Related News
-
LCH tells communities to ‘Get on Yer Bike’! - 14/06/12
-
Review: Floating at The Unity Theatre, Liverpool - 31/05/12 -
-
-
The roll of a dice seals your fate, in the Everyman’s latest adventure. Will you be given a milk bottle or a party popper?
You are led through the story by just one of the several characters in the show. But the adventure chooses you, and even though we all start as one audience in the auditorium, we are split up. The props, not the characters, determine each group.
Created in association with Slung Low, Anthology has managed to take theatre, as we know it, out of the box and has injected new and inventive ideas. Using the latest technology and some of our much loved local writers, they have managed to create seven new stories inspired by the city.
At the start I was given a plastic spoon and a blue piece of plastic, as well as a set of headphones with which I was to follow the story. Each prop is flashed up on a TV screen placed in the auditorium and each character appears out of various areas of the theatre to guide each group on their individual journey. As soon as a plastic spoon appeared on the screen, Jacko the Guitarist appeared announcing that he was going to be late for his gig with Paul McCartney, if we didn’t get a move on. So, with headphones on and plastic spoons at the ready, our group were guided out of the Everyman and so began our journey.
Jacko’s story is not a happy one. After growing up in a children’s home, he finds himself on the streets of Liverpool looking for his lost guitar and the girl he once knew, Rose. Despite roaming the normally busy student area around Liverpool University, the headphones were able to block out any outside interference and also inject sound effects and music, as well as having Jacko talking to us the whole time.
His story is very well written. With plenty of humour, there was also an awful lot of sadness, but it was played beautifully by Kevin Harvey and the child like qualities were plain to see, with flash backs to childhood and the harsh realities of adult life.
Artistic Director Alan Lane has said that devising something like Anthology is the easy part, it’s persuading every one else that a production, which relies heavily on technical support and promenade performing is going to work. But put together the expertise and the dedication that has gone into this production, with the elegance and ease that the Everyman team have, then Anthology is certain to make its mark in theatre history.
This is a good opportunity to hear some of our local writers doing what they do best, writing about the city and the people who live in it. If you want to be part of it then book your tickets now, you won’t be disappointed.
9/10
Anthology is on at the Everyman until October 30th. See www.everymanplayhouse.com for more details.
