Into The Woods @ The Royal Exchange, 09.12.15

The pantomime season is upon us and if, like me, you want to go to the theatre without the risk of someone saying “It’s behind you” or listen to the same tired jokes you've heard a thousand times before, fear not. There is light in the forest of the Manchester theatre scene.

Into The Woods at The Royal Exchange is an imaginative telling of Stephen Sondheim’s enchanting musical. The story opens with a wealth of fairy-tale characters, including Little Red Riding Hood, Cinderella and a wicked witch, all looking for their happily ever- afters before embarking on various quests that require them to go into the titular woods. Each character’s tale starts to intertwine amongst the trees and branches, before they eventually reach the end of their stories, or so we think. Soon we are shown what happens after happily ever after, and it’s not all singing birds and friendly dwarves.

The Royal Exchange hold no punches with this production. The second you walk into the theatre, you see large trees surrounding the performance space, inviting the audience to go into the woods themselves to see the show. The entire cast are amazing.  Normally when watching a show, it’s easy to see the standout star, but each cast member shines, never missing a single beat. Some highlights from the show are Marc Elliot and Michael Peavoy’s duet, ‘Agony’, which has the entire audience in stitches with their perfect timing and sublime voices. It was a joy to watch. Gillian Bevan’s portrayal of the Witch was a real showstopper and Natasha Cottriall brought a wonderful mix of childish innocence, sass and edginess to the part of Little Red Riding Hood.

The cast were just one part of this fantastic show. A special mention has to go to director Matthew Xia, who rose to the challenge of taking this epic musical and fitting it into the Exchange’s intimate venue. This is greatly helped by Jenny Tirmani’s jaw-dropping set design, which looks unassuming to begin with, but soon you feel you are sitting between towering trees and being chased by monstrous giants.

If you are looking for a magical experience this festive season there’s no reason to get lost in the thicket, just go into the woods, …or the Royal Exchange.

Into The Woods runs until 16 Jan 2016 

Words: John Mulholland 

Image: Courtesy of The Royal Exchange 

MIF: Neck of the Woods @ HOME, 10.07.15

Who’s afraid of the big bad wolf? Certainly not me in the MIF production of Neck of the Woods. There were far worse things to fear. If you go down to the woods today, you will be leaving underwhelmed.

On paper, this ‘collaboration’ ticks all the boxes and garners expectations of something special. An acclaimed casting choice (Charlotte Rampling), check. A concert pianist (Hélène Grimaud) playing a phenomenal repertoire, check. An eclectic and culturally diverse choir using their voices to create the soundscape, check. A new multi-million pound venue to host the event, check. And all under the reign of a Turner Prize-winning visual artist (Douglas Gordon) – big check. But, heartbreakingly, no. In fact, there was barely any collaboration, and these components struggled to come together resulting in something fractured and unconnected, which is a real shame.

Neck of the Woods is a vague retelling of Little Red Riding Hood, while drawing on the many different takes of wolf mythology in literature and a very loose metaphor of the animal of man. “Mostly wolves represent a bad man […] I think men are worse than wolves,” says Gordon.

The play opens in complete darkness with the sound of a tree being chopped down with an inevitable crash. This is probably the most impressive part of the production and, with the almighty sound, the audience is immediately immersed. The HOME acoustics are so good that it was truly terrifying.

The production is hugely self-indulgent, with Gordon listed in the programme for concept, direction, design and performance. None of which met par. That’s not completely fair, the concept is very interesting and I think there is something there. As for everything else, I felt it was very safe and riddled with clichés. There’s talk about blood, wolves and snow, so you can bet there was red lighting, fake snow and a fluffy shag pile with a wolf head.

This project clearly hosted a lot of talent. Grimaud’s playing is a beautiful silver lining to this piece. The Sacred Sounds Women’s Choir, first formed at MIF 2013, is abundantly talented, but drastically underused in this production. Rampling did have a few fluffs, but overall I felt she didn’t have much to work with, which I imagine is quite restrictive.

Regrettably this piece hasn’t met the standard set by other MIF productions, the responsibility for which falls on Douglas as he struggles to harness the hot ball of talent he had at his disposal and utilise it effectively. Instead, he rides on the coattails of other people’s talent and uses it for his own gratification. Douglas is indeed the wolf, and a house of straw or sticks has more solidity than this piece.

Words: Kate Morris

Neck of the Woods continues until Saturday 18 July. For tickets and more info, click here.