues and advisers and travel alone to the US to have intensive talks. But as usual, one need to make a decision leads to another, and the political duo end up in Las Vegas with hilarious consequences.

There is the sense that nine months and three rapid reaction plays later, these episodes may be coming to a natural end. It is tantamount to bullying to keep lampooning something that shows no sign of changing.

Maria Connolly and Mary-Frances Doherty are very comfortable stepping back into the shoes of their monstrous creations. Connolly’s grimaces hit new shapes and her union flag suitcase is a veritable mini-bar of Scottish whiskies while Doherty sports an Irish Rebel Alliance t-shirt, an enormous green bow in her blond wig and an infectious free-spirit.

Both political leaders are exhausted by endless non-agreements who are not motivated by the “negotiating salon” in New York. Connolly portrays a DUP leader that is trapped by her role, her party and her politics. So her escape to Las Vegas and entry into a Dolly Parton singing contest is not as surprising as the competition result. And for a minute I wondered if her rendition of Jolene would somehow refer to a Belfast councillor with the same name.

Stuffed full of songs and amusing video interstitials between scenes, there’s a rawness to aspects of the production that remind the audience that the play was rehearsed and staged in a week. But there are plenty of laughs throughout, never more so than about ten minutes from the end when the local political tit for tat rhetoric is exposed for its absurdity in an extended scene when the two protagonists face up to their ability to agree a deal about a personal crisis while still overshadowed by their political stalemate.

Interviewed a couple of weeks ago for a preview piece, Jenkinson explained:

“A lot of that stuff stems from truthful words. I don’t put things in that really don’t have a basis in reality. Something sparks it off [and] it’s not just me deciding to have a little stereotypical joke here.”

This factual foundation is what gives this type of satire its bite, moving it beyond mockery into sharp political commentary that questions the status quo and the public’s acceptance of recalcitrant behaviour.

Michelle & Arlene: Love in Las Vegas continues at Accidental Theatre (12-13 Shaftesbury Square, right under the big screen) until Saturday 12 May.

Hubert and the Yes Sock – building confidence in the joy of socks (Tinderbox in The MAC as part of CQAF until 9 May) #cqaf18

What timid Hubert needs is an injection of confidence to help him find office camaraderie, friendship and love. Played by Dan Leith (who also wrote the show), the shy character is thrust into the spotlight by Mr Sock (Keith Singleton) who offers him the gift of the red ‘Yes Sock’ that can a-pair-ently turn his life around. But right from the start you suspect that this so-called ‘fresh start’ is as fresh as the November 2015 one up on the hill at Stormont.

Over 55 minutes, Hubert and the Yes Sock’s audience watch this excruciating well-crafted exercise in discomfort and humiliation as Hubert pulls on the sock and becomes a puppet in Mr Sock’s glitzy game show. The comic actors lean into long pauses and deafening silences, feeding off the audience’s laughter while director Patrick J O’Reilly creates boundaries on stage with jeopardy when they are breached.

There’s a creeping feeling of anticipation that “the sock that makes you want to say Yes” will create a second monster on the stage. Socksual innuendo was perhaps inevitable, yet when Hubert gets overexcited, the recourse to cheap school boy humour threatens to become the show’s Achilles heel. Watch out for the final Carly Simon twist: cruel and barely forgivable.

Audience participation cleverly heightens the sense of anxiety and tries to make us complicit in the charlatan confidence-building practice. As we giggle and guffaw, we question whether Hubert’s new found confidence is a cure for anything that needed to be healed and cotton on that the manipulative Mr Sock – he’s a bit of a heel – is empowered rather than empowering.

Hubert and the Yes Sock finds a lot of cheese between its toes, with a toy xylophone, glittery props and the sole mates’ brightly coloured polo necks (pink and green) and trousers (mustard and purple). Giver of the sock and game show host Singleton sports a thick gold chain and a sock medallion that could make a great Christmas gift on the Tinderbox website for mindful shoppers!

Dan and the Tinderbox team have created a memorable production that skilfully lace up the audience’s insecurities and shyness with the characters’ foibles in this slick and humorous performance.

Hubert and the Yes Sock runs in The MAC until 9 May as part of the Cathedral Quarter Arts Festival.

Out To Lunch Arts Festival: Making January Great Again! (until 28 January) #otl18

In its thirteenth year of brightening up the dark month January, The Out to Lunch Arts Festival is well under way in Belfast’s Cathedral Quarter. The majority of events are hosted in the main space within The Black Box or it’s front Green Room, with a few others in The Duke of York, Oh Yeah Centre and The Empire.

The ticket price of weekday lunchtime events tend to include a fabulous warm lunch. Lots of the events have already sold out, but here are a few highlights of the best of the rest of the programme.

While Wednesday 10 January’s evening with Andrew Maxwell as sold out, tickets are still available to hear the cutting edge comedy and social commentary in Showtime on Thursday 11 at 8pm.

Joanne McNally went on an amazing diet and lost weight, jobs, friends and fellas. Come along to The Black Box at 1pm on Thursday 11 to hear her one woman show Bite Me and how, realising she had lost her mind, she enticed it back to recover her sanity.

The Irish Video Game Orchestra will bring over 30 years of classic video game tunes (including The Legend of Zelda and Super Mario Bros) to life in a concert in The Black Box on Saturday 13 at 2pm.

Robin Ince’s new stand up show Pragmatic Insanity looks at ideas about creativity in science and art, and asks why we believe we see what we see and why we believe what we believe. 1pm and 8pm on Tuesday 16.

Monthly storytelling evening Tenx9 (which now has its own podcast) is back on Wednesday 17 at 7.30pm. It’s free, so turn up early to hear nine ten-minute stories on the theme of “Never Again”.

I last heard Bernadette Morris at Out To Lunch back in 2012. It was a fabulous gig – her first one headlining in Belfast – with her lilting voice and fiddle bringing folk songs to life. She’s back launching her EP upstairs above The Duke Of Work at 8pm on Thursday 18.

Traditional harpist and singer Amy McAllister will entertain a lunchtime audience at 1pm on Friday 19 January with original material alongside traditional airs. Deirdre Galway from Realta will accompany Amy in The Black Box.

Dead Ringers’ Jan Ravens brings her Difficult Women show to The Black Box at 1pm and 8pm on Tuesday 23 with impressions Theresa May, Nicola Sturgeon, Diane Abbott, Hillary Clinton, Kirsty Wark, Lyse Doucet, Fiona Bruce and more. She asks why women are perceived as being ‘difficult’ when they are just being decisive, ambitious and tenacious?

Young comedy talent Alison Spittle – star and writer of RTE sitcom Nowhere Fast – brings her touring show Worrier Princess to The Black Box at 1pm on Wednesday 24.

The Leading Ladies – a trio of songstresses Michelle Baird, Ceara Grehan and Lynne McAllister – will be blending their richly flavoured voices on stage in The Black Box and entertaining the lunchtime audience with their repertoire of stage, screen, opera and swing. 1pm on Friday 26 January.

Iain Lee and Katherine Boyle’s live podcast The Rabbit Hole will be streamed from The Black Box’s Green Room on Sunday 28 January at 7.30pm, rounding off the festival. With interaction from people phoning in as well as those in the room, there’s no way of knowing quite where the conversation will go.

What The Reindeer Saw: festive frivolity in the Lyric Theatre until 6 January

Santa 45 (played by Alan McKee) is being inaugurated into the role, taking over the role of chief gift giver from his father. “Let’s make the North Pole great again” he intones in his speech to the assembled elves that heralds a time of unpopular change. His personal assistant Cornelia (Rosie McClelland) tries to prep him for the tasks ahead, but Santa seems more interested in playing darts in the reindeer shed than taking advice from the learned elves around him. What The Reindeer Saw starts out so well, but the fun with Trump abruptly stops and is never quite properly revived.

The long first half drags as Mr Claus comes to face to face with a workers’ revolt and a North Pole trade union official, a republican of the local variety. Add to this his performance issues with the elfegant Mrs Claus (Conor Grimes), the Secret Service elves (played by scene-stealers Jo Donnelly and Gerard McCabe) and four singing reindeer. After the interval, the threads of the story are efficiently tied up and director Tony Devlin steers the cast towards a big heart-warming finale with a suitably snowy resolution.

The normal rules of theatre seem to be torn up every December late November as entertainment and mirth are put way above other theatrical crafts. It sometimes feels like ambitions are lowered, voices are raised, and gags are handed out like sweets from a tub of Haribo to audiences that are assumed to have drowned their discernment in the bar.

Last year’s Grimes and McKee-authored The Nativity … What the Donkey Saw was Troubles-free and a much classier, sweeter tale. For 2017 the comedy double act have revived What The Reindeer Saw as a more shouty and crude production, with the music and singing blasting out at the audience at an uncomfortable volume.

The lyrics to the songs, set to carol tunes, are clever. Elf puns litter the script, and the final payoff with its language-based joke is well (should that be wellf?) worth the wait.

Rosie Moore’s costumes – including a very alternative Claus outfit – are fun and colourful. For once, Ciaran Bagnall’s set is unusually bland, and I fear that the revolving stage may be the death (or at least the cause of bank strain) of the pointy-eared stage hands who have to manually rotate the central section.

The live music from Sir Elfton John (Rod McVey sitting to one side of the stage) adds to the sense of occasion, and the rich vocals in Mr & Mrs Claus’s duet (to the tune of Once in Royal David’s City) create one of the standout moments of show.

The reindeer lock horns at least once too often, the flight simulator scene picks up speed very slowly, and it’s unfortunate that more is not made of the great tomfoolery between Donnelly and McCabe (complete with strong Country Antrim accents and a quare lot o Ulster Scots). The talented pair end up spread too thin across their roles as security agents, builders, mechanics, and furry animals.

If you’re looking for an evening of light-hearted banter at which to let your hair down with colleagues or friends, set your GPS for the Lyric and pull the hand brake on tight as you park your sleigh on Ridgeway Street. What The Reindeer Saw continues at the Lyric Theatre most evenings (except Monday) at 7.45pm until 6 January.

Review - Not the Norn Iron News (episode 1)

“We’re not going to have a government until gays can get married in Irish” said warm-up act Conor McGinley as he conflated a number of unresolved political issues together. He set the scene for an evening of comedy that was socially liberal, anti-DUP and allegedly progressive with his pop at a DUP party officer and the exposé of the Irish Catholic tendencies of a local radio presenter.

The three main performers sat behind a coffee table on the MAC stage to gently mull over some of the news of the week before returned to the stage for their solo sets.

John-Paul Whearty wore a velvet jacket and has a brushed beard that’s so soft you could stuff pillows with it. He used his cunningly minimalist style of questioning to elicit some great lines from audience members who were brought on stage in the first half to back up his theses that “the news doesn’t change” and “we don’t pay attention”. He returned to that theme after the interval as he sat in the central chair, fending off hecklers with aplomb, and calling on the audience to “come together as one” and engage in politics and draw Northern Ireland away from mediocrity.

Newcomer Barbara Wheaty was the most naturally funny performer of the bunch with a spot on impersonation of the bus tour sales patter you hear in front of the City Hall. She wrapped up some scathing retorts in a blanket of sincerity as she responded to some whacky audience suggestions around how to resolve the problem of the Irish border after Brexit. And who knew that people who keep their toaster in a cupboard could be such a comic concept? A promising performer whose eye for detail and throwaway quips generate giggles aplenty

The self-described “sissy boy from Lurgan” David Doherty-Jebb was resplendent in his pinstripe kilt and launched into a history lesson on sodomy, bargain bomb sales and a morally backward DUP (complete with pictures of Iris and Kirk). His point was well made when he examined the myth of straight white cis male oppression and call for allies (which reminded me of aspects of Taylor Mac’s performances on the same stage last October) but the character assassination of Jolene Bunting was harking back to the worst of LADFLEG. You can’t preach progressive while taking the piss out of someone’s speech and fashion: it damages the message.

This new comedy vehicle from the Whearty-Doherty-Gebb clan with its loose mix of observation and satire promised “two hours of side splitting comedy live at The MAC”. It over-delivered on the duration, with a three hour show that unlike JP’s beard needs to be severely trimmed along with a toning down of the preachiness and the total focus on demonising the DUP and extreme unionism. While Ben Elton got away with hating the Tories in a two and a half party system, Not the Norn Iron News surely needs to widen its scope right across the political spectrum (including the cosy centre ground).

The night finished with the strongest material: a clever Arlene/Adele parody that had intelligent lyrics and a visual performance that entertained and showed off the team’s true talent. Filling The MAC’s downstairs theatre with paying punters to see a new show is quite an achievement. With an injection of songs, snappier routines and less reliance on audience involvement, the format could develop into a returning format that builds a reputation and a following.

Photo of performers above from Facebook.

Here We Lie - a dark morality play where lies are louder than truth (Lyric until 2 July)

With the hoods of their transparent rain macs up over their heads, the five members of the Here We Lie cast turn into feverishly grotesque goblins who feed off other people’s misery, the kind of souls who swap sympathy for information in times of trouble. Meeting in the aisles of the local supermarket, they swap tales gathered from social media as well as the streets of Loughshea.

When Brian (Antoinette Morelli with her hood down) admits to having an affair, Sharon McKevitt (Rosie McClellend) panics and screams out an even bigger revelation in retaliation. But she’s not dying.

However, words can’t easily be unspoken. Particularly when your husband blabs all in the pub and the local gossiping goblins decide that they can “Make Loughshea Great Again” by wallowing in your misery and boosting their profile and sense of self-importance by arranging fundraising, cake sales, and all manner of publicity.



In a time of need, everyone needs a friend. Enter Michelle (Louise Matthews) who has her own problems at home with unemployed husband Declan (Claire Connor) whose car accident while under the influence has created a financial meltdown. Meanwhile, mistress Paula (Bernadette Brown) has to contend with Brian’s conflicted loyalty.

“People aren’t stupid: have they caught on yet?”

The community grief at first deafens their ears to the truth. And when some do realise what is really going on, they are too caught up in their own plans and misfortune to be able to set the story straight. The circle of lies and deception spirals out of control as the community’s need for the fake news to be real heightens.

After the interval there are the inevitable confrontations; yet the revelations are pleasingly unpredictable if all the more shocking. Writer/director Patrick J O’Reilly’s has developed a sense of movement amongst the entire cast that accentuates the ghoulish and helps distinguish the gossiping witches from the main characters.

Niall Rea has created a dystopian world is which the entire set – including chairs, tables, beds, and walls – have been fashioned from supermarket trolleys and wire baskets. The only comfort comes from stuffed supermarket ‘bags for life’, perhaps referencing the temporary solace brought by money and the stuff it can buy.

If the set wasn’t a big enough clue, Isaac Gibson’s sound design firmly places the opening scenes in a supermarket and the comical tannoy announcements add to the dark mirth throughout.

The Lyric Theatre are currently hosting two shows with all-female casts. (The Ladykillers continues its run until 8 July.) The two shows raise questions about gender and comedy: whether audiences perceive women as funny – or funny in the same way – as men?

At times the script overly relies on cussing and swearing to generate the emotion of scenes. Bernadette Brown makes a fabulous jilted lover who challenges the cloud of deception and one stage intervenes without having to rely on over the top reactions. Louise Matthews has a superb repertoire of scowls that bring both Michelle and her rain mac-covered evil sprite to life. I never want to look out and see her at my window!

Here We Lie is a dark and sobering morality tale that is sinister rather than silly and avoids being played as a farce which might have garnered more laughs. We watch a victim being scapegoated as the entire community figure out how to live with the consequences of their monstrosity. Individually we may recognise ourselves in the on stage victims or perpetrators. But on a grander scale, Northern Ireland society too knows all about scapegoating and the ongoing upshot of community lies and mistruths.

Rawlife Theatre Company’s Here We Lie continues at the Lyric Theatre until 2 July.

Sinnead: a rap-turous audience with the Irish pop sensation

Over the last couple of year’s I’ve watched the character of Sinnead develop, through a scratch session at Accidental Theatre and then putting in a percussive appearance at Pony Panto in 2015.

However, performing Sinnead: One night only … for two nights on the MAC’s big downstairs stage has put the wannabe pop star’s name in bright lights and may have swollen her head (and other parts) to a no doubt hard to manage size. Pregnancy hasn’t slowed down this artist.

The no interval confessional show introduced adoring fans and new audiences to the origin story of how the Irish singing sensation Sinnead (pronounced ‘Sin-ne-ad’) came to live in Belfast.

There’s plenty of devil in the detail of this show. The props were ridiculous, yet filled with fun and unpredictability whether a bin full of audience questions or a bicycle. At times, Sinnead was deeply irritating. Her diction was hard to app-re-she-ate. Her eyebrows looked like slugs. She surely scored low in any Insight exam at Leaving Cert. Yet Paula O’Reilly has filled out and rounded a fascinating creation to work up this extended show.

A chavtastic track-suited band led by Donal Scullion provided the rich musical soundtrack for Paula O’Reilly and her two deliberately sullen backing dancers. Surprises abound with even the a couple of brass players being introduced with great theatre. Guests pop on stage and threaten to overshadow the star-billed phenomenon.

Keith Singleton is O’Reilly’s real life partner. His on-stage appearance as Decky complete with a broad Belfast accent was a revelation. The people’s pop princess is at her strongest when rapping new parody lyrics over old familiar tunes (and rhyming ‘ordinary’ with ‘strawberry’). Dissonance abounds when she flips over to sing the melody.

There’s something of the Ronnie Corbett to Sinnead’s style of elongated storytelling, with fewer off-topic diversions, but always with a fabulous last line to pay off at the end. The Beyoncé story would make a great parody YouTube video.

He puts his arms around me waist / So close that Lynx is all I taste / I’ve never felt the warm embrace / Of a fella that’s right swiped my face

The show finishes on a high with a new anthem for Andytown and the audience escape before any more people are singled out for special attention from the sharp-tongued minx. Paula O’Reilly’s alter ego has definitely grown in confidence.

If good things come in small packages, then the challenge for Paula O’Reilly is harvest her fertile imagination and develop some more comedy characters to sit alongside (but never replace) Sinnead.

Cathedral Quarter Arts Festival - some remaining gems (until 7 May)

The Cathedral Quarter Arts Festival is well underway. What gems remain in its enormous programme full of ripe juicy events and gigs?

Wednesday 3 May

Join Anton in the Black Box Green Room as he delivers his sermon to save Belfast. Expect music, the slaughtering of sacred cows and a bit with a teddy. 8pm. £5.

Two back to back pieces of theatre by Tinderbox in The Barracks (Wednesday 3 and Thursday 4): #filtered by Sarah Lyle and Conscientia by Abby Oliviera. Always a treat. 7pm. £10.

Prime Cut’s award winning Scorch is back in The MAC (until Sunday 7 May)for what might be its final run in Northern Ireland for a while. Amy McAllister brings to life an exploration of gender, uncertainty and where the law meets teenage naivety. 8pm (and 3pm on Sunday). £12.50.

Thursday 4 May

Kieran Hodgon’s Maestro should be a very special evening in the Black Box as the performer explains how Gustav Mahler inspired him to write a symphony … something well outside his ability. 8pm. £10

Friday 5 May

Stephen Beggs’ new work My Father’s Chair opens in The MAC and runs until Sunday 7 May. A performance for young audiences (6 years+) and families about the nature of fatherhood. Times vary. £9/£6.

Sunday 7 May

Theatre critic and playwright Jane Coyle’s presents Both Sides, a double header of Beckett-inspired monologues in The Dark Horse in advance of an autumn tour. Me, Here, Me features a young woman sitting alone in a Paris café watching the life of the street unfold. But what is her story? In Before Before a woman sits in a Nice bar looking back on a turbulent life and a painful loss. Poignant stories accompanied by live traditional French music. 3pm and 7pm. £8.

Omnibus perform Mule in the Waterfront Studio. Inspired by the actions of the Peru Two this two-hander explores victimhood, media spin and personal tragedy. 7.30pm. £10.

A darker, sinister bouffon Santa - TGI Christmas (Black Box – 20 and 21 December)

After being treated to a great playlist of Santa tunes, the lights dimmed and the audience looked out at the simple tree, chair and fireplace on the Black Box stage for Amadan’s annual TGI Christmas show. Lulled into a family Christmas spirit with a superb reading that built up the anticipation, we wondered from where would the performer enter? When would we get our first glance at Jude Quinn’s red-suited creation? The answer was both obvious and totally unexpected when it came.

In silence, punctuated by increasingly loud waves of giggles, we grew to appreciate some of the struggles facing Santa as he moves around delivering presents.

While “he was chubby and plump, a right jolly old elf” and definitely had “a little round belly, that shook when he laughed, like a bowlful of jelly”, this was also an adult and sophisticated Santa. A darker, sinister one who can brutally judge the quality of hospitality left in a living room. A person who can perhaps distinguish bad from good better than he can discern naughty from nice. The UK government might describe him as creating a ‘hostile environment’.

Mischievous, curious, absurd, vain, rude, at times perverse, and only ever a tiny bit remorseful for the misery he creates in the supposed season of cheer.

For the most part it’s a one man show – with some help from Lunchbox Theatre – but when you’ve got a whole captive audience to play with, you’ve more than enough to create a tableau or two across the front of the stage. Costumes can be provided!

With a loooong stare or a gesture, Quinn – who trained at the Lecoq theatre school in Paris and is a master at the bouffon style of physical performance – confidently wields the power to freeze an audience member to their seat and leave their mates cowering. Like Pavlov’s dogs, we soon all know a treat is in store when the light comes on over the audience.

The musical cues and track choices add to the layers of physical and emotional comedy being created on stage. Quinn has a remarkable ability to minutely control his movements and to change his shape inside a costume, at one point making it look like two different people are controlling the two sides of his body.

The final lipsynced medley boosts Quinn into the premiere league of silent Stars in Their Eyes performers, as he morphs through the shape, gender and movements of so many well known artists in a routine that is highly synchronised with the shifting music tracks. (His Mariah Carey is amazing!)

Ultimately this is a Santa who is generous with his gifts for all the audience.

Thank F#ck It’s Christmas is probably the best lit shows I’ve seen in the Black Box, truly converting the Cathedral Quarter venue into a blacked off theatre space. This fourth annual version of the production is a fabulous showcase for Jude Quinn and Gemma Mae Halligan’s talents and their Amadan company.

The swear word in the title is the warning that the show has a sharp edge. But a style of comedy that attracted a wide age range to the performance I attended. When Band Aid sang “It's Christmas time; there's no need to be afraid” they certainly didn’t have Jude Quinn’s Santa in mind!

Tickets are still available for the Wednesday 21 December performance. Laughter guaranteed at the Black Box where doors open at 8pm.

Tim McGarry Goes Over the Top - a funny yet at times tender exploration of 1916 and 2016

“If we don’t learn our history we might forget why we hate each other”

Can we laugh at history? In a town that celebrates the Titanic, its construction and ambition though not its sinking, can it not be appropriate to smirk at the absolute absurdity of events, even when they were deadly? On an island that builds mythology around history and struggles to distinguish truth from fable, don’t we owe it to ourselves to unwrap the events of the past and better understand them in any way we can?

Tim McGarry has been doing just that in his Goes Over the Top stand-up show that has toured Northern Ireland this year.

In amongst much material covering contemporary events ran a thread of historical reflection at events across the island and in the trenches of northern Europe during 1916. The same hand gestures and passionate delivery that were applied to jokes about the Royal Family or the First and deputy First Ministers were employed when McGarry cast his biting wit over historical remembrances.

As evidenced by the three series of Radio Ulster’s The Long and the Short of It with Tim McGarry examining historical events alongside “vertically challenged Orangeman and historian” David Hume, the comedian can hold his own in a debate over history.

I was in the audience for the 11 November show in Belfast Waterfront Studio, and the Remembrance Day date added a tender poignancy to some of McGarry’s material. While it was never going to be complete or thorough, the overview of events felt more truthful and less one-sided than some other performances I’ve witnessed this year.

While no doubt a result of my lack of appetite for history, McGarry’s descriptions of the scale of the losses at of the first day of fighting at the Somme struck home along with his explanations of the relative size of gun-running to arm the Ulster and Irish volunteers prior to war breaking out.

Aside from the history, we laughed at Nama, Panorama, Charles and Camilla, corgis, the main five parties, the PSNI and national anthems. With a skilled sense of timing and the patience to pause and wait for a laugh to erupt in one corner of the audience and ripple around the room, McGarry is a much more confident (and experienced) performer than his Ballymena warm-up Paddy McGaughey.

There are just two more dates on Tim McGarry’s (1916) Goes Over the Top tour: Friday 25 November at 8pm in The Burnavon in Cookstown and Saturday 26 at 7.30 in The Old Courthouse in Antrim.

2016 Belfast Comedy Festival (28 September - 9 October)

The evenings are drawing in, the mornings are cold, but the Belfast Comedy Festival is back from the 28 September for twelve days of chuckles to warm your soul. It’s fifth annual programme this year includes some real treats.

The free Tenx9 comedy story telling session on Wednesday 28 September at 7.30pm in the Black Box will set you up with true stories of mirth and madness. And a week later on 5 October, the regular Film Devour evening of short films will take a comedic bent with its screenings and voting.

Accidental Theatre are running a variety of shows in their Wellington Street city centre comedy command control complex on Friday 30 September and Saturday 1 October. Joe Nawaz’s Hey You! will tackle the problem of conspicuous consumption (30th at 8pm) and The Alternative Bedtime Stories from Gemma Walker and Sorcha Shanahan (30th at 9.15pm) are sure to keep you awake.



Tim McGarry will be exploding myths and slaughtering sacred cows in his 1916 Goes Over the Top show in the Lyric on Sunday 2 October at 7.45pm. What’s funny about 1916? Why do we let our politics be led by events from 100 years ago? What’ll be remembered about today in 2116?

Paul Currie, fresh back from sweaty performances in the Edinburgh Fringe, is unleashing some new absurd material on the paying public in The Barracks (Exchange Place) at 7.30pm on Saturday 8 October.

For the week of 3-8 October, Brenda Murphy’s play Two Sore Legs returns to the Grand Opera House. A one woman show telling the story of the playwright’s own extraordinary family circumstances.

And don’t forget the award-winning stream-of-consciousness physical comedy genius Trygve Wakenshaw (Friday 7 October in The Mac), an invasion of Australian comedians, Jenny Eclair, The Horne Section and even a comedy walking tour.

Full details on the Belfast Comedy Festival website.

A tale of the unexpected as the cast of IGNITION faced their fear (Tinderbox Theatre)

Four actors, a director and a dramaturg walk into an empty theatre. It’s like the start of a joke … or in the case of the cast, Patrick J O’Reilly and Hanna Slättne, a self-imposed five day nightmare.

The external instruction they received on Monday would shape the entire week.

“What could we do if we weren’t all so afraid?”

It’s a great question for the entire arts sector in Northern Ireland never mind the recently refreshed team at Tinderbox Theatre. [You can read my preview post for more background on the production.]

The Friday and Saturday night audiences had no idea what was ahead when they walked into the Upstairs at the MAC theatre for IGNITION. Unless the team had sat in the pub for the last week, between the group exercises and the perspiration accompanying the ever-closer deadline, they must have dreamt up something?

What happened next was reminiscent of some of the shows in the Old Museum Arts Centre. There was gentle audience participation as we took our seats, joining in the cast’s new ball game (a cross between a net-less-volleyball-badminton-baseball variant). Later the show paused for a moment of reflection and we helped servce refreshments.

The main show – which can’t really be distinguished from the moments of breaking the fourth wall – is a metadrama, increasingly self aware of the pressure under which it was created. Flipcharts and post it notes cover many of the walls around the stage. There’s an air of incompleteness and unanswered questions that drives the performance forward.

Snippets of contemporary news from a local newspaper propagate belly laughs in what becomes a roller coaster of emotion. Panic is stirred up by kill joy Keith Singleton. Louise Matthews and Michael Patrick are joined on stage by Julie Maxwell who doesn’t escape a shower of water (though less immersive than her previous role in the Upstairs theatre!) while her eyes have a lethal glare. There’s even room for some multi-lingual tongue twisting around the fear-ridden referendum.

One giggler audience member in the front row described it as a “pure geg” as the performance reached its conclusion. What we witnessed was what happens when six artists face their fear. There’s latitude within the scenes to ad lib and stretch the boundaries, while

IGNITION is a promising format. A sustained burst of creativity tested out on an audience before complacency and script rot can set in. A different cast and we’d have a totally discrete show. A different line of inspiration and we’d have been transported to a totally new destination. Nerve-racking for the company, pretty nerve-racking for the audience too. Not a bad way to light up an evening.

5 days to create a new play - @tinderboxNI's IGNITION on stage @TheMACBelfast Fri 17+Sat 18 https://t.co/cJcY1jrWND pic.twitter.com/M8RFfoe3Gu

— Alan in Belfast (@alaninbelfast) June 6, 2016

Warm your soul and your stomach at this year's Out To Lunch Festival (until 31 January) #otl16

It’s January and it’s cold, but fear not … The Eleventh Annual Out to Lunch Arts Festival is here to warm your soul (and your stomach if you attend a weekday lunchtime event)!

Some highlights from the programme that’s bursting with comedy, music, poetry, opera and storytelling.

You can save 50p if you book your tickets for weekday lunchtime shows in advance for £6.50. Prices of evening and weekend performances vary - check the programme. Unless stated, events are in the Black Box in Hill Street.

Tuesday 12 January at 1pm and 8pm // Lance – Kieran Hodgson’s hilarious story of belief, betrayal and redemption as he recounts how his boyhood admiration of Lance Armstrong was sullied.

Wednesday 13 January at 1pm // Novel Operas – NI Opera’s young artists perform pieces from operas based on novels. Join Gabrielle Mulcachy, Rebecca Rodgers, Laura McFall and David Lynn for a novel lunchtime performance.

Wednesday 13 January at 7.30pm // Tenx9 gives nine people ten minutes to tell a true story from their lives. Given that it’s the Out to Lunch festival, this month’s subject is food. Admission free. (And for the first time, I’ll be telling a story …)

Thursday 14 January at 1pm // Cup O’Joe – Bluegrass and Gypsy Jazz music from three local siblings who’ll have your toes tappin’ and your hands clappin’. Reuben (18) plays guitar and mandolin; Tabitha (15) is on banjo and fiddle; and Benjamin plays upright bass.

Saturday 16 January at 2pm // Strolling Through Ulysses with Robert Gogan as he takes the audience on a whistle-stop tour to highlight the funny bits in James Joyce’s enigmatic novel.

Sunday 17 January at 2pm // Join Saint Sister, Prima Quartet and Jealous of the Birds for a lazy Sunday afternoon of soulful harmonies, dreamy synth, harp, alt-folk and more.

Tuesday 19 January at 1pm and 8pm / Of Mice and Men – John Steinbeck’s classic story of two drifters striving to find their place in an unforgiving world. The play (Michael Roy Andrew and Nigel Miles-Thomas) is scored by gospel singer Mahalia Jackson.

Wednesday 20 January at 1pm and 8pm // Comedian Sarah Kendall with her one hour narrative about the day in October 1990 when her best friend died for 11 seconds. “It’s a story about life. It’s a story about death. It’s a story about 20 foot tall fibreglass chickens.”

Friday 22 January at 1pm // Join Roisin Ingle as she reads from some of her best Irish Times Public Displays of Emotion columns. SOLD OUT.

Sunday 24 January at 8pm // Attila The Stockbroker – high-energy and hilarious punk poet and songwriter who “grabs listeners by their conscience and accosts apathy at every verse” with his “poems that spit fire at fence-sitters”.

Tuesday 26 January at 1pm // My Name is Saoirse – an ordinary yet extraordinary 15 year old growing up in conservative Catholic Ireland.

Saturday 30 January at 2pm // An all age screening of anime epic Princess Mononoke in which the young warrior Ashitika get caught up in a struggle between forest gods and the humans who consume its resources. £4 (and includes hot chocolate).

Belfast Comedy Festival - laughs, films, improv & the bouffon smell of fear (until 4 October)

If you’re looking for laughs, then check out Belfast Comedy Festival which runs until 4 October. There’s a competition to win tickets for Sara Pascoe and Diane Morgan up in the Mandela Hall on Wednesday 30th.

Lots of events every evening, but here are a few recommendations:

• Monday 28 September - Bright Club brings back the NI Science Festival Hit with local comedians combined with university scientists exploring the topic of ‘Taboo’ in the Black Box from 8pm. Tickets £5.
• Tuesday 29 September - Join Rory McSwiggan on the Belfast Barge at 8pm for his mad cap improvised singalong routine. Supported by Louise Taylor and David Doherty-Jebb. Compèred by Gemma Hutton. £8
• Wednesday 30 September - Nuala McKeever is facing up to the fact that most of the time we’re all Winging It in the Black Box at 8pm. Tickets £10.
• Thursday 1 October - Expect lines to be crossed, laughs to be had, and boundaries to be crossed as the Red Bastard takes to the Black Box stage (and likely the main seating area too) with his audience participation bouffon clown show. £10

My first place of employment is back in action as an entertainment venue next as Accidental Theatre opens its doors up on the fourth floor of Wellington Buildings (around the side of the Northern Bank Dankse Bank headquarters on Wellington Street):

• Friday 2 October - 7pm The Deconstructed Coffee: Episode 5 – Locked Erne £5; 8.15pm The Half Hour Comedy Club (part 1) £5; 9.30pm Sinnead Being Deadly By Doing Things £5; 10.45pm Geoff Hatt and the Rockpool Band £5.
• Saturday 3 October - 7pm Wonder Frog at the Weekend £4; 8.15pm The Half Hour Comedy Club (part 2) £5; 9.30pm Shatter by Nick Boyle £5; 10.45pm The Imp [review of a previous performance of the perverse black bouffon creature] £5

• Sunday 4 October - Those Who Can’t sketch show written and performance by Stephen Beggs and Rachael McCabe. Amongst much other mayhem, discover how to rid Belfast of its plague of Hipsters! The Crescent Arts Centre at 7.30pm. £7.
• Sunday 4 October - And rounding off the festival, surreal nonsense from comedy genius Paul Currie in his third full length show FFFFFFFMILK (7 Fs, it’s important!) in the Black Box at 8pm. £10

The Beanbag Cinema (23 Donegall Street) is showing a selection of classic feature-length comedy films at 12.30pm some afternoons. Free admission, but you do need to book.

• Tuesday 29 September – Buster Keaton’s Steamboat Bill Jr
• Thursday 1 October – Harold Lloyd’s Safety Last!
• Friday 2 October – Laurel and Hardy’s Sons of the Desert: “Well, here’s another nice mess you’ve gotten me into”