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Stars explained: * A production of no real merit
with failings in all areas. ** A production showing evidence of not
enough time or effort, or even talent, and which never breathes any real
life into the piece – or a show lumbered with a terrible script. *** A
good enjoyable show which might have some small flaws but has largely
achieved what it set out to do.**** An excellent show which shows a
great deal of work and stage craft with no noticeable or major
flaws.***** A four star show which has found that extra bit of magic
which lifts theatre to another plane. |
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Harrison Horsley, left, Rosie Pankhurst, Connor Bailey, Simon Truscott, Charlie Longman and Mark Roberts. Pictures: Richard Smith, Loft Theatre Company Up ‘n’ Under The Loft Theatre, Leamington Spa ***** John Godber’s Up ‘n’ Under is, as might be expected from this prolific and indefatigably clever author - a true master of teasing and winning over audiences, speaking their down-to-earth language without ever talking down to them, mostly though not cheaply populist in content, packed with witty lines and bons mots, evoking not just hilarious but brilliantly crafted scenes, each in its way an undoubted masterpiece, which is why the Loft, with its unfailing eye and wonderful rich gift for pursuing vivid repertoire, has opted to stage it. And they were handsomely rewarded: the entire theatre was packed to the gills for this hugely, gratifyingly comic staging by Lorna Middleton: on some evenings there was not a seat to be had. This quick-witted, endlessly talented company’s Up ‘n Under was a jubilant coup in every respect: staging, superbly controlled lighting (notably wide-arced shifting spots , everything meticulous); a splendidly marshalled seven-strong cast, terrific without exception; or the way Middleton prised – invented - every ounce of detail, so that the script was whammed home killingly. Richard Moore shrewdly kept his set this time to a minimum. A drawback? Far from it, the sparseness actually helped: it reflected the down-on-your-luck, humble Billy Casper or Billy Elliot background of these not quite Burnley flounderers. The concluding cyclorama green pitch unveiling was thus a wizard surprise for the final tussle. Everything about this show shone. Indeed it’s that bumper last scene, the inevitable, seemingly doomed match, that has to be the climactic highlight of the play, and of any truly successful production. An ingenious trio – Middleton, Movement Director Dan Walsh, and (as in a Musical) ‘Dance Captain’ Connor Bailey, who also served up a humorously waggish yet periodically sage character as schoolmaster Phil Hopley, whose chief hobby is Scrabble. All his rugby footballing fellows matched him capably - six more, with the glorious participation of the cast’s feisty girl, Hazel (Rosie Pankhurst - boyishly talented (latterly an honorary lad) - plus also the occasional narrator: each on the field achieved miraculous interplay, deft passing, naughty but honest tackling, endless buoyant wizardry in match one might dub electrifying. It was fortunate that Godber made it Sevens—rather than two complete fifteens on an impossibly replete stage. Seven did nicely: the whole betimes ruthless battle in this delicious production was dazzling, Intriguingly, there is also a Football Opera - although Soccer in that case. Composer Benedict Mason’s Playing Away (1994) was commissioned by Munich’s Biennale and premiered by Leeds’ Opera North during the resplendent Artistic leadership of Nicholas Payne, conducted by Paul Daniel (who happens to be a former grammar school pupil of mine), with the impossibly ingenious Richard Suart side-splitting as the gritty, dogged Manager.
Mark Roberts, left, Simon Truscott, Charlie Longman, Connor Bailey, Rosie Pankhurst and Steve Farr The nattiest visual touch in the Loft’s magical Up ‘n’ Under was the double-fronted boyos from the Wheatsheaf Arms, who’ve never, poor fellows, won a match, is magically transformed into the sinister, threatening darkness of their bullying opponents. The Loft has previously performed seven of Godber’s plays, including e.g. Teechers (sic), and Bouncers (the latter twice, most recently last season, also directed by Lorna Middleton). This is their first staging of Up ‘n’ Under. and what an unforgettable hit it proved. Everything this season has struck the ceiling: Medea (Director Craig Shelton); Constellations (expertly overseen by Sue Moore); Frank Wedekind’s prophetic Spring Awakening (the Musical, staged by another seasoned Loft actor, Chris Gilbey-Smith: a deeply poignant work, in which the aching teenagers were superbly cast and utterly believably enacted by their elders): a work Gilbey-Smith has, he says, longed to put on; or the six-role Things I Know To Be True (really perceptive, from Lynda Lewis); and the most recent, The Just Price of Flowers, directed by the supremely accomplished Mark Crossley, earlier - amongst countless outings - the Loft’s Macbeth. Add to 2024, another divinely packed season: two Russian masterpieces - Uncle Vanya and The Government Inspector, plus the utterly scintillating, amazingly acted Glorious! with Rayner Wilson staggering in the Meryl Streep/ Maureen Lipman appallingly, joyously unmusical role, one almost impossible to carry off. What courage. This dazzling quality seems unceasing. The Loft definitely earns five stars (often ten in my book) time and again. It might sound as if I have some personal interest to declare. But no, it’s simply what I find at its theatre beside the River Leam on every visit. A veritably top-class company. Fabulously well-rehearsed acting. Inspired direction. Invariably professional standard. And so it proved, yet again, with Middleton’s supremely skilled handling of Up ‘n’ Under. Mark Roberts, that most seasoned performer, stalwart pillar of the Loft, is the club member (Arthur) who gamely steps up to act (riskily) as manager/trainer - not just tentatively, but where needed, assertively - and leads the hitherto hapless team to its first victory, has a string of great roles behind him. The lordly Cymbeline (pre-Claudian leader of the dominant Catuvellauni in Boudica), Marc in Art, Telegin in Vanya, the vindictive Henry VIII in Anne Boleyn, Badger in Wind in the Willows, Twelfth Night’s Orsino, in younger days the future king Malcolm - III Canmore, the (in actuality very capable usurper’s legitimate unseater) back in the Loft’s 2004 Macbeth (Charlie Longman in David Fletcher’s 2023 staging starring a splendidly nervy Mark Crossley). Is there anything to which Roberts, this burly man of palpable authority, has not brought his particular brand of excellence? It was so here, Roberts as so often in roles taking charge. Interestingly, one of the funniest scenes was near the start when Reg Welsh (Steve Farr, new to the Loft but doyen, as actor and director, of Stratford’s always enticing amateur company The Bearpit, indulges in a tantalising bet with Hoyle (Arthur) that the Wheatsheaf Arms, even freshly led by Roberts, has (as previously) not a hope of winning.” They’re good on the ball, but crap on the touch.”
Simon
Truscott, Connor Bailey, Harrison Horsley, Charlie Longman and Rosie
Pankhurst Mr. Farr has a wonderful (and memorable) twinkle: a polished performer of the very top quality, doubtless as fine in serious repertoire as here in comedy. The cheekiness this duet – this witty duel - imbued the whole cast, and the whole play. Everyone in the team (to risk sounding corny) picked up the ball and ran with it. Not just Bailey’s intermittently, schoolmasterly wise Phil, star of wisecracks, but Charlie Longman’s Frank, Simon Truscott’s Steve, not to forget Rosie Pankhurst’s Helen - a match for any of the chaps – brought their own impertinently differing characteristics to their lippy roles, the merry contrasts between them being a vital asset to the team spirit. Each time the men were all onstage - in the changing room on their first appearance was one classic instance – their chuntering banter (and initial pessimism) set against impressive, almost Greek play quick-fire exchanges (as quick as their passes in the ultimate match) were a hoot. Up ‘n’ Under has to be really funny. This crazy lot were exactly that. But my accolade, inasmuch as I’m entitled to one, goes to Harrison Horsley (Tony). His mixture of mischief and dedication, waggishness and uncertainty, innocent yet daring, puzzled but youthfully shy, yet geeing up to prove himself mature and determined, made Tony, if not the star of the show, one of its sheer joys. A relative Loft newcomer (since 2024), he caught my attention as Jason’s (Peter Daly-Dickson’s) skinny, silent – then explosive – attendant in Medea, a very accomplished bit of not quite scene-stealing but character-capturing (a bit like Jonathan Fletcher’s increasingly nasty Seyton in Macbeth). Here the vivid, expressive youngster of the team, Harrison cut his teeth at school, neighbouring Warwick’s Campion School, not least I guess as Algie in The Importance of Being Earnest and perhaps especially as Winston Smith – the key role in the George Orwell-based 1984. Like his teammates, a thoroughly polished, even immaculate, performance: I could well imagine he’s heading for some significant future parts at the Loft. He was virtually one such here. The spirit of wacky managers like Brian Clough (Michel Sheen in the film) or Terry Venables hangs over this hapless ninth division club. Arthur’s three weeks of training rituals were hilarious, everyone, including himself, scampering from strenuous task to task like clockwork. The story is not without pathos: Frank’s (Charlie Longman’s) tragedy is that his ‘wife has left him and taken the kids’. Not, one hopes, because of his love of Rugby football. Thus Frank becomes agitated and aggressive: “Go home, Frank”, puts in the kindly, benevolent Arthur; “save all that hatred for the field.” And the field is where everything climaxes. Throughout, Helen Brady – what wonderful ingenuity she always betrays in the Costume department – kits them out nattily and alluringly. When the Wheatsheaf turns out onto the pitch in glorious red tops and gleamingly laundered white shorts, even their stockings mirror with their shining scarlet. The game itself, as indicated above, was a marvel: the neat switches in personality between our tender heroes and their brutal, cheating black shirt Cobblers Arms opponents (cleverly played in alternation by themselves) were a treat to behold. And the victory forlornly hankered after was so nearly snatched from them – until one last desperate try sealed it. What superbly managed interaction from game devisers Walsh and Bailey. What skill by which the ball got passed to what (in a full 15-a-side) would be along the yowling line of centre- and wing- three-quarters; what artfulness with which they changed direction, grabbing the treasured sphere and delivering perfectly one to another. It genuinely had all the grit and grind, courage and clash of a genuine match. Puffing and panting in their urgent bid to carry off the trophy, every one of the bunch (not least Hazel) created a hair-raising not so much tryst as brawling, feuding joust, just like the real thing. The furious final battle alone would have made witnessing this marvellous show worthwhile. Another triumphant five stars. The Loft, too, declines to be defeated. to 21-06-25, Th
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