MARIA DUARTE, FIONA O’CONNOR and ANDY HEDGECOCK review Savage House, Enzo, Madfabulous, and Erupcja
Latest editorial
Best of intentions pave way to indifference
MARY CONWAY is disappointed to see a once award-winning comedy lose its spark entirely
ZERO INTERACTION: Lucy Black (Teresa), Laura Rogers (Mary) and Carolina Main (Catherine)
[Helen Murray]
CHRIS SEARLE recommends a work of love and deep admiration for a great musician
KENNY MacASKILL relishes a fictionalised account of the life and death of the principled Irish anti-colonialist, executed for betraying his English imperial masters
FIONA O’CONNOR admires an ambitious first novel that loosens South Africa’s rainbow collective to examine the racial tensions within
Aussie mining corporation murder, Liverpudlian ex-cop amnesia, a naive vigilante tries to reset capitalism, and the riddle of the dead psychoanalyst
SYLVIA HIKINS is persuaded by an entertaining play that the true miracle of Lourdes would be for attitudes toward disability to change
The Memory of Water
Hampstead Theatre
★★
SHELAGH STEPHENSON’S The Memory of Water at Hampstead Theatre is a prime example of how time changes everything.
In the year 2000, this play won an Olivier Award for best new comedy and was subsequently adapted for a film (Before You Go) starring Julie Walters. Now it seems less notable for its crowd-pleasing content than for a creaky storyline, laboured attempts at comedy and a range of under-developed and almost indistinguishable characters.
Not that I blame artistic director, Roxana Silbert, for selecting it. It must have seemed like a safe revival at a time when current themes are so dispiriting. But the result, despite huge commitment from director Alice Hamilton, cast and crew, is a listless affair, addressing too many inconclusive themes while seeming to grab at arbitrary cultural references that never take us to moments of genuine insight.
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