festival
have other roles. They are mothers, sisters, lovers, students.’
Devoid of moralising, the five interwoven monologues focus on the womens’ hopes, fears and aspirations as well as dealing with issues surrounding the world of prostitution such as domestic violence and drug abuse. By focusing on the personal rather than the professional, this production promises to visit areas of prostitutes’ lives not usually explored. (Dawn Kofie)
I Be Carna, Women Of The Flesh (Fringe) Theatre Workshop (Venue 20) 226 5425, until 30 Aug (not 23) 6.30pm, £6 (£4).
COMEDY REVIEW Julian Barratt And Noel Fielding In Arctic Boosh
* 1k * *’
Unsurprisingly not billed as the lad from the Metz ads and the bloke with the hair like him from from Gay Dad, Fielding and Barratt take us on a peculiar trip round the contents of their heads via the Arctic Tundra and a Post Office. One-liners, slapstick and surreal references carry the show rather than a plot of any worth and the charming twosome stagger along with a variety of hit and miss episodes including encounters with stray family members and love affairs with mythical beasts. If their very stylised brand of humour tickles you then you’ll likely end up in tears, if you don’t then, after spending nine quid you could well end up in tears. (Mark Robertson)
l julian Barratt And Noel Fielding In Arctic Boosh (Fringe) Noel Fielding And Julian Barratt, Pleasance (Venue 33) 556 6550, until 30 Aug, £9/£8.50 (£8/£ 7.50).
THEATRE REVIEW
After Dinner
****
There’s more than a touch of Mike Leigh in this Australian Comedy of Suburban Cringe, as a group of altogether dysfunctional 30- somethings meet at a restaurant/bar for a Friday night gathering. Each of
in.
We"
6-8pm
the characters have their social and sexual problems from the prudish killjoy plain girl, to the man with the not so much premature, as yesterday ejaculation problem. As the evening reaches the post prandial state of the title, everyone's sensitivities are stamped on, and it all gets as gruesome as their emotional futures. Some stomping performances here, in a cruel, but guiltin amusing play. (Steve Cramer)
I After Dinner (Fringe) Dirty Bird Productions, C cubed (Venue 726) 225 5705, until 30 Aug, 6pm, E 7 (£5). THEATRE PREVIEW
Macbeth - The Director’s
Cut
On a Fringe flooded with Macbeths, Swansea-based'Volcano Theatre Company are erupting with a stripped- down, two-person version straight out of bedlam. ’Shakespeare has become a children's author,’ performer Fern Smith sweetly complains. Watch out, kiddies, because her Lady M is a fire- breathing diva of operatic dimensions. ’I want audiences to revel in her evil,’ Smith says, ’as well as feel empathy for these two murderers.’
Macbeth is played by company co- founder Paul Davies. He and Smith gnaw their way through the text in a ravenous, jaggedly physical style. Their performances bear the stamp of director Nigel Charnock, with whom Volcano has previously deconstructed Ibsen, the Bard's sonnets and Karl Marx’s Communist Manifesto. The show owes as much to the grisly, true- Iife killers Fred and Rose West as it does to Shakespeare. Davies puts it nicely: ’I don’t want us to meet people's expectations.’ (Donald Hutera) . Macbeth - The Director ’5 Cut (Fringe) Volcano Theatre Company, George Square Theatre (Venue 37) 662 8740, 23-30 Aug, 7. 75pm, £8/£6.
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STAR RATINGS
***** Unmissable **** Very good Worth seeing
*** it Below average You've been warned
Not behind the eight ball: After Dinner
the word
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BRO" ;
RESTAURANT.-
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19-26 Aug 1999 THE US? 47