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Theatre listings > Playwright - Jo Clifford. Director - Stephen Wrentmore. Assistant Director - Fergus Ford. Set Designer - Simon Black. Costume Designer - Hayler Coulter. Lighting Designer - Matt Thompson. Sound Designer - John Lemke. Voice and Dialect Coach - Alex Gillon. Company - Co-production between Queen Margaret University College. and Byre Theatre Company. Cast - here . Venue - Byre Theatre, St Andrews, www.byretheatre.com 01334 475000 Abbey Street or down lane from South Street. Dates - 2 - 5 Nov at 8:15pm. Run Time - 1 hours 15 mins no Interval. Reviewer - Thelma Good. Well aimed modern morality play. The eleven strong cast acknowledges there is an audience and a tree. What a tree it is, its branches draped with unbleached muslin and leaf coloured camouflage net reaches out above us, the strong, brown, wrinkled trunk speaks of a tree that people will gather round and tell stories. And so it is for us the audience as the actors under Stephen Wrentmore's direction bring Jo Clifford's The World to life. With the audience arranged all around, the earth floor, the atmospheric lighting and set you are somewhere else - not quite in this world but real none the less. In it we encounter a deity, a three in one, with a crucified Son, a pregnant, veiled Mother and a Father who is leading his army of the Children of God, dressed as a woman. His love is so universal, he loves even war and the dying death rattle. This three in one trio have weathered 2000 years of human life, they've roam the world, or in the case of Mother stayed in the land the last extreme intervention happened. All three are disenchanted, behaving more like other cultures' Gods where divine beings share our human varied natures, the bad as well as good sides. The Mother and Son want the world to cease but Father suggests he tells a story, and if they find a good person then the world will be spared. Nine humans find themselves under the tree, characters from diverse places, a lap dancer, a young boy uncomfortable in his football strip, a young woman equally uncomfortable in a deep peach tulle creation. Then, from the same wedding party, the very affectingly played father of the bride and Freemason in the angst of being 55 with his overly mothering wife striking in brocaded deep blue silk. Each one is a little more complex than the one before, their goodness and badness increasingly interwoven into perverted patterns despite some of the motives being to make people better or to live in the ways of God. In the last three the complexities become ghastly trapping meshes, the misusing-her-skills surgeon, the US sergeant and the female filing clerk he orders to do things to help to humiliate the prisoners. Clifford's play catches many of our human desires and confusing needs there's at least one of the nine we could be. There's humour, anguish and pain here and the QMUC third year drama students play its nuances well. Clifford's new play is a well aimed modern morality play to get you thinking how and who you are. © Thelma Good 3 November 2005 - Published on EdinburghGuide.com Cast - God The Mother - Hazel Darwin-Edwards, God The Father - Dudley Rees, God The Son - James Fisher, Dancer - Amy Carpenter, Footballer - David Ashwood, Bridesmaid - Ceri Mill, Freemason - Alex Harris, Mrs Freemason - Morven Scott, Surgeon - Sophie Palmer, Charles - Nathanial Martin and Lyndie - Romana Abercromby. 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. Theatre listings >
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