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Theatre listings >
The Last Yankee
- Scottish Premiere.
Playwright - Arthur Miller.
Director & Designer - Andy Arnold.
Lighting Designer - Steven Roe.
Company - The Arches Theatre Company. website,
Cast - here
Venue - The Arches Argyle Street Glasgow. book on lone at their
website or 0901 022 0300.
Dates - 5 - 22 March at 8pm Not Suns or 19 March.
Run Time - 60 minutes no Interval.
Reviewer - Nicholas Whyte.
Humorous and sincere.
The Last Yankee - The Arches Theatre Company Production.
Selina Boyack as Patricia and Kay Gallie as Karen.
© Niall Walker 2003.
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Following the dress rehearsal of his own 'underwater' adaptation of Cinderella
in December, Andy Arnold, artistic director of the Arches Theatre, asked
his three year-old daughter if she had enjoyed the play. Reportedly, there
was a pause whilst she considered her response. All eyes fell on her,
and all mouths were stopped. "No," she replied, succinctly and with sincerity.
She was, however, beguiled by the humming noise coming from the lighting
rig.
Traumatised by the response, Mr Arnold went on to direct 7:84's Can't
Pay Won't Pay, a Dario Fo play in which a woman who passes off the
stolen food bulging beneath her skirt, as pregnancy. No, inspector, it's
not brine, it's my waters breaking. Its tour arrives at the Tron, 18th
-22nd March, but you don't have to wait until then to catch an Arnold
production.
Back home at the Arches, arguably the most down-to-earth and on- the-pulse
venue in Scotland, Arnold is directing the Scottish Premiere of Arthur
Miller's The Last Yankee. The story of two men who meet in the
waiting room of a hospital, where each is visiting a clinically depressed
wife. The younger man, Leroy, is more experienced - it's his wife's third
period of convalescence - whereas the older man, Mr Frick, is new to the
scenario. They come to loggerheads over the Frick's preconceptions of
what marks out the successful Yankee male.
We meet the women in the wing. The younger one, Patricia, deliberating
over whether to tell her husband that she's off medication for the first
time in 12 years, and fearful of the prospect of returning home. The older,
Karen, in the grip of medication, unable to see the peculiarity of her
desire to tap dance down the ward in tails and top-hat.
Instead of humming lights, productions at the Arches have the unavoidable
sound of rumbling trains from overhead. But good productions, like this
one, have the cunning Arches' habit of incorporating the aural extra. Perhaps
the rumble of a train is universally evocative of the turbulence of hearts
and minds. The Last Yankee is a humorous and sincere piece, well
acted and smartly directed, exploring the complexity and emotional severity
of human lives in even their humblest of struggles. It may be short but
it's well worth making an effort to go and see.
© Nicholas Whyte 5 March 2003. - Published on EdinburghGuide.com
Can't Pay, Won't Pay directed by Andy Arnold and tour Scotland Jan -March
2003 Review.
EdinburghGuide's page
for the Arches with more info & reviews.
Cast: Alec Heggie - Mr Frick, Stephen Clyde
- Leroy, Selina Boyack - Patricia and Kay Gallie - Karen.
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