Richard Elliott’s latest production might be set in the midst of a culture clash of 1960s USA, but it certainly does not pull any punches when it comes to good old-fashioned Elizabethan violence. With a body count that exceeds that of the notorious Hamlet, Titus Andronicus is not one for the weak stomached – this became clear early on as the usher advised that we avoid the front row for fear of being splattered with blood.

Other than overwhelming tragedy, the stage was dominated by Katie McGunagle whose wild passion and energy in the role of Tamora made her a highlight performance of the evening. Every bit the Queen of the Goths, the simple dramatic pause before her first line lent her the power that was maintained until the end. Andrew Laithwaite also gave a strong performance in the role of Aaron, successfully combining remarkable comedic timing with chilling, lip-biting menace, and growing more vulgar to the audience’s delight in the presence of the laddish Demetrius and Chiron (Matt Broomfield and Anirudh Mandagere respectively). Other notable performances included that of Edward Lewis as the gentle Marcus Andonicus and Lara Panahy as Lavinia whose violent desperation in the scene of her rape is easily the most disturbing moment of the show.

Shakespearian English was the cast’s own language, with the dialogue flowing smoothly and without the reluctant enunciation that is a common pitfall for amateur plays. Even the limitations of the set had their own bohemian charm – substituting paper planes for arrows and stamps for LSD drew appreciative chuckles from the audience. Whilst setting the action in the post-revolutionary Washington DC should have worked well in highlighting the play’s modern relevance, in my view there should have been more emphasis on the period. After the first debate between Bassianus and Saturnius (which seemed to hint at the recent Romney-Obama campaign) the 1968 theme seems to be remembered in costume only, which made the sudden blasts of Nancy Sinatra and Jefferson Airplane serve as reminders of the setting, rather than harmonizing with it.

This slight chronological incoherence detracted little from what was a wonderful rendition of a Shakespearian classic – a credit to both the creativity of the cast and the imagination of a playwright whose love of blood, guts and drama has stood the test of time.

FOUR STARS

In a startling reworking of a Shakespearean tragedy, Christ Church performed Hamlet the Musical involving adapted lyrics to dance-floor favourites, Claudius suffering from alcoholism and the usually demure Ophelia rendered a brazen and bold temptress.

After an opening scene of Hamlet’s father shouting, Hamlet the Musical proved an entertaining if irreverent romp where lines extracted from the original play were presented in an entirely new fashion. This was especially so in the case of Rosalind Brody’s Ophelia, where the line ‘Lord Hamlet, with his doublet all unbraced’ became the start of a passionate retelling of an erotic moment to the horror of Tom Perrin’s Polonius. The cast deftly injected modernity into the Shakespearean text and the archaic speech ran as natural from their confident deliveries. 

Constance Greenfield shone as Gertrude embodying the society wife from false smile and nit-picking to bleeping BlackBerry. In an inspired moment of physical comedy, Gertrude revealed her anxieties over Hamlet’s temperament to an unconvinced Claudius (Luke Howarth), all with Hamlet (Charles Morton) attempting to slay his uncle. An element of pantomime was sustained with frequent breaking of the fourth wall and self-aware references to Christ Church but even these were mocked in a joke about the ridiculous fallacy of the ‘quiet aside’ in Shakespeare.

Despite no musical showstoppers, snippets of songs kept the atmosphere light-hearted. Kanye West’s classic ‘Gold Digger’ was reworked as ‘Grave Digger’ for Ophelia’s funeral. Here the cast made jibes at Ophelia as ‘Shakespeare’s most over-rated female character’, all accompanied by exaggerated sobs and dabbing at eyes. 

Luke Howarth carried an excellent scene alone of explaining the poisoned chalice in a drunken stupor before the final ‘cleansing of the court’ scene allowed the whole tragedy to descend into melodramatic farce. Gertrude advised Hamlet the best place to slay her so as not to fall over the other bodies and Hamlet’s ghost father returned to agree that the best plan would be to kill himself and be done with it. The body-laden stage sprang back to life for a final number, the surprising but nonetheless cheering ‘Always look on the Bright Side of Life’ from Monty Python’s Life of Brian.

Overall, Hamlet the Musical provided an enjoyable half-an-hour of comedy and with costumes essentially pared down to black clothes, the actors allowed their skills in manipulating the language for humour to shine. The iconic scenes of Yorrick’s head and the murders meant the audience could follow the narrative fairly easily and the show had the atmosphere of high-energy theatre threatening but never acquiescing to chaos that means the audience are fully engaged throughout. 

St. Anne’s Wonderland, written by David McShane, is a delightfully snappy rendition of Lewis Carrol’s Alice novellas. With only weeks to assemble and perfect a condensed play, each aspect of Wonderland is just as near flawless as one could expect. Packing the entirety of Carroll’s world of Wonderland into a twenty-minute time slot is no small feat. Each handpicked, slightly altered line of dialogue must perform both a comedic and narrative role, while also ringing true to the whimsical rhyme schemes of the original. Wonderland does just that and with an effortless flow that never feels rushed or spotty.

The expected clunky transition into and out of Wonderland is made smoothly with the clever idea of both opening and closing the Cuppers performance with verbatim poems from the novellas in an enchanting chorus. Jabberwocky, with its nonsensical wordplay, zips one down the rabbit hole with plop onto a world just as queer as the poem. Likewise, the closing recital whirls one up and wakes one from the wonderful dream the play creates.

Singling out any one role as captivating or alluring would be an insult to the other performers, as each part was a remarkably selfless and unique embodiment of Carroll’s fantastical creations. In such a condensed space as was offered, it is the colorful will of the performers to not only peel their parts from page to stage, but to tastefully embellish each oddball along Alice’s path with their own fitting personality, that makes the play superb. Alice herself never loses flavor and treads through Wonderland, picking at each actor and actress with pomp and curiosity.

Despite a lack of props, Wonderland was able to do more than expected with simply five fold-up chairs and a table. The costumes and makeup were exceptional for such a small production, and the presence of each performer on the small stage throughout created a tangible outline of the play. Interpretations of Carroll’s tales have a tendency to be gaudy or overdone, see Tim Burton’s recent film remake, but such is not the case for the Stanners. In fact, the most unfortunate aspect of Wonderland is its brevity. 

Any negative critique of the play would come in the way it stuck too close to the original storyline. Of course, this is combated by the unique and creative appeal of each role. If there are slips in dialogue, they are covered quickly by a supportive, instinctive cast. And when the lights do finally come up, one is but itching to dive back down the rabbit hole of St. Anne’s Wonderland.

 FOUR STARS

“You can’t start with a pause” remarks one of the critics Birdboot and Moon seated in the audience as the Exeter performance of their adaptation of The Real Inspector Hound opens. Luckily, he was one of Stoppard’s overblown affected critics and their antics had the audience tickled from the start. Not only did they begin by throwing chocolates around the auditorium – never a bad way to start – but succeeded in rooting us in the play-within-a-play idea even before the real drama began.

The critics captured well a pretentious disinterestedness in what was unfolding before them. In a way, however, you can’t really blame them. The meat and bones of the whodunit are sadly lacking, judging by any standards, let alone Agatha Christie’s. But this is part of the beauty of Stoppard’s production and Exeter played into this, never taking themselves or the action too seriously. 

The murder mystery all begins when the housekeeper of Muldoon Manor discovers the news that a madman is on the loose. Naturally we are reminded by Birdboot to watch out for the ‘outsider’ (of which there are plenty to choose from) and so the play begins. The love triangle between Simon Gascoyne and the two friends – Cynthia Muldoon and Felicity Cunningham – was well played and Cynthia’s insistence that she still loved Albert coming straight after her passionate embrace with Gascoyne brought much laughter from the audience.

Not all the actors were equally strong, some struggling to really get into character but one notable performance was that of Mrs Drudge – witty yet practical, she gave us the breath of fresh air we need among the chaos of a murder mystery where the victim lies unnoticed throughout the majority of the play. She used her comical script to full advantage, in particular reminding us frequently that the fog was coming in more and more flowery terms as the play came towards its climax.

It’s never easy going last – Trinity performed an adaptation of the same Stoppard play just two days before – especially with such a precedent as Stoppard’s. But Exeter weren’t intimidated and I thoroughly enjoyed their interpretation. (Plus, I got a chocolate into the bargain – what more could you want?)

Christopher Durang’s The Actor’s Nightmare poses the question of what would happen if a man should wake up on stage and inexplicably be informed that he is expected to understudy an actor he has never met, in a play he has never heard of. Brasenose’s Cuppers team (one of two entered this year by the college) provided us with the answer: thoroughly entertaining comedy.

With one character continually present on stage, the challenge of The Actor’s Nightmare is that it relies on being carried by a lead with the energy and variety of performance to keep the audience engaged during a frantically-paced journey that encompasses Noel Coward, William Shakespeare, Samuel Beckett and Robert Bolt. Fortunately, here Brasenose did not disappoint. Armed with impeccable comic timing and a perpetual expression of bewilderment, Harley Viveash dominated the production with his central performance as the accountant-cum-actor George Spelvin, whilst simultaneously succeeding at the unenviable task of making a cuppers audience laugh at 2.15 in the afternoon.

Whilst the supporting cast had a far less prominent onstage presence than that of the blundering Spelvin, they were by no means simply playing the ‘stooge’ to his antics, and the double acts that emerged were consistently entertaining. The set and lighting were minimal, yet tactfully employed, with a sudden descending spotlight on the hapless Spelvin proving a particularly effective moment in what was a production full of brilliant touches, and one that provided this reviewer with a reminder of the wealth of untapped talent in oxford drama that the cuppers competition helps to shine a light upon.

Apparently, Google doesn’t just know I like to image search “cupcake” every now and again. The Googleplex knows my name! My age! Where I live! And, judging from some crafty chalk-on-pavement guerrilla advertising, the fact I cross St. Giles every morning. I was impressed by the publicity for this original St. John’s piece, but the lack of plot, clumsy dialogue and bizarre casting choices meant it didn’t quite manage to live up to its own hype.

Google knows where you live portrays the search engine as a present day Big Brother, and it’s pretty much all 1984 from thereon out. We opened with “Julia” riffling through various documents in an official manner, to the sweet revolutionary sound of Muse’s “Uprising”, and interrogating (invisible) “comrades”. I spent some time considering whether she was a schizophrenic, partly due to the “dialogue” and partly her odd costume- probably supposed invoke Moneypenny but in reality giving a more Confused Emo vibe. I was relieved from my pondering by a bit of audience interaction- fervid whisperings from a guy in the front row wearing a Russian bear hat and conferring the extent to which we were all controlled by the Googleplex. Eventually, “Julia” and “Guy” acknowledged that they were the only two actors in the play and began to discuss their reasons for hating “the machine”, which climaxed in Guy’s monologue calling for a revolution of new drsm codes and comparing life without Google to Fairtrade chocolate.

This was actually quite funny, but the subsequent debate over whether or not Google’s manipulation of reality was to blame for the fact we and Guy couldn’t see the “comrades” pushed the audience too far. Casting your invisible friends is rarely a sensible artistic choice, and unfortunately this was no exception.

When a BT theatre techie rushing shouting “Who are you? Get the hell off the stage!”, I couldn’t help but wonder how the actors had been allowed on there in the first place.

Okay, so before I start, I will begin by applauding the sheer foolhardiness of the Oriel cuppers. The decision to put on such an intense and fragmentary play as Sarah Kane’s 4.48 Psychosis is undeniably a bold move, let alone over a period of a few weeks. It is true that Kane’s name has carries a certain notoriety, and she is perhaps best known for the In-Yer-Face shock tactics of plays such as Blasted! and Crave all of which are infamous for their demands upon the acting troop.

Kane’s play delves into the mental world of the clinically depressed, it is a harsh uncompromising insight into the mind of a suicidal woman.  Kane herself suffered severely from depression and went on to commit suicide in 1999, meaning the play had to be performed posthumously. The play has no distinct characters, stage directions, or setting; rather, it is a collection of twenty-four scenes on the subject of clinical depression. Because of this, no two productions of the play are at all alike – there is so much scope for interpretation. In other words, it is easy to butcher.

First impressions of the Oriel play were striking, the theatre remained in complete darkness, cue the sound of a ticking clock, and someone, somewhere shouting seemingly random numbers into the audience. As the scenes of dialogue began, the actors used of torches to momentarily illuminate their faces in the darkness, using that moment to shout into the audience about how alone and sad they felt. Whilst I thought that the climatic movement of these torch lights across the 4 actors faces was nicely choreographed, it still reminded me of someone holding a torch to their face to tell a scary Halloween story. Overall, the staging was precise and relatively effective, 

The four actors onstage, purposefully masked to prevent individualisation, struggled to fully express any sense of inner anguish. In a play with no clear characters, characterization is so important, and I was left feeling that the actors were not aware of who they were, and what was going on. Instead, there was a lot of shouting at the audience. 

Here’s a play that came into being with no set outcome in mind, for a change. Born out of improvisation sessions, the comedy A Structured Panic  created by the four actors and their director from Linacre comes in bits and pieces, deals with a little bit of everything but makes sense if you enjoy a good laugh  and don’t take life nor drama too seriously.

When the lights are switched off, and some last chatters are still audible from the tiers, disharmonious notes from a guitar jingle to us, the audience, from somewhere in the darkness  and thus leave us from the start with a big question mark that will stay with us throughout the play. 

When the lights are switched on again, we are faced with four characters, each of them peculiar in their own right. They seem to be working in a perfume company, and take us through the ordinary odyssee of a business man or woman’s life: the secretary’s seductive advances towards her boss, the boss’ sleazy dispatch of the job applicant, the dreams and hopes of an employee in the lower third of the hierarchy all look familiar.

Then there’s another layer: the four stylised characters have, strangely enough, animal names, and as it dawns on the spectator after a while, the characters operating in the human structure of the company office are in fact animals that have survived the big Flood in the safety of the Arch, and have now gone on to normal life and work again.

The experience has been traumatizing for all of them, though, as they vividly manifest during various ‘meditative therapy’ sessions. As the secretary and ‘Peacock’, played by Philly Howarth, bursts out in tears declaring that make-up is her ‘real, unimaginery problem’, or as Samuel Elliott, acting exceptionally well as Lama a.k.a. unconfident job applicant, dreams of being a Zebra, or as Becky Hancock as the Hedgehog/employee feels unloved and all prickly, or, finally, as Aidan Robinson as the boss and Badger has a coming out when he confesses really being a skunk, it is clear that these guys know their acting.  

There were slips of the tongue, there was nervousness, but they may be blamed on the frequent changes to the play throughout its preparation (there have even been modifications a couple of hours before the staging of the play). There was the fragmentary, rather confusing structure of the play (a sequence of scenes interrupted by darkness and guitar playing), there was a jigsaw of issues tackled (such as identity and the professional world), but it’s not like they didn’t warn us from the start by calling their piece A Structured Panic. Splendid acting, engaging humour, and a variety of day-to-day aches and pains, but to come back to my initial advice: not to be taken too seriously. 

Two players, one game: getting a driver’s license. As simplistic as the plot was the stage setting of DMV Tyrant. A laptop on a table, a chair and a straightforward topic were more than enough for the two actresses from St Catz to keep an unfortunately tiny audience amused for an entertaining half hour. A smart but subtle critique of our everyday battles with an agonizingly slow bureaucracy and a refreshing reminder that sometimes less is more, especially in drama.

Well, there is, of course, a little bit more to it. To be precise, the young girl who wants to get her driver’s license has already passed her driving test but has come to the DMV office because she is desperately trying to renew her provisional license, and the draconic official who successfully avoids being helpful at all is reading a book while consistently ignoring the polite, then gradually less well-behaved customer in front of her. Add a good portion of humour and the expertise of a playwright, the critically acclaimed Christopher Durang, whose speciality is absurd comedy, and off you go.

It would have been a walk-over to overact the madness of the DMV Tyrant in her silly but eloquent stubbornness or the (justified) fury of the poor girl, incredulous at such an obstinate lack of cooperation. But the actresses were well advised to avoid exaggeration for the sake of authenticity.

If Genevieve Hoeler, playing the DMV officer, convincingly adopted and rendered the all too well-known attitude and tone of those middle-aged civil servants, compensating their bitterness in life with smug self-righteousness at work, her partner, Megan Hughes, had no difficulty in slipping into the role of the outraged young woman either. Although her acting was at times slightly static and, when she was barking at the clerk (without effect, of course), perhaps over the top, the admittedly very scarce movement was nevertheless fully counterbalanced with a verbal sparring that ran like clockwork.

While common sense regrettably didn’t win over the absurd narrow-mindedness of bureaucracy in DMV Tyrant, the actresses, evidently enjoying themselves and obviously well-cast, certainly did win over their audience.