Good theatre, even theatre that reaches those heady heights of greatness, is all down to the art of storytelling. It is unlike many other mediums in that you as the captive audience are completely at the mercy of the performers. The story, the delivery and the theatrics used to tell a tale are all armoury in the arsenal of the storyteller. Get it wrong and you’ve lost the audience. Get it right and you will have people regaling your tale to the world.
The Tiger Lillies are a phenomenon that may have escaped many of you. They label themselves as a cult band mixing “pre-war Berlin cabaret and avant garde music hall in deranged anarchic gypsy style” And that my dear readers is not that far from the truth. Their new show, Corrido de la Sangre, is currently playing at Home Manchester, and is one of the highlights of the ongoing ¡Viva! Spanish & Latin American Festival.
When productions come into town that are written by rockstar playwrights like Annie Baker there is inevitably a buzz. A strong cast that includes an Olivier Award Winner, an up and coming director who has worked extensively at the National and the Young Vic and being staged at one of the city’s leading art venues, Home Manchester, you cannot help but be swept along by the frenzied anticipation of Baker’s Circle Mirror Transformation.
There are some things that only the medium of theatre can do justice to. The co-production of Winter Solstice from the Actors Touring Company and Orange Tree Theatre is one of those things. Currently playing out to enthralled audiences at Home Manchester, it is a beguiling, betwixting and brainstorming evening of dysfunctionality that the medium of television or film could not bring to life as much as you could by placing it on the stage. For it is that ethereal connection that you only get by being in the presence of something extraordinary!
I’ve never really understood why January has been consigned to the history bin of inconsequence. It really is very, very bleak. The excesses of December have given way to the banality of the new year. There are no more bright sparkling lights anywhere. The streets are empty and the folks are all at home, skint and living on the fag ends of what’s leftover from the food and booze of Christmas. Everyone is content to get their heads down and see the month through in some sort of short enforced hibernation. Yet, if you can be bothered to put your head above those snuggly warm covers, you will see that not everyone has given up on January.