Reviews of Habibi Funk 031, Kayatibu, and The Good Ones
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Kes adaptation never quite takes wing
Unchanging: Lucas Button in Kes
[Anthony Robling]
SIMON DUFF relishes the cross contamination of Damien Hirst’s greatest hits by street artists from France and the US
In view of the grooming gangs inquiry, SIMON PARSONS feels the relevance of this powerful examination of trauma suffered at Medomsley Youth Detention Centre
JOHN GREEN doubts the motivations of a US war photographer who never questions why, or for whom, she is producing images of imperialist conflict
MARIA DUARTE reviews Springsteen: Deliver Me From Nowhere, Hedda, The Mastermind, and Regretting You
TONY CONWAY welcomes a thrilling and concise history of Hope not Hate, that is also a manual full of tactical advice
PAUL DONOVAN welcomes an inspiring account of living with deafness that has important lessons for the treatment of deaf people in today’s UK
Kes
Leeds Playhouse
A VICTIM of social circumstance and impoverished education, Billy Casper remains an anti-hero for young people from deprived backgrounds.
Robert Alan Evans’s adaptation of Billy Hines’s 1968 working-class novel seeks to distance itself from Ken Loach’s iconic film by presenting a tightly wound, impressionistic play.
Staged with just two actors, Lucas Button’s 15-year-old Billy is joined on one life-changing day by his older self. Jack Lord plays this version and all the other adult characters, from his own single mother through to the sadistic PE teacher Mr Gryce — who describes himself as being “born wi’a tracksuit on!”
Similar stories
SIMON PARSONS is taken by a thought provoking and intelligent play performed with great sensitivity
SUSAN DARLINGTON is bowled over by an outstanding play about the past, present and future of race and identity in the US
This is poetry in paint, spectacular but never spectacle for its own sake, writes JAN WOOLF
SUSAN DARLINGTON is unmoved by a production full of spectacular tableax but without emotional connection to the characters