STOVEPIPE. To 26 April.
London.
STOVEPIPE
by Adam Brace.
Unit 19 West 12 Centre Shepherds Bush W12 8QD To 26 April 2009.
Tue-Wed 7.30pm Thu-Sat 7pm & 9.30pm Sun 3pm.
no performance listed 18 March, 15, 21, 22 23 (7pm) April.
Wheelchair accessible performances 13-19 March: check with box office for details.
Runs 1hr 40 min No interval.
TICKETS: 0208 743 5050.
www.bushtheatre.co.uk
Review: Carole Woddis 9 March.
War in West 12 is impressive.
A stone’s thrown down from The Bush theatre stands the West 12 Shopping Centre. Dwarfed by its pushy new arrival, Westfield, Unit 19 West 12 is now playing host to an unlikely nightly bombardment set in motion by the Bush’s enterprising Josie Rourke, in collaboration with the National Theatre.
Stovepipe comes with the NT and Bush Theatre’s imprimatur but is produced by HighTide, a newish, well-connected producing company, based in London, which holds annual new-writing festivals in Suffolk with the intention of transferring plays on.
Stovepipe, first seen at last year’s High Tide, is a remarkable piece not least for its obvious access to resources but also for its topical focus on malfunctioning equipment (‘Stovepipe’ is apparently a firearms malfunction). A line also shoots out half way through: “Least the IRA didn’t get him.” So it goes. You write a line years before then history catches up with you.
In its Middle East setting, Brace’s Stovepipe is a bit like David Greig’s Damascus, if entirely different in tone and subject. Set in Amman, Jordan, it concerns the rebuilding of Iraq and the private companies and ex-army lads in their pay acting as security guards. Alan and Eddy are two such `soldiers of fortune’. Very laddish. Very macho. Very pummelly with each other. Then something strange happens. Eddy goes missing.
Brace, a onetime journalist, certainly knows his area. Through a small number of characters, he conveys a whole theatre of intrigue whilst abrasive, sardonic language vividly conveys a sense of lives lived on the edge. There is a wonderful scene, for example, between Shaun Dooley’s world-weary Alan and Sargon Yelda’s Iraqi translator, of throwaway, darkly comic lines about the English sense of humour, Mr Bean and the Iraq war.
As a promenade, site-specific piece, Michael Longhurst’s production sprays us with sights and sounds from the Rebuild Iraq sales conference to the life and death throes of Alan and Eddy on patrol, to murky back-streets, hotel bars and neon-lit briefing rooms.
A Black Watch for the post-war, it’s thunderously well acted by a highly talented team of five. Impressive.
Andre/Grif: Christian Bradley.
Alan: Shaun Dooley.
Eddy/Harry: Niall MacGregor.
Carolyn/Masha/Sally: Eleanor Matsuura.
Saad/Marty/Rami: Sargon Yelda.
Director: Michael Longhurst.
Design: takis etc.
Lighting: Matt Prentice.
Sound: Steve Mayo.
Voice: John Tucker.
Dramaturge: Jack Bradley.
Fight choreography: Rachel Bown-Williams.
Assistant director: Titas Halder.
Associate sound: Luke Swaffield.
Stovepipe was first staged as part of HighTide Festival 2008, The Cut,
Halesworth, Suffolk on 1 May, 2008.
2009-03-14 00:30:19