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Double Bill Two-
Part of the Citizen's A Little Bit Of Ruff Season in The Citizens' Circle
Studio.
The Ruffian On The Stair.
Playwright - Joe Orton.
Director - Vivien Reid.
Cast - here.
4:48 Psychosis.
Playwright - Sarah Kane.
Director - Julie Austin.
Casts - here.
A Little Bit Of Ruff Season's Designer - Kenny Miller.
Fight Direction Carter Ferguson.
Company - Citizens' Company.
Venue - Citizens' Theatre www.citz.co.uk
for internet booking 0141 429 0022.
119 Gorbals St .
Dates - 23, 29, 30 Sept and 6, 7, 16, 19 and 23 Oct
at 7:30pm also mats on 16 and 23 Oct at 3pm.
Run Time - 1 hr 40 mins including 15 minute interval.
Reviewer - Sarah Jane Murray.
Unrelenting high-octane dramas.
The Ruffian On The Stair - Citizens' Theatre Company Production.
Andrew Clark as Mike and Pete Ashmore as The Young Man.
© Richard Campbell 2004.
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Continuing the Citizens’ A Little Bit
Of Ruff season, co-ordinator Kenny Miller does not relent with
the high-octane drama in the second of the double bills. Pairing Joe
Orton’s black 1960s kitchen-sink drama with Sarah Kane’s chilling
ode to suicide - first performed in 2000 – is never going to be a particularly
easy night out. This is a meaty coupling, and performed in the small Circle
Studio, one that offers no way out. Deep breath, here goes. . .
The evening begins with Orton’s The Ruffian
on The Stair a snapshot tale of
a London woman, trying to move on from a life on the streets. Joyce is left
home alone day in day out, by the man who ‘rescued’ her, Mike, Andrew
Clark. She is left shaken and confused when a young man, Pete Ashmore,
forces his way into their home, suggesting that Mike’s hands are not as
clean as Joyce would like to believe. There are no rose-tinted specs here
– the sixties’ London that is portrayed is bleak, unforgiving and isolated.
Joyce – clothed in a thigh-high fuchsia towelling wrap throughout – teeters
dangerously on the verge of becoming a ditzy blonde cutout. Thankfully,
director Vivien Reid has manipulated the role, allowing Candida Benson
to play her with touching desperation. The dizziness is fleshed out, and
Joyce becomes simultaneously pitiful and endearing. Reid has been cautious
in highlighting Orton’s humour, edging more towards the sinister qualities
of his script. But the laughs are there, lurking quietly behind the drama.
4:48 Psychosis - Citizens' Theatre Company Production.
Vivien Reid, Lorna McDevitt and Candida Benson.
© Richard Campbell 2004.
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Then to 4:48 Psychosis. It's a quick
break for Candida Benson, who is back on stage fifteen minutes later
in Kane’s similarly black and uncompromising final play where she
joined by Vivien Reid and Lorna McDevitt. The three actors
remain cemented to their starkly severe angular mirrored beds throughout,
desperately clawing for comfort, but the striking stage offers none. The
acute emotion of this play is throbbingly resonant, and one can almost hear
Kane’s neuroses bouncing off the studio’s void-like walls. The doctor’s
questions are met with unrelentingly long silences, and for us – like the
patient – the combination of counselling and prescription cocktail offers
no relief. Meanwhile, it is the lighting design that exposes the fervour
felt by the patient, but restrained in the three performances. A rage of
colour fights its way over the actors towards the end of the play, competing
with vacant yet movingly human voices.
It is a bleak tie that links the two plays. The empty void presented in
Orton’s is starkly reprised in Kane’s, and the sense of
suspension that dictates the latter serves to highlight the limbo of
housebound Joyce’s days. The Circle Studio provides a pertinent setting
for both, leaving no room for manoeuvre.
©Sarah Jane Murray 23 September 2004 - Published on EdinburghGuide.com
Cast of Citizen's Production of The Ruffian On The
Stair.
Joyce - Candida Benson .
Mike - Andrew Clark .
Wilson - Pete Ashmore .
Cast of Citizen's Production of 4.48 Psychosis.
Person One - Lorna McDevitt .
Person Two - Vivien Reid .
Person Three - Candida Benson.
Theatre Editor, Thelma
Good's e-mail is thelma@edinburghguide.com
Although every effort has been taken to ensure the accuracy of the
information presented in these pages, no responsibility can be accepted
for any errors or omissions.
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