Reviews: The Witches – Dundee Rep; Sleeping Betty – Tron Theatre, Glasgow

First published in The Times, Monday December 7 2015

The Witches: Three Stars

Sleeping Betty: Three Stars

A Roald Dahl adaptation at Dundee Rep has become as much a staple of the Christmas season as mince pies. This is the third year in a row that the ensemble has staged one of David Wood’s adaptations of the celebrated author’s twisted children’s tales, with a production of George’s Marvellous Medicine already slated for next year.

 

Like George’s potion or the formula developed by the Grand High Witch to turn children into mice, at its best Dahl’s absurdist, somewhat menacing sensibility is a recipe for dark theatrical magic. Jemima Levick’s production of The Witches certainly doesn’t lack pungent set pieces, notably the anarchic hotel dining room sequence, in which the tale’s boy-to-mouse hero (Matthew Forbes) tries to turn the tables on the dastardly coven. The show gains further levity from its use of live music, developed by Gavin Swift and performed live.

Review: Can’t Forget About You – Tron Theatre, Glasgow

First published in The Times, Thursday July 9 2015

Three Stars

Sweet, sensitive 25-year-old Stevie (Declan Rodgers) is wallowing in grief following a painful break-up. Relief comes in the unlikely form of Martha (Karen Dunbar), an attractive, unaffected but lonely Glaswegian widow more than twenty years his senior. Stevie encounters her in his local Starbuck’s.

Both are determined to keep the relationship that follows on a strict friends-with-benefits footing, but when their fling reaches the eyes and ears of Stevie’s religious conservative Mammy (Carol Moore) and fervent Protestant sister (Abigail McGibbon), Stevie and Martha are forced to confront the depth of their feelings for one another.