MIK SABIERS savours the first headline solo show of the stalwart of Brighton’s indie-punk outfit Blood Red Shoes
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A poignantly contemporary reading of an old murder folk tale
A cautionary melodrama that hits the right notes in articulating the realities of class-ridden society with omnipresent violence against women, writes GORDON PARSONS
SPLENDIDLY TALENTED: Ensemble acting
New releases reviewed by IAN SINCLAIR
STEVEN ANDREW is moved beyond words by a historical account of mining in Britain made from the words of the miners themselves
CAILEAN MCBRIDE welcomes a refreshing and timely study of the way officialdom creates structures that exclude LGBT+ rights and humanity
The bard mourns the loss of comrades and troubadours, and looks for consolation with Black Country Jess
CHRIS MOSS relishes the painting and the life story of a self-taught working-class artist from Warrington
MARY CONWAY is disappointed by a star-studded adaptation of Ibsen’s play that is devoid of believable humanity
The Ballad of Maria Marten
The Everyman Theatre
Cheltenham
WHILE even theatrical farce can lend itself to reflecting the surrealist element in human behaviour, melodrama, with its nods towards music hall and pantomime, must be the most difficult dramatic form to treat seriously.
Back on the road after the Covid break, Eastern Angles Theatre Company’s touring production has taken this old folk tale treatment of the 1827 murder of a village girl in a journalistically sensational red barn, and invested both characters and situation with a human and historical context.
An all-female, six-member cast add a feminist dimension with obvious but not overworked reference to our contemporary Sarah Everard and Sabina Nessa murders.
The original particularly horrific killing by a local man, anxious to avoid marriage to a girl he has seduced and whose baby he has possibly killed, was notable for the gothic element of the buried body being discovered after Mary’s stepmother had dreamed of its whereabouts, leading to the murderer being tracked down, tried, convicted and hanged before a huge “appreciative” crowd.
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