Agatha Christie’s plays are often tightly timed and suspensefully wrought, simultaneously thoughtful and entertaining. The same, unfortunately, cannot be said of the present production. It dragged on for hours without any feeling of momentum or excitement. The first half alone, lasted a full hour and a half without any sort of plot development until the very end. The second half too, even after the expected murder, sullenly plodded on until the great Belgian detective, Hercule Poirot, finally revealed the who and how of the crime. The show was, therefore, quite disappointing; not particularly awful, but not special in any way either.

Various factors contributed to this sense of stasis, but chief among them was the cast. The play is very much an ensemble piece with characters as one dimensional place-holders all thrown together in a strange environment. Here we have the aristocrat, the star, the socialite, the Americans, the nouveau riche and so on, and much of the interest comes (or should come) from their interactions. Yet, the cast consistently failed to work together in any real way. At times it seemed almost as if they had only been rehearsed individually, with characters not physically reacting until their opposite number had finished speaking. The result was farcically disjointed, with actors staring deadpan waiting for lines to finish and then suddenly springing to life when it was their ‘turn’ to do so. There were standout performances by Gareth Russell as the dandy Timothy Allerton and Emerald Fennell as the washed up star Salomé Otterbourne, but even they were not so much acting as offering caricatures merely to draw laughs. Matt Lacey’s Hercule Poirot was less the quirky Belgian detective so absorbed by his work that he cannot see his own oddities than a twitching buffoon whose skill as a detective was only believable for the lines
he is given. Indeed, Lacey’s attempted francophone belge accent was so thick that he often tripped himself up.

Eventually we find out who and just how in the truly surprising style of Agatha Christie (don’t worry, I won’t give it away), but Poirot’s explanation of the crime came more as a relief to cold audience members than as the sort of shocking revelation that one might expect. 

Jay Butler

A narrow line crosses the island, untouched by either side: an isolation zone. Grubby concrete barriers split the cit of Nicosia in two. Peering through a gap, there’s a bizarre sight: a street, abandoned thirty years ago and untouched ever since.  The cars look like something out of Sunday morning TV: drawn lace curtains, grey with dust.  
 Cyprus is close to Turkey, it’s only 75 km away across the sea, and its other neighbour Greece is a distant 600. If you ever travel there, you’ll find beautiful weather, friendly locals and mediocre beaches. You’ll also hear a lot about Nicosia, ‘the last divided city in Europe’. 
 Cyprus has been ruled by Phoenicians, Franks, Egyptians, Romans, Venetians and Crusaders.  After three hundred years of being ruled by the Ottomans, Cyprus was nabbed from Turkey by the British after World War I.  It became independent in 1960.
   The joys of independence! Now you are free of the brutal oppressor you can turn your attention to the noisy sod next-door. Cyprus is split between ethnic Greeks and Turks, 80% to 20%. Traditionally they have got on reasonably well, but each side has always seen themselves as being primarily Greek or Turkish, not Cypriot. To shorten a long story, the two communities didn’t (and still don’t) trust each other, and so they failed to negotiate a constitution that both worked and protected the rights of the minority. The result: a bitter low-level conflict, which involved both motherlands. When a military junta took control of Greece (1967), they encouraged EOKA-B, a terrorist group that committed atrocities against Turkish Cypriots. A main street of Greek Cypriot Nicosia is still named after EOKA-B’s founder, Grivas.
Now, take a step back. It’s the cold war. Two NATO members are squabbling over an island in the Middle East, upon which Britain maintains sizable military bases.  The leader of this country, Archbishop Makarios, is supported by the local communist party and plays a major role in the non-aligned movement (avoiding both the US and USSR).  He has also come into conflict with the Greek junta which is rumoured to be backed by the US.  In 1974, the Greek government, with the foreknowledge of the US State Department (headed by Henry Kissinger, a man with a reputation for hard-ball), topples Makarios, and replaces him with Nikos Sampson, famed for demolishing Turkish Cypriot houses with JCBs.   In response, Turkey launches a massive (and well-prepared) invasion, with the stated goal of protecting Turkish Cypriots.  The army succeeds rather well and ends up with 38% of the island.  Feel free to insert your own conspiracy theory here. 
Take that situation and freeze it, for thirty years. During that time the forced migration of several hundred thousand people has taken place, encouraged by the British.   The Turkish army has stayed, and Turkish Cyprus declared itself a republic, which nobody other than Turkey has recognised.  Meanwhile, the UN patrols the dividing line, where the lace curtains get dusty.
 Enter wealthy uncle EU. The EU negotiates with Greek Cyprus, led by Tassos Papadopoulos, saying, in effect: “You join, then unite with the Turkish Cypriots under the Annan plan (a revised power-sharing deal).  The Turkish forces leave, and we’re all happy bunnies.”  Papadopoulos concludes the negotiations, then campaigns vehemently against the Annan plan in a national referendum.  Turkish Cyprus votes in favour, Greek Cyprus votes against.  Cyprus joins but as a divided island, with Turkish Cyprus frozen outside. 
Murky waters.  Turkey is desperate to join the EU, and wants its troops off Cyprus as quickly as possible, but it needs to maintain its face. Greece also wants Turkey to join, since it minimises the chance of future conflict (which would most probably see Greece being creamed by  Turkey). The Turkish Cypriot ‘republic’, which has been ostracised internationally, is dirt-poor and likewise desperate to join.  Finally, the US also wants Turkey in the EU, since that stabilises the Middle East and (if you’re cynical) weakens EU political unity.  However, anybody in Europe who doesn’t want the Polish plumber replaced by the Turkish construction worker, breathes a quiet sigh of relief.
And Greek Cyprus? Comfortable. Wealthy, with EU membership and plenty of tourists. Morally superior victims of invasion. Finally, they don’t have to share power (and funds) with Turks. The government is outwardly keen to continue negotiations, but they’ve been going on for fifty years. It’s debatable whether the devil is in those details.
Solution? The EU needs to get its act together, present a united front on Turkey, and sit on the Greek Cypriot government’s head. Prognosis? It’s going to take time, enough for those embittered by 1960-74 period to leave politics, and it’s going to take a whole lot of EU money, but eventually they’ll wash those curtains.
 

While student-written comedy is often a hit-or-miss affair, there is much in Jack Sanderson-Thwaite’s sketch-show which is original and very funny, giving new and bizarre, yet enchantingly simple perspectives on the world. The content of the sketches deals with altered perceptions and irrationality, creating an aberrant world where fairy tales come to life through mediums as far removed as the business of dealers and TV news reporting. The moment the audience thinks they have a handle on the action, that they can find a meaningful link between the sketches, enabling them to keep their feet on the ground, is the moment when personifications of day and night duke it out or the world is viewed from the point of view of a lamp post. It is quite clear that all bets are off.

Occasional recurring characters are all that tenuously links together some sketches, and it is truly the lack of rationality present in all which create this convincing world of madness and delirium. One fully believes that even
the most bizarre of the sketches viewed could occur whilst walking down the street in this self-proclaimed ‘wondrous realm‘. The difficulty of disentangling oneself from this world is a testament to Sanderson-Thwaite's
success in enticing the audience with the ludicrous goings-on.

The energised ensemble cast almost manages to saves the few sketches which run too long or lack pace, and adds to the accomplishment of those which Sanderson-Thwaite's surreal writing already illuminates. Alexander Craven and Ben Forrest are particularly worthy of mention for their impeccable comic timing – it is the scene consisting of only these two which is perhaps the funniest in the show.

James Callender performs brilliantly as Demetrius Skylark, the 'compare extraordinaire', our guide through the anarchic and tumultuous world created by Sanderson-Thwaite. Speaking directly to the audience, Skylark's comments on the characters and this bizarre world provide a surprising tone of downheartedness and uncertainty to the proceedings, as he struggles to express himself in logical terms in a world where no logic exists.

The oddball action culminates in chaos around our guide, in a sketch parodying the nature of sketch shows themselves. Making the audience fully aware of the writer's sophisticated talents, Skylark then delivers a Puck-like summation, addressing the desires and intentions of the characters in a suddenly sobering and not unwelcome turn.

The action is outlandish without being absurd, and the charming daftness of the better sketches is what makes them the most memorable. It's entirely likely that if the play lasted any longer than an hour, the topsy-turvy world would crumble into the preposterous or the laboured, but a jolting halt is put on the proceedings at just the right moment. Sanderson-Thwaite, always in control as both a writer and flawless director, drags the audience, busy peering at this surreal world, away from the brink just as suddenly as they were thrust towards it.

Laura Williams

Up The Republic! is a piece of new writing about a Communist mayor in a Parisian suburb who embezzles town money meant for fireworks, gets exposed by his ex-wife, and goes up against her in the election by petitioning for the Muslim vote.   Very much out of the ordinary of Oxford drama (and particularly new writing), it is a farce written predominantly in rhyming couplets. Nick Bishop as the mayor is splendid and the rest of the cast support him admirably. Bishop’s performance was hilarious, with comic and constantly adapting facial expressions and perfect delivery of the farcical lines. His timing is spot on and in many ways this is a showcase for Bishop’s comic talent.

Sophie Siem is very comfortable opposite Bishop as his assistant, and some of the most comic moments in the play occur between them, especially a wonderful scene about political correctness. The Ex-Wife was played by  Harry Creelman who came, fresh from the wonderful world of Six Characters in Search of an Author, equipped with cleavage and leather trousers and gave a coherent and amusing performance.   

What most impresses is the quality of the writing. Max Mcguinness has a wonderful talent for using the couplet to great comic effect; obscenity, irony, sarcasm and wit are all deployed through the use of a highly varied verse form, which Mcguinness is clearly able to use extensively and effectively. None of the lines sound awkward and most are very funny. The issues dealt with concern the place of Communism in modern France, but it is more than just anti-Communist binge. The play mocks political correctness, corruption and honesty, makes use of sexual humour, and the rise of the Right with the sinking of the Left and the horseshoe relationship between them. As the poster says, Fireworks, Fascism and Leather Pants.

There is little to say about this play other than that it is remarkably well written and wonderfully acted – a top show indeed. Book your ticket now. 
Henry Oliver

Boris Johnson admitted this week to having experimented with drugs in his younger days, snorting cocaine and smoking marijuana, which he says "was jolly nice."
Oxfordshire MP's have been quick to criticize Johnson. Lib Dem Evan Harris called Johnson a hypocrite given his party's tough stance on drug related crime.
"Tory policy, trying to appear tough on drug-taking, does not permit a defence of youthful indiscretion so Boris Johnson really has to explain why he is not seeking to prosecute himself to the full extent of the law that he wishes to impose on everyone else," he said.
Harris said he himself had never taken drugs. Others were less forthcoming–David Cameron and Andrew Smith (Oxford East's Labour MP) both declined to comment.
Johnson's party, meanwhile, seemed unconcerned.  Ann Ducker, president of South Oxfordshire Conservative Association said: "It was all a long time ago and he is very much against drugs now. We will certainly not be asking for his resignation or anything like that."

This time last year I was smack bang in the middle of finals. Amid the hyperventilating over quotation learning and the shopping for carnations, I had another occupation to fill my hours in between exams: job hunting. When I came to the end of my exams, I would also be reaching the limits of my life-plan. No divine inspiration had steered me towards one employment sector or the other, and consequently I was still perusing the Oxford University Careers Service website daily, hoping to find the answer.

But lo, on one weekend in May, I spotted one occupation that looked more interesting and frankly less work-like than the rest. “Au Pair in Paris for One Year”. My mind whirled with images of picnics on the Seine, romantic walks by the Eiffel Tower and a job full of fun and laughter: I would be as competent as Mary Poppins, as creative as a Blue Peter presenter. Finally a job that didn’t involve a desk or a management strategy! It would be like an extension of university, just without all the essays. I’d always liked children, so I was sure that my lack of concrete experience would not be a problem, so I applied, and after a couple of weeks of communication by email and a quick daytrip to Paris to meet the family, I got the position.

            Of course, the reality was more than just a little different to the daydream. My hopes of delaying my encounter with the ‘real world’ of work were swiftly disappointed. Granted, I did get to go to French school for 8 hours a week, and thus play at still being a student, but the rest of the time when I was working, I was suddenly skyrocketed into the elevated position of a ‘grown up’: a far more demanding place to be than behind a desk. For the first time ever I truly understood the illusion that is adulthood, the superficiality of the omniscience brought by Age and Experience. With four little pairs of eyes looking up to me, expecting me to be able to help them with just about everything, I realised how little I really knew. I had been placed, unexpectedly, into a position of extreme responsibility.

            There were the simple everyday challenges: getting three children and a pushchair to cross the road without anyone getting flattened, getting a three year old dressed fed and delivered to school on time. I only just learnt how to do that for myself recently. The other thing I had to accept was that grown ups often have to do things that they really don’t want to, because if they don’t, no one else will. I’ve had to put my hand down blocked drains, wipe up spilt wee and even managed to change the vomit-smeared sheets and pyjamas of a child without waking them up. Other responsibilities are more complicated: explaining to a child why someone is begging on the metro, why there is a bird ‘lying-down’ in the road. The kids I work with really do believe and take in everything you say, and it can be difficult explaining the world to them sometimes.

            The lifestyle and skills needed to be an au pair could hardly be more different from those needed for university, although being woken by the patter of tiny feet skidding round the house at 7am on a Saturday morning isn’t all that different to being woken at 3 am by kebab-laden Park-Enders, singing their way home. My abilities of close reading and essay writing have not been used. Instead I have been called upon to develop a new range of skills: how to iron without ruining clothes, how to distract a child from a tantrum and how to change a nappy without gagging. The closest to literary criticism I got was doing the voices while I read the kids bedtime stories.

            For the equivalent of my first term, I loved it. Apart from having to pretend to be an adult for a large portion of the day, I adored the freedom. I had no deadlines, no pressures. Everything was new. Even going shopping for food was fun, because the shelves were full with unfamiliar boxes and products. When I was off duty I relived the recklessness of Freshers’ week, trying to survive on five and a half hours of sleep a night, drinking wine with friends into the early hours of the morning, attempting to sleep off a hangover on the Champs des Mars in the September sunshine.

            But then I came home for Christmas. Suddenly I was surrounded by close friends and family and marmite, and I realised how superficial my Parisian paradise was. I missed the British banter, not being an outsider, being able to use all my favourite English words and phrases (the senses of which were inevitable lost on my international friends). I revelled in being the looked-after, rather than the look-afterer, and the debt of gratitude I owed to my parents for twenty-two years of care became acutely apparent.

            My return to Paris was difficult. With the magic of the city fogged by homesickness, the weight of looking after someone else’s children seemed much heavier. The novelty of the school run had long since disappeared. Now however, several months later and only weeks from my ultimate departure from Paris, I am glad to say that the decision I made this time last year was not a foolish one; the time here has not been wasted. Apart from dramatically improving my French (and my ironing) I’ve learnt more about children and adulthood than I thought possible. And even though my ability to navigate JSTOR and to whip off an essay have been lying dormant for twelve months, the knack of blagging your way through a tutorial when you haven’t read the books isn’t so different to convincing a five year old that you know how to work a washing machine.

As the City Council convenes its climate change conference this week, it will also launch a campaign to rid Oxford stores of environmentally unfriendly plastic bags.
Technically, the Council cannot get rid of plastic bags by decree. Environmentalist leader Craig Simmons said: "You can't legally force retailers not to stock plastic bags, it would probably require national legislation."
Council leader John Goddard, who has organised both the conference and the bag campaign said success will instead depend on individual consumers insisting that supermarkets change their practices.
"I refuse plastic bags if I am offered one and I want as many shoppers in the city as possible to follow suit," Goddard said.
 "Oxford is well tuned in to the Green agenda," he added.

Cherwell 24 Editor: online[at]cherwell.org
Cherwell Editors: editor[at]cherwell.org
OSPL Chairman: chairman[at]ospl.org
OSPL Managing Director: md[at]ospl.org
OSPL Company Secretary: secretary[at]ospl.org
Jobs and applications: jobs[at]ospl.org
 

Saturday night was an important landmark in Cherwell 24's history as, a decade after its original launch, a shiny, new, redesigned version of the site went live. Those of you who were at the relaunch at the Jam Factory would have witnessed ex-editors Elle Perry and Ali Gibson pressing the button to launch the site and giving Oxford its first glimpse of the current Cherwell 24.
The site has come a long way in the last 10 years with the introduction of online-only content, podcasts and comment faciilites, and now Cherwell 24 has even more to offer. As well as a fantastic new look, there are broadcasts, vox pops, blogs, more accesible comment functions, weather and lots lots more. I can only encourage you to take some time to explore the site and see for yourself not only how much it has evolved from what it once was, but also what an excellent procrastination tool it has now become!
I must take this opportunity to say a massive thank you to everybody who has helped with the relaunch, particularly Larry Hardcastle, Larry Smith, Fiona Wilson, Cat Rutter, Chris Stainton, the directors of OSPL and everyone else who has made this possible.
Enjoy the site and remember to have your say by commenting and rating the articles,
Emma x