Matthew Bourne’s the Midnight Bell
A New Adventures production
At Curve: 11th to 16th October 2021
“30’s Soho in all its shabbiness”
Any Matthew Bourne production is something to be savoured but a brand new piece is to be hotly anticipated and embraced. The Midnight Bell does not disappoint.
This, Bourne’s latest dance show, centres around a shabby Soho pub in the 1930’s. With the Great War well and truly over it was thought hostilities were behind us. Little did we know what was lurking at the back end of the 30’s.
Inspired by Patrick Hamilton’s painfully personal stories of his experiences in the acutely observed world of Soho, The Midnight Bell is where an array of characters love, lose or fall apart. Each relationship tells a complete story, some successful, others not so. Often the stories overlap and this gives a realistic edge to the narrative.
As with many of Bourne’s works the cast are integral in the choreography process.
The set by long time collaborator Lez Brotherston is a masterful piece made of sections that place the action in various hotel rooms, cinemas, dance halls and squares. Lez’s costumes perfectly chime with that inter-war period when austerity was starting to drift away.
Lighting by Paule Constable, another regular artistic associate of New Adventures, highlights the action and provides focus on the characters as their stories unfold. The soundtrack by Paul Groothuis is especially inventive with, unusually, songs that characters mime to.
Of course none of this would work without the incredibly talented dancers, most of whom we regularly see in other Bourne productions. It is the actors who, staying in character, shift props and scenery. This further cements their characteristics.
The Midnight Bell is at Curve until Saturday 16th October and then continues on tour
Curve https://www.curveonline.co.uk/
http://ptheatre.blogspot.co.uk/
No comments:
Post a Comment