midasreviews
dirty little secrets
***** 5 STAR
www.one4review.com
White faces, big colourful hair, black outfits and a huge scaffolding frame that fills the stage.
That's the first impression that I had about this show, but first impressions can sometimes be misleading. There is way, way more to this spectacle than that. It's a quasi restoration comedy, it's a magnificent piece of physical theatre, it's 3 acting performances that are a credit to the performers Harper Ray, Lucinda Ryan and Lindsay Trehearne, it has music, and has the cast clambering around the scaffolding and the girls are doing so in high heels!!
The three performers created the piece themselves inspired by the music and lyrics of Shane Cullinan and it should be top of the list for lunchtime entertainment. An interested spectator at the performance I saw was Pop Idol winner Will Young who was paying his first visit to the Edinburgh Fringe. Will said that he selected this show because he had heard good things about it and had friends in the company. He added that he enjoyed the show very much.
Who knows may be one4review will have a celebrity reviewer before long!!!
dirty little secrets
***** 5 STAR
Venue C Central Carlton Hotel (Venue 54)
Reviewer Thelma Good.
The not-in-the-programme shows are sometimes where you find gold nuggets. This one's more than that. It's a beautifully fashioned pure gold piece from a new company, Another Midas whose founders are Harper Ray and Lucinda Ryan. Just over three weeks ago they were planning to come to Edinburgh in 2004 when they suddenly decided to bring a show now. Just over 21 days later here they are with a stylish production which drips quality and integrity and quite a bit of perspiration. It's a highly physical show performed on scaffolding with the white-faced performers almost constantly on the move as they tell the tale of Magpie/Mrs Janet Gordon adapted by Ryan, Ray and Lindsay Trehearne from a story written by Ryan.
The two founders of the company, Ray and Ryan are joined by Helen McManamon in the performance. Watching them it's hard to believe they only all got together so recently. McManamon plays the Magpie, in a curly black mop haired wig, twitching and moving like a light on her bird, her performance contains the arrogance and smartness of that avian, dressed as a scarlet suspendered vamp. Where McManamon is the Magpie she can become when she goes knocking at windows for treasures, Ryan is the lusty whoring reality of Mrs Gordon. With the exaggerated white makeup all the cast wears, she also sports a very curly magenta with white strands wig, is cushioned and voluptuous where the Magpie is taunt skinned and angular. Ray is the neighbour the Magpie/Mrs Gordon visits, blond haired, dressed in black shirt and trousers, his androgynous good looks complete the strong production visuals. Shane Cullinan's music and lyrics skilfully increase the cabaret atmosphere of the piece. Dirty Little Secrets is accomplished, all elements come together with orgasmic intensity - a real gem of Fringe spirit and creativity. And Another Midas are well named, this short and intense 35 minute assays as theatrical gold.
© Thelma Good 6 August 2003 - Published on EdinburghGuide.com
Chaucer's Cock Tale
***** 5 STAR
www.rampantscotland.com
A Potent Cocktail, Blending Chaucer and Noel Coward
Last year, Another Midas brought a touch of glamour to the Fringe with Dirty Little Secrets, a visually stimulating, operatic and erotic dance. This sensational physical theatre company is back with a mesmerising modern interpretation of Chaucer's The Nun's Priest's Tale, a beast fable in which Chanticleer, a vain, pompous, pink-rouged rooster is seduced by Dawn, a sly young fox.
Set in the 1950s, Chanticleer's buxom hen-wife Pertelot, in shocking pink wig and lace housecoat, is the domestic goddess baking sponge cakes to entice her Cock to stay home. Away from this cosy marital bliss, his wild fantasies take hold and he pursues the ravishing raven-haired vixen, a vision in black stockings, corset and killer heels. "Dreams come true if you believe them," he sings, as they tango in a lustful embrace. While he binges on sexual pleasure, the deserted Pertelot binges on cake. With a hint towards the alleged Beckham/Loos encounter, the 'kiss and tell' tabloid gossip begins to destroy the romantic dream.
This is a potent cocktail, blending Chaucer and Noel Coward, song and dance with a fabulous Broadway musical-style soundtrack by composer Jim Fowler. Harper Ray, Lucinda Ryan and Helen McManamon perform with their inimitable style: they prance and preen with precise animalistic characterisation. While outrageously, grotesquely camp on one level, this is above all an intelligent re-working of Chaucer's morality tale dramatised with passion, humour and wit.
Vivien Devlin, August 2004
Chaucer’s ‘Cock Tale’
3RD PLACE
The Scotsman
The Chaucerian lucky bag (The Top three Chaucer pieces)
IT’S easy to do Chaucer very badly, and I’ve seen some turkeys. This year, though, there are three pleasant surprises at the Fringe.
In third place, but not without distinction, is Chaucer’s Cock Tale. This version of The Nun’s Priest’s Tale is brought to life in the 1950s: Chanticleer (Harper Ray) and his wife Pertelot (Lucinda Ryan) are media darlings; Chanticleer is a celebrated singer while his wife is the perfect 1950s housewife with a passion for cooking. They live in a perfect 1950s world until a foxy young dancer sours the dream and creates a more titillating story of sex, betrayal and lies.
Harper Ray does cocky extremely well - so well that by the end you can’t wait for someone to come along, put him in a pot and boil him - and Helen McManamon’s fabulous dancing has the audience captivated.
ZOË GREEN
Chaucer’s ‘Cock Tale’
The Stage
Dedicated to fusing classical and contemporary performance vocabulary, Another Midas theatre company has theatrically translated Geoffrey Chaucer’s The Nun’s Priest’s Tale into the context of the fifties celebrity lifestyle.
Although the production almost exclusively utilises the original text, aesthetically it is a melange of restoration comedy, the stage musical and contemporary dance with some fairly graphic sexual and gustatory naturalism. Narratively, we have a multiple Oscar-winner led astray from his high-profile marriage to a cookery queen.
It all ends, of course, in a kind of kiss and tell debacle for the mistress that would be the envy of some contemporary football husbands. But then again this is the fifties - as we’re told by the programme note - and what would Chaucer have known about the possibility of divorce? Bad wigs and creased dresses aside, this is a worthy exercise in accessibility to the classics and will probably delight a wide range of the audience .
Chaucer’s Cock Tale
The Gay and Lesbian Humanist
At the always very prolific “C” venue was Cock Tale. The Another Midas Theatre Company provide a stage visit to the world of Chaucer – one of several at this year’s Fringe. Harper Ray is Chanticleer, delighting in his own voice, transported to the 1950s and appearing in Vogue photoshoots (very effectively conveyed through repeated stills). This show is ravishing to the eye, with sets and costumes that were very pleasing. The chicken-coop physical movements are very well sustained. Pertelote (Lucinda Ryan) is a charming magical baker. Helen McManamon’s scalding seductiveness and impassioned dancing are particularly riveting.
Tony Challis
Chaucer's Cock Tale
*** 3 STARS
Scotsgay
OK, OK, so the boys on the last Scots Gay cover, which promoted this show, aren't actually in Cock Tale. That is, except the blond one who is standing in the middle at the back. His name is Harper Ray and it is he who is the brainchild of 'Another Midas', who bought us Dirty... Little... Secrets last year. It is also he who moves on stage with such grace and agility, looking absolutely gorgeous, along with his two female co-stars. This is a visually stunning, glossy adaptation of Chaucer's Nun's Priest's tale - it's just that the performance deserved a better text to base itself upon.
Chaucer's 'Cock Tale'
**** 4 STARS
www.one4review.com
Following on from their critically acclaimed Dirty Little Secrets from Fringe 2003, Another Midas are hoping that this years offering of Chaucer's 'Cock Tail' turns to gold also.
This is a direct translation from Chaucer's middle English and together with the company's own twists in respect to costumes, The Nun's Priests Tale takes on a different guise.
There is high camp, physical theatre, musical numbers and much, much more as the talented trio of Harper Ray, Lucinda Ryan and Helen McManamon turn in their typical virtuoso performances under the direction of Bernie Byrne.
So if you are into Chaucer or maybe just into inventive theatre you could do far worse than to check this out.
My Dearest Byron
***** 5 STAR
EdinburghGuide.com
With two previous Fringe hit shows, (Dirty Little Secrets and Chaucer's Cock Tale) Another Midas dazzled audiences with their distinctive, stylised shows, blending physical theatre, music, poetic text, camp, dry wit exploring themes of sex and seduction. This year's show, most suitably, is about Lord George Byron, as famous for his affairs with women (and young Greek boys) as for his poetry. After first meeting him in 1812, Lady Caroline Lamb wrote in her diary that he was "mad, bad and dangerous to know" and a wildly passionate love affair ensued. Lesser known is his passionate affair with his half sister Augusta. Based on actual letters and diaries, writer and director, Bernie C Byrnes has created a colourful portrait, revealing the private, secret lives of Georgie, Harper Ray, and Gus, Karen French.
On a tiny, white draped stage, the backdrop is a giant letter, featuring such words as smile, feelings, summer and dream. We hear the sound of a scratching quill and slow cello chords. Regency London,1813, life for the rich and fashionable was extravagant and decadent - Byron liked to party and travel. In a series of imaginatively devised and choreographed scenes, he tours Europe, to Italy and Greece, he takes Augusta to the theatre and society balls. Like children, they play games, joke and laugh together as gradually, their affection deepens to love and passion which ultimately gets out of control.
This intimate one hour play is beautifully written, like a romantic love song, capturing the heartfelt feelings expressed in their letters. With a gentle music soundtrack and cool, crisp, sensual performances, this is a perfectly cut diamond of a show -a wee gem.
Vivien Devlin
My Dearest Byron
**** 4 STARS The British Theatre Guide
From the wholehearted welcome, the choice of venue and the direct audience addresses, it was clear that My Dearest Byron was to be as self-indulgent and irreverent as the man was himself.
Taking place in a virtually empty space, the focus of the play is absolutely on the performance. The actors recount the scandalous love affair between Lord Byron and his long estranged sister Augusta. Both acquit themselves admirably, both with the convoluted dialogue and the physical sections, where the sex is played out in the form of a ballet. This is later contrasted with a retread of the same movements n a violent almost rape-like fashion, as the relationship and Byron's life begins to crumble.
The work was constructed upon the basis of surviving love letters between the two, giving an authenticity to it that otherwise might have gone astray, and the inclusion of Byron's poetic rhythms only add to the decadent sweetness of the tale.
Graeme Strachan
My Dearest Byron
**** 4 STAR
www.one4review.com
I have seen both the last two productions Another Midas have performed at the Fringe and both Dirty Little Secrets and Chaucer's Cocktail have been beautifully created and performed, so I was in no doubt that this would apply to this years offering My Dearest Byron.
Company founder Harper Ray stars as Byron and always gives an immaculate performance, and there was yet another tour de force was delivered. Karen French plays Augusta Leigh, his half-sister and lover, an affair that caused scandal within society around 1816. Their relationship and subsequent break up is beautifully written and directed by Bernie C Byrne, also has a most appropriate musical score created by Jim Fowler and a simple yet effective set.
This is an excellent piece of theatre from an exciting company. It should really be witnessed if you are aware of the story and even if you are not, it is totally accessible in the way it is written and staged.
Ivy Paige's Scandalous!
***** 5 STAR
remotegoat.co.uk
"Camp, funny, dirty, theatre burlesque!"
Ivy Paiges Scandalous is funny, dark, and tongue in cheek. The whole show is set in a 'House of Whorecraft' where the audience are addressed as the customers. We were given guineas to spend on strips and scandal sheets were handed out in the interval. Indeed, it wasn't long before I was convinced I was a fallen lady myself!.
As for the show Ivy Paige is hilarious as the bitter sweet burlesque madam and her erotic poetry strip in the finally is worth a guinea of any bodies money. The wicked den had its own set of characters, such as the dry wit of the Libertine Lord, Marquis Gray. Generally I am a Classic burlesque lover so it was a feast to see Roxy Velvet, Ruby Blues and Ivys troop of sordid burlesque babes known as the Paige Girls.
I loved this show and will definetly go again. P.s. Watch out for Ivy and the Paige girls singing Hanky Panky it is one of the funniest things I have seen in ages!
Daniel Austin
Ivy Paige's Scandalous!
**** 4 STAR
remotegoat.co.uk
"Like Some Nudity With That?"
If you like a little nudity with your dinner, then Ivy Paige's 'Scandalous' is certainly worth a look. Set in the basement of the swanky Volupte Bar, the waiters and cast all but grabbed you by the collar and pulled you into the show. With obviously limited resources, Ivy and her ladies of ill repute and slipping corsets did a great job in making the audience feel like they were involved.
Ivy was the highlight of the show, with her smoky voice and wicked humour she commanded the audience. I just wish I had seen more of her during the show. Like any good mistress, Ivy Paige knows how to delegate the work to her girls, but in her case it is a disappointment. She should spend more time onstage. Highpoints of the evening included Tamara Feinstein and her vocal solo where she combined coquettishness with coloratura. The Marquis Gray, a fun little fop who made sporadic appearances throughout the show, gave the impression early on that he would also steal it.
The climax was also not to be missed. A fun night was had by all and it was a very entertaining way to spend a meal. Next time, a bigger helping of Ivy and the Marquis please.
Meagan Miller-McKeever