Wise children

[pochard]

Totally agree with robadog and foxa . I read the book very recently, having somehow missed out on Angela Carter probably because I too associated her with magic realism although Wise Children really isn't. I approached this feeling really curious because I just couldn't think how you could make a play out of such a packed novel (as opposed to a tv series which I could see really working.) It feels to me like a story that if you can't get it all in, there doesn't seem to be a point of just doing *some* of it - the glory is in all the detail. On the other hand, all the Shakespearian themes would obviously work really well. I felt optimistic after the first half (and loved the showgirls) but then it fell flat for me in the second part and seemed like a bit of a succession of events. There were a couple of good renditions of songs but I would have liked more of a feeling of time passing. I preferred Gareth Snooks to his sister but agree that they didn't feel like a pair. I saw the second preview so it may well have a bit of a journey ahead & it would be good to see it again much further down the line.

And also I think I may have misread the book in one particular plot point unless the production has changed it significantly (though I would bet money on me getting things wrong..)

[Deleted]

£5 tickets for press night on Wednesday

[showgirl]

Hah, was just going to post that - desperation or what? As they don't normally do this.

[oxfordsimon]

Oct 14, 2018 9:34:57 GMT showgirl said:

Hah, was just going to post that - desperation or what? As they don't normally do this.

Many theatre managers are looking very nervously at this. The co-producers have invested heavily and need it to sell.

Otherwise ACE and lots of regional theatres have put their money behind a project that will not have succeeded in attracting the crowds.

Lots of regional theatres could have a significant gap in their revenue streams if this does not generate audiences.

Angela Carter has fans. But this does not have the immediate market appeal of Brief Encounter.

Worried faces all around

[Deleted]

Oct 14, 2018 9:34:57 GMT showgirl said:

Hah, was just going to post that - desperation or what? As they don't normally do this.

Actually I’ve seen them do this for press nights of other shows to get a full house - it’s just the upper circle and dress circle slips they have on offer

[Deleted]

Seats only in the upper circle. The only time I sat up there it felt like I was watching the show from over the border in an adjoining country.*

* Wind on the Willows - Bennett adaptation.

[zahidf]

The tours normally go ok don't they? The knee high touring model works out

[johnnyutah]

I saw this on Friday and found it to be a glorious oddity. Vaudeville meets magical realism with some piercing social commentary. Some very dark themes were elegantly addressed with real poignancy. With no knowledge of the source material, I wasn't burdened with any preconceptions. As a theatrical spectacle it more than held its own.
All the familiar Emma Rice devices are correct and present. However, from my perspective, they added to the overall experience. She has a real flair for engaging musical storytelling. Both Gareth Snook and Omari Douglas were outstanding.

[oxfordsimon]

Oct 14, 2018 11:41:32 GMT zahidf said:

The tours normally go ok don't they? The knee high touring model works out

Only for certain projects.

Those with a popular source material do ok (at least that is what I have been told of the Oxford box office performance)

But those more on the fringe of public awareness can struggle.

I personally don't think that Carter is mainstream enough for this to be a dead cert.

[Deleted]

The Oxford Playhouse run looks to be selling reasonably well as far as I can see. I know they hold the rear rows of sale initially but they look to have released most and while it's not a sellout I think it's doing as well as most things there.

Agree the Old Vic run is selling really badly. Of course the fact that top price at the Playhouse is £30 rather than £90 might have something to do with this.

[zahidf]

I think most stuff recently at the old Vic has sold pretty badly.

[oxfordsimon]

Oct 14, 2018 13:18:44 GMT @xanderl said:

The Oxford Playhouse run looks to be selling reasonably well as far as I can see. I know they hold the rear rows of sale initially but they look to have released most and while it's not a sellout I think it's doing as well as most things there.

Agree the Old Vic run is selling really badly. Of course the fact that top price at the Playhouse is £30 rather than £90 might have something to do with this.

I haven't looked at playhouse sales for this yet. But it is not just the back seats they don't release. It is more structured than that do it is always hard to gauge just from looking. I rely on my usher friends to keep me updated.

[andrew]

I was moderately tired and moderately grumpy when I saw this and presumably as a result, I really didn't get on well with the play at all. I found the childish tone clashing with the adult topics that emerge quite annoying, the humour was poor and fundamentally I just wasn't engaged or interested in what was going on. I'm sure a happy Andrew would have come away with a more positive view, but I ended up leaving at the interval. Hilariously a member of staff approached me on my way out to ask if I would like to give my opinions for a video they were filming, and I advised that I was probably not the best person to ask...

[barelyathletic]

Oct 14, 2018 14:35:32 GMT andrew said:

I was moderately tired and moderately grumpy when I saw this and presumably as a result, I really didn't get on well with the play at all. I found the childish tone clashing with the adult topics that emerge quite annoying, the humour was poor and fundamentally I just wasn't engaged or interested in what was going on. I'm sure a happy Andrew would have come away with a more positive view, but I ended up leaving at the interval. Hilariously a member of staff approached me on my way out to ask if I would like to give my opinions for a video they were filming, and I advised that I was probably not the best person to ask...

You were very wise to leave at the interval. I was more than moderately grumpy by the end of this.  While I thought the first half had a certain theatrical charm and caught something of the raucous, joyful spirit of the book; the second half is one of the worst pieces of theatre that I've seen in a while. Lazy and embarrassingly inept. The trip down 'Electric Avenue' to find dresses for the evening was excruciating, and the final party - which in the book is a truly glorious, over-the-top extravaganza of comic coincidences and heartfelt emotional reconciliations and reunions, that still manages to tie everything up - was reduced here to a painful, weirdly depressing finale to an evening which simply powered down and flattened out for the last, long hour. The actors seemed acutely aware of the fact that it just wasn't working and looked embarrassed to be there. So they more or less gave up. I wish I had and, like you, left while the going was sort of good. Wise Children. Foolish old me.

[Steve]

I enjoyed this, more for Emma Rice than Angela Carter. The point of union for Rice and Carter is a love of song and dance, and Emma Rice's populism makes those elements glorious, particularly the showgirl dancing duo of Melissa James and Omari Douglas, but a lack of depth to the characters reduces most of them to whimsy and Carter's teenage provocations are wearing. Loads of fun to be had if you switch your brain off.

Spoilers follow. . .

There is a line in this about wanting something to happen, anything. That is Carter's sensibility, that anything good or bad is a rollercoaster of worthwhile experience to be celebrated. I have only read her "The Bloody Chamber" short fairy stories, not "Wise Children" nor anything else, so I speak from ignorance, but while Carter's prose is phenomenal: mischievous, taboo-breaking, gory, surprising, enveloping, her characters make zero sense.

I mean, in her short story, "Company of Wolves," (Spoiler alert), after the Wolf eats her granny, Carter's Red Riding Hood isn't bothered and shags the wolf, and cuddles him. It's a fun story, but not about a character you believe. This not-bothered experiential indulgent teenage type of thinking translates into this work too, where jumping into bed with your uncle is somehow just a frolic, and CS Lewis' "child porn" is gleeful story punctuation. Carter reverently embraces Shakespeare's comedy plotting, with multiple twins and mistaken identities, but not his psychologically realistic characters, so without her brilliant prose to disguise it, the flimsiness of her plot is here exposed.

For me, Emma Rice's love of singing and dancing and theatre is associated with a celebration of community, whereas Angela Carter's is associated with self-masturbation, and while you can merge those two sensibilities in a love of show, song and dance, in this instance, this is a weird mismatch that leaves a strange taste, like the lingering fatty lipids that make a punter later regret a Dominos pizza feast.

There are elements to this feast I loved, other than the singing, dancing, and the dazzling duo of Douglas and James. I also loved Katy Owen's comedic caricaturing, her Grandma Chance reminding me of Catherine Tate's brazen Nan, but with more heart and a penchant for nudity (here depicted by a hilarious floppy body stocking). Still, the lewdness is pure Tate, with Owen's Grandma declaring "As you Lick it" to be her favourite Shakespeare, or "As you flick it, when you're taming your shrew." I loved not only Owens, though she's the best at it, but all the vaudeville style comedy performances, including Gareth Snook's Dora, and Paul Hunter's lecherous Melchior.

If I'd ever read it, I suspect I'd conclude that "Wise Children" cannot be successfully adapted, as the plot is more unwieldy and less attractive than the prose. I assume that's what the National concluded when their decade-old commissioned version from Bryony Lavery disappeared without a trace. If anybody can make it fun, it's Emma Rice, and to a great degree, she's succeeded, in spite of it.

3 and a half stars.

[partytentdown]

3 stars from What*sO*St*ge

[oxfordsimon]

This article is very telling:

www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-45744643

She only wants to listen to certain voices...

The lack of overwhelmingly positive reactions to this launch project does not bode well for the future of Wise Children as a company. It needed to land with a bang to justify the massive injection of public money. Mixed reviews will not deliver that.

[dani]

Um, it's got 4* from the Guardian, Times, Time Out and The Stage. Plenty of positivity, I would suggest.

[oxfordsimon]

Oct 18, 2018 23:40:21 GMT dani said:

Um, it's got 4* from the Guardian, Times, Time Out and The Stage. Plenty of positivity, I would suggest.

There has yet to be a rave review that I have seen. Ticket sales are sluggish.

That is not overwhelming positivity which is what I was talking about.

Positive isn't enough to make the ACE decision easier to defend.

[dani]

True, there are no raves, but it even gets a very warm 4* from Quentin Letts in the Daily Mail. I imagine ticket sales will pick up now. That's not to say that the ACE decision you mention is vindicated, but this doesn't seem to be the flop some were saying.

[oxfordsimon]

I have yet to understand why this work needed a new company. It seems firmly within the Kneehigh remit and indeed has the current Kneehigh boss in the cast.

On top of the ACE direct money, there are a number of ACE funded co-producers on board.

I maintain that Angela Carter is not known as widely as is necessary to establish this as a surefire winner. Rice's popular success was due to her adaptation of Noel Coward - a far more marketable source.

Yes, there are Rice fans. And there are Carter fans. There is no doubt an overlap between those groups. But that doesn't appear to be enough to fill theatres.

[Deleted]

Kneehigh is not Emma Rice, it existed well before her and now exists after her. If anyone, it's Mike Shepherd who is Kneehigh's 'centre', having been with them for nearly forty years.

[zahidf]

Most the reviews seem to be raves ( 4 stars) so I imagine it will help pick up sales in London and across the country

[partytentdown]

Cancelled show last night, anyone know why?

[Deleted]

Cast illness apparently but nothing tweeted by the old vic or wise children oddly. Why no understudy (and before anyone says the old vic doesn’t have them, we established during Sylvia that they do)