Theatre and radio

This page is a work in progress I am determined to find out more about each of these

England People Very Nice (previews 4 Feb, press night 11 Feb 2009)

Written by Richard Bean and performed at the Olivier theatre in London England this is a look into four waves of immigration into Bethnal Green London from the 17th century to today.
~ England people very nice at the National theatre

Long days journey into night at the Lyric theatre ~ as Kathleen (2000)

Written by Eugene O’Niell, the action covers a fateful, heart-wrenching day (from around 8.30 in the morning to 12.00 midnight) in August of 1912 at the seaside Connecticut home of the Tyrones – the autobiographical representations of O’Neill himself, his brother, and their parents.

Stags and Hens Roadie theatre ~ as Maureen (2007)

Stags and Hens is a play written by Willy Russell. Like most of Willy Russell’s work, the play discusses working class society in England in the 1970s. It makes comments about their intellect, life, party habits and exclusion of the different.

The play is set in a trashy 70s disco in Liverpool, England. The action is mainly in the gents and women’s toilets of the disco where both Linda (The Bride) and Dave (The Groom) have decided to hold their stags and hens nights, not knowing that their other half is at the same place. When Linda’s ex-boyfriend, Peter, arrives and offers her an escape she is forced with a difficult decision – to stay or to go.

The miser ~ as Frosine/Elsie

I am still looking for information about this production, but here is a synopsis of the play from wikipedia:

The Miser’s plot, involving a rich money-lender called Harpagon, whose feisty children long to escape from his penny-pinching household and marry their respective lovers, is a comedy of manners to which the 17th-century French upper classes presumably objected. It is less savage, however, and somewhat less realistic than Molière’s earlier play, Tartuffe, which attracted a storm of criticism on its first performance.

The play is also notable for the way in which it sends up certain theatrical conventions. Many comedies from the Elizabethan period and onwards contain asides which are delivered by characters to the audience and which the other actors ignore. In L’Avare, however, characters generally demand to know who exactly these asides are being delivered to.

The play’s ending is also self-consciously ridiculous, mocking the French idea of comedy to better the comical effect of the play and its parts, while still taking in hand the tragedy of Harpagon and his life. Fortunately this joke is preserved for modern audiences of a certain age because the conclusion of the play is now rather reminiscent of the emotional climax of the Star Wars trilogy, namely that an unexpected character turns out to be everyone’s father.

Norman conquests ~ as Annie

I am still looking for information about this production, but here is a synopsis of the play from wikipedia:

The Norman Conquests is a trilogy of plays written in 1973 by Alan Ayckbourn. The small scale of the drama is typical of Ayckbourn. There are only six characters, namely Norman, his wife Ruth, her brother Reg and his wife Sarah, Ruth’s sister Annie, and Tom, Annie’s next-door-neighbour. The plays are at times wildly comic, and at times poignant in their
portrayals of the relationships between six more or less unhappy characters.

Each of the plays depicts the same six characters over the same weekend in a different part of a house. Table Manners is set in the dining room, Living Together in the living room, and Round and Round the Garden in the garden. Each play is self-contained, and they may be watched in any order. Some of the scenes overlap, and on several occasions a character’s exit from one play corresponds with an entrance in another. The plays were not written to be performed simultaneously, however – although Ayckbourn did achieve that some twenty-five years later in House & Garden.

The threesome (2000)

At the Lyric Hammersmith, Neil Bartlett as translator and Gordon Anderson as director are attempting to justify the ways of French farce by staging The Threesome by nineteenth-century playwright Eugène Labiche, author of The Italian Straw Hat . This tale of a skilfully concealed liaison in which the duped party ends up double-duped, is steeped in heavy Victorian decorum and accoutrements – a moose head, a summerhouse – while the action moves with the speed of a guillotine.

What should be an extended panic attack is here more like a series of indigestion disorders. The production doesn’t sizzle, but it purrs. As a barmy Alsatian (with a beetle in his lederhosen), Paul Bradley seesaws between silliness and solemnity. And Deborah Findlay can suggest a week of pleasure and disdain with one lift of her upper lip.

Western front ~ as various principles

I am researching into this theatrical production and will have more information when I can.
Olivia’s work in radio

Hut 33 (2008) ~ as Minka

A BBC radio 4 production Set in Bletchley Park, in WW2, this sitcom focuses on 3 code-breakers forced to share a draughty wooden hut as they try to break German ciphers. Unfortunately they hate one another.

Dirk Gently’s holistic detective agency ~ as Janice (2007)

A radio 4 adaptation of a novel written by Douglas Adams, it is described on its cover as a “thumping good detective-ghost-horror-who dunnit-time travel-romantic-musical-comedy-epic”

Fabulous (2008)

Sitcom by Lucy Clarke about a woman who wants to be Fabulous but can’t cope.

Attention deficit department

Well that’s one way of looking at it ~ as Jane

Before an audience

Concrete cows (2002-2003)

Robert Webb and Olivia Colman co-star in the first series of the BBC Radio 4 sketch show. Welcome to the surreal, silly and ingenious comedy sketch show that features one half of Mitchell & Webb and Olivia Colman from “Peep Show”, with Sally Hawkins, Steven Kynman and Chris Pavlo. The highlights include Narnia being vandalised by two kids from Peckham, Mr Punch’s parole board, Thomas Hardy’s agent, temping for NASA, Batman’s schedule and the theft of Hitler’s jewels. There’s also the real reason why Columbus sailed round the world, email problems in Ancient Rome and Lesser Known Novels (“The First of the Mohicans”), plus a taste of Radio 4’s popular (and wonderfully dull) anecdote show, “Give Me Strength”

The 99p challenge (series 4)

The 99p Challenge is a spoof panel game originally broadcast on BBC Radio 4. The show is presented by Sue Perkins and features a selection of regular panelists such as Armando Iannucci and regular writers Kevin Cecil, Andy Riley, Jon Holmes and Tony Roche. Panelists are given silly tasks by Perkins (in a manner not dissimilar to those given on I’m Sorry I Haven’t A Clue by Humphrey Lyttelton) and are awarded pence for being funny. The player with the most money at the end of the show is given the chance to win 99p. It has been shown in some episodes that the gamble is compulsory, even if the winner has amassed a fortune of more than 99p in the game.

Mitch Benn’s crimes

That Mitchell and Webb sound (2003-2005)

That Mitchell and Webb Sound is a comedy sketch show on BBC Radio 4 which started on 28 August 2003. A second series was broadcast in 2005 with a third starting on 24 May 2007. The series became adapted for television as That Mitchell and Webb Look in 2006. The series is seen in some ways a follow-up to The Mitchell and Webb Situation, a sketch show shown on Play UK in 2001.The series stars David Mitchell and Robert Webb who also write a fair amount of the material. Also performing in the show are James Bachman and regular Mitchell and Webb collaborator Olivia Colman.

Trapped

The house of Milton Jones ~ as Henrietta

Giles Wembley Hogg

The Rotter’s club

Crème de la crime

Lean on me ~ various characters

Think the unthinkable ~ various characters

Richard the III ~ as Prince and the narrator