IRON PEA. To 8 October.
London
IRON PEA
by Ravil Bukharaev
Galiasgar Kamal State Academic Theatre at Riverside Studios (Studio 2) 8 October 2006
Runs 1hr 55min One interval
Review: Timothy Ramsden 8 October
Colourful storytelling loses something in translation.
British theatre is a world-leader in young people’s theatre. From David Wood on, writers as diverse as Noel Greig and Alan Ayckbourn have provided plays that explore human issues with vivid narrative and theatricality. Such writers as Stuart Paterson and Charles Way have explored emotions and experience in their adaptations of folk-tales. Theatre-in-Education created an economical way of telling stories with 2 planks, a passion and minimal subsidy.
So Ravil Bukharaev’s version of this traditional Tatar tales of a greedy selfish person (an ‘iron pea’ in local idiom), arriving at Riverside for a single performance at the end of this visiting Tatarstan theatre company’s week in Hammersmith, is an intriguing chance to see how another country handles young people’s work.
It’s a large-scale show and quite literal in its costumes and set, which consists largely of three knotted-tree panels that can be shifted around, plus some fencing sections occasionally used. Such visual elements fare better than Ravil Bukharaev’s script, which suffers as it’s channelled through a single earpiece into which an accented voice reads a translation, battling with speech and music, or indeed in the curious programme synopsis.
The story, of love and a talking blue cow (Leisan Rakhimova, bent with an arm doing duty as a tail when humans are around, otherwise erect and articulate) seems to involve more than one iron pea. I’d have Oleg Fazyljan’s Miller down for one too, though it may simply be that Fazyljan, here as in the company’s Dumb Cuckoo, is a particularly forceful actor.
The story has links with Andersen’s Snow Queen, the Witch Jukha turning Minvali Gabdullin’s strong, imposing Gali on his wedding-day into the title’s faithless, tyrannical and prematurely-aging Iron Pea. There seem some strange story structurings; the year of Gali’s abduction pass immediately between 2 second-act scenes while Jukha’s arrival is separated from the wedding by an interval.
But this does allow two spectacular scenes space to breathe: the colourful, disturbed wedding and, first, Jukha’s spectacular, swirling approach. It’s here, amid a surrounding world of animate spirits, the company’s seen at its best.
Gali: Minvali Gabdullin
Alsou: Guzel Shakirova
Sarvar: Najiba Ikhsani
Nasyr: Khalim Jalai
Miller: Oleg Fazyljan
Smith: Fanis Safin
Jukha: Lucia Khamit
Deve: Irek Bakhman
Shurale: Ildus Ahmetdjan
Water-sprite: Firaya Akbarova
Blue Cow: Leisan Rakhimova
Genie: Milausha Shaikhutdinova
Director: Ramil Fazlyev
Designer: Boulat Ibragimov
Music: Rouslan Aboubaker
Choreography: Roustam Fatkhullin
2006-10-13 12:37:14