Leopoldstadt - Wyndham's / Cinema Screening

[mrbarnaby]

Jan 28, 2020 9:58:33 GMT jek said:

My partner, who works near Wyndham's, saw Sir Tom outside the theatre yesterday having a smoke.

Wow. I think the message board will be rocked by this revelation.

[theatrelover123]

Jan 28, 2020 19:30:12 GMT mrbarnaby said:

Jan 28, 2020 9:58:33 GMT jek said:

My partner, who works near Wyndham's, saw Sir Tom outside the theatre yesterday having a smoke.

Wow. I think the message board will be rocked by this revelation.

Parsley?

Have 

You

Come Back

To

Us? 

[Jan]

Jan 28, 2020 19:30:12 GMT mrbarnaby said:

Jan 28, 2020 9:58:33 GMT jek said:

My partner, who works near Wyndham's, saw Sir Tom outside the theatre yesterday having a smoke.

Wow. I think the message board will be rocked by this revelation.

Fairly recently I saw him in the audience at a cosmology lecture and after he took the same tube as me but got off at Ladbroke Grove.

Is that more noteworthy ?

[jek]

I had quite forgotten how rude this board could be. Sometimes, like I suspect other board users, I'm sitting by myself and just trying to strike up a conversation. Something about Czech culture and smoking perhaps. Or whether at 82 there might be a case for sorting out somewhere out of the rain for someone to smoke. I'm not one to go off in a huff (in my mid 50's I'm past that) but I certainly feel quite upset at this. This board can be so helpful in its advice and opinions about productions but is clearly a place to be avoided if, like me, you are feeling a bit fragile.

[Latecomer]

Jan 28, 2020 22:26:00 GMT jek said:

I had quite forgotten how rude this board could be. Sometimes, like I suspect other board users, I'm sitting by myself and just trying to strike up a conversation. Something about Czech culture and smoking perhaps. Or whether at 82 there might be a case for sorting out somewhere out of the rain for someone to smoke. I'm not one to go off in a huff (in my mid 50's I'm past that) but I certainly feel quite upset at this. This board can be so helpful in its advice and opinions about productions but is clearly a place to be avoided if, like me, you are feeling a bit fragile.

Sending a bit of board love. Ienjoyed the chat, jek, and enjoyed hearing that you saw him...I saw him once and it brought it back to me. X

[justfran]

I agree jek but try not to take other people’s snarky comments to heart. I think as with social media, some people think they can say what they like or be rude because it’s “not real” to someone’s face.

Anyway, I love reading this board for the reviews and opinions. Don’t post often myself in the Plays section as I don’t get to see as many as I’d like but always interesting to pop in here for a read.

[justfran]

Just to add - there’s an interesting interview with Ed Stoppard on The Guardian website under the culture section.

[Dave B]

We saw it this evening.

I'd agree with comments above about the second half not quite keeping up with the first. I thought the first did a better job of setting up that generation of the family and then the second half didn't manage to do as good a job for some of the subsequent generations. My better half took the opposite view and thought the second half stronger... so what do I know? 

I suspect a change this evening with regards to the transition from 1938 to 1955 that people have mentioned above. As soon as the 1938 piece finishes, there's a loud piece of music (louder than anything else throughout the play) which accompanies more photos from around that time projected onto the curtain. I didn't hear a single clap.

Biggest laugh was indeed the mistaken identity but also quite a ripple of laughter as Leo goes through his list of things to be proud about towards the end.

SPOILER: Click to show

{Spoiler - click to view}I did find the ending with the naming of the dead quite moving. I would have prefered a little less exposition but at the same time, it was bluntly effective.

[joem]

Well, if nothing else this proves the commercial theatre can still put on a big production of a new play with a huge cast. Well done Sonia Friedman Productions for matching commercial ambition with the vision to see that serious drama can have a significant audience too.

Glad to say Tom Stoppard continues to write well and meaningfully. This is not an old man's play, perhaps the smoking is keeping his mind sharp. This sits well within his oeuvre and is certainly much more accessible than his previous work, the intellectually ambitious but dramatically unengaging "The Hard Problem".

This is an autobiographical work, the names have been changed as have some of the circumstances, but the heart of the story is the story of what happened to Tom Stoppard and his family.

Set in Vienna in five different time periods from 1899 to 1955 the extended Merz and Jakobovicz families are well-to-do, cultured, successful middle-class Austrians. But they are also Jewish, even if some of them are baptised, they intermarry with other religions and lead a pretty secular lifestyle. This assimilation is not enough to protect them from the anti-Semitism which increases after the First World War, from the casual prejudice which might have existed in the days of the Austro-Hungarian Empire to the full-blown exterminations which result from Austria's (fairly willing) assimilation into Nazi Germany. The detail of how this family suffers is best seen in action.

It is indeed odd for the second half of a performance to be longer than the first half these days. Tonight the audience was not confused by the ending and it is indeed difficult to keep up with who all the many characters introduced in the early 1899/1900 sections are, let alone how they age, but this is not really that important. It is the sense of family that matters, of the whole rather than the parts.

Slick production, good acting and direction. Not a lot wrong with this.

Apparently Tom Stoppard only found out about his Jewish family in his fifties so this play feels like a catharsis on the playwright's part but also a personal statement of bearing witness, pertinent directly this week (International Holocaust Remembrance Day) but also a living issue in the recent and current politics of this country.

[Someone in a tree]

Jan 28, 2020 22:26:00 GMT jek said:

I had quite forgotten how rude this board could be. Sometimes, like I suspect other board users, I'm sitting by myself and just trying to strike up a conversation. Something about Czech culture and smoking perhaps. Or whether at 82 there might be a case for sorting out somewhere out of the rain for someone to smoke. I'm not one to go off in a huff (in my mid 50's I'm past that) but I certainly feel quite upset at this. This board can be so helpful in its advice and opinions about productions but is clearly a place to be avoided if, like me, you are feeling a bit fragile.

We do have an ignore function. Unfortunately I have used it on two members

Hugs

[lynette]

Jan 28, 2020 22:26:00 GMT jek said:

I had quite forgotten how rude this board could be. Sometimes, like I suspect other board users, I'm sitting by myself and just trying to strike up a conversation. Something about Czech culture and smoking perhaps. Or whether at 82 there might be a case for sorting out somewhere out of the rain for someone to smoke. I'm not one to go off in a huff (in my mid 50's I'm past that) but I certainly feel quite upset at this. This board can be so helpful in its advice and opinions about productions but is clearly a place to be avoided if, like me, you are feeling a bit fragile.

I know what you mean about just wanting to strike up a conversation, make contact. Please keep the faith. Tbh it tends to annoy me when I see older people smoking! How dare they be so healthy. That kind of thing. I don’t think smoking is anything to do with being Czech as Stoppard has lived most of his life well away from his place of birth. Are you seeing the play? 

[jek]

Thank you lynette. I know what you mean about smoking. My dad died at exactly the age I am now (56) of smoking related heart disease. As a then teenager I did, of course, think he was properly old! I am hoping to see the play - in precis it reminds me of something that Stephen Poliakoff would write for TV. Funnily enough my music student daughter phoned me earlier in the week to ask if I knew the play Every Good Boy Deserves Favour as she had been asked to play the trumpet in a student production (unfortunately she can't as the dates don't work). It set me reminiscing about the fantastic National Theatre production of it with Toby Jones ten years ago.

On the theme of Austria under Nazi rule I really enjoyed the film A Hidden Life at the weekend. I've never seen a Terence Malick film before and am told that this one is unusual in terms of having a clear, chronological plot. It is certainly very beautiful.

[siteseer]

Many thanks to all for the informative reviews so far.
Looking for seat advice for a March visit.
Need an aisle seat in the stalls and my options are row A
stage left or either aisle seat in Row L.
Thank you in advance.

[MrBunbury]

I saw it last night. It is a very good play and it really confirms that Stoppard is a very clever author. There are some nice hints to famous figures of Vienna and an object that links the different time periods (I don't want to say more to avoid spoilers). I agree with those who were moved by the ending: from what I read Stoppard had a similar experience to Leo(pold) and it is a very original take on what could be an abused topic. I admit that I got lost a little in terms of who were the characters so there are some that I am unable to place anywhere in the family tree (probably the script might help to get all nuances).
The only unfortunate side last night was that a woman sitting in the balcony was seriously ill in the last act (at one point she was bent on the balaustrade and probably being sick or in great pan). She was taken out by her daughters and the theatre staff and I hope she is better now (she was sitting and looking better when we go out).

[Deleted]

Jan 29, 2020 13:22:21 GMT siteseer said:

Many thanks to all for the informative reviews so far.
Looking for seat advice for a March visit.
Need an aisle seat in the stalls and my options are row A
stage left or either aisle seat in Row L.
Thank you in advance.

Not sure which of these is best, but if you need an aisle seat for legroom reasons, you could also look at row Q which has a wide walkway between it and the row in front, and the two middle seats in row R which have nothing in front of them.

[Dave B]

Jan 29, 2020 14:17:04 GMT MrBunbury said:

The only unfortunate side last night was that a woman sitting in the balcony was seriously ill in the last act (at one point she was bent on the balaustrade and probably being sick or in great pan). She was taken out by her daughters and the theatre staff and I hope she is better now (she was sitting and looking better when we go out).

She was directly in front of us, I think it sounded/looked worse than it was. She didn't actaully throw up. FoH were on hand to help very quickly, the young lady who helped them out was a first aider and seemed to have the situation in hand. She came back to collect coats/bags etc and did quietly indicate that everything was ok.

[lynette]

Is it worth getting a programme for some more explanation?

[Dave B]

Jan 29, 2020 19:17:14 GMT lynette said:

Is it worth getting a programme for some more explanation?

I think so.

There is a family tree which is helpful. What I found more helpful was the cast page is seperated by time period, and it tells you which role the actors are playing. Comparing that to the family tree during the interval and breif interludes while the set changes made things a little clearer for me.

[mrbarnaby]

Jan 28, 2020 19:33:31 GMT theatrelover123 said:

Jan 28, 2020 19:30:12 GMT mrbarnaby said:

Wow. I think the message board will be rocked by this revelation.

Parsley?

Have 

You

Come Back

To

Us? 

WHERE

IS

PARSLEY?

[siteseer]

Thank you Xanderl and theatremonkey.
My issue is that I am claustrophobic thereby needing an aisle seat.
I was concerned about the Row A seat as Mr. Barnaby mentioned
big heavy furniture pieces so I was worried about obstruction.
I don't mind the extra cost of Row L. I would imagine it is a better view
than Rows P and Q.
Don't like being under the overhang.Thanks again for the kind replies.

[Deleted]

I think in that case you are definitely better off in L than A as the aisle seats in row A are I think close to the corner of the stage so you could feel hemmed in.

[sweets7]

I am so glad this appears to be optimistic. I am so looking forward to seeing it. Intergenerational drama is right up my street.

[rumbledoll]

Jan 29, 2020 20:10:30 GMT Dave B said:

Jan 29, 2020 19:17:14 GMT lynette said:

Is it worth getting a programme for some more explanation?

I think so.

There is a family tree which is helpful. What I found more helpful was the cast page is seperated by time period, and it tells you which role the actors are playing. Comparing that to the family tree during the interval and breif interludes while the set changes made things a little clearer for me.

Oh my. I generally got confused when there’s a need to distinguish 5-6 people but with the cast this large I’d be completely lost..
Can somebody be so kind to post pics with the family tree & cast (if such thing is allowed in here)? Would be most helpful for us, who are yet to see the play so we won’t go through the pages during the action on stage)

[MrBraithwaite]

This looked interesting to me from the start and after reading some reviews here I booked for row A center. I am usually front of stalls as I'm visually impaired and being closer to the stage helps distinguishing people...but with so many and various time-jumps this will be interesting.

[Dawnstar]

I have to queries for anyone who has seen it: 1) How harrowing does it get in the 30s/40s? 2) Do Jenna Augen & Dorothea Myer-Bennett have reasonable sized roles.