theatreVOICE

In England it is common practice for an actor to count the number of laughs he can get when first reading a text. With Laurence Olivier this was the case even when he played King Lear. (A famous German Lear like Bernhard Minetti would seriously have contested the notion that the play contains […]

I’m impressed by the spread of this year’s Laurence Olivier awards. Good to see the Donmar’s sensational revival of The Chalk Garden being rewarded in the best actress and lighting categories. Top marks for the championing of Elena Roger, too, as Piaf, a knock-out performance. And the acknowledgement of the RSC’s Histories was more than […]

When I uploaded my last theatreVOICE posting its title was: “Who pissed against Melbourne city gate?” – a job for Harold Pinter’s ghost. Mysteriously on the website the first half was missing. Naturally I assumed that the system was programmed to remove “offensive” words like “pissed”. Immediately Dominic Cavendish reassured me that the […]

Although these are nervous times in critic-land, as they are in pretty much every other land you care to mention, including the one beginning with Ice, it’s always reassuring for those who fear the professional reviewer is a dying or doomed breed, to see luminaries from the world of British theatre turning out in force […]

As a translator you should not sound too flippant about colleagues. We all make mistakes, and I know myself only too well the feeling of sitting in a first night and flinching at some turn of phrase because you only then realize how stilted it sounds. Paradoxically, in many cases this is because one tends […]

Hi all, just a quick note to say that the podcast problems identified last month have now been rectified, we’ve been assured by our web-designer. If you notice any further problems, best - and quickest - to report them via the theatrevoice facebook group. Thanks

As you stagger bleary-eyed to your computer terminals at the start of 2009, hungover from the end of year celebrations or afflicted by those January / recession blues, you should do your ears - and imagination - a favour and give up eight minutes of your time to listen to Chips Hardy’s delightfully fresh comedy […]

The theatre world is still digesting the news of Harold Pinter’s death on Christmas Eve. A great, great loss. In latestNEWS, you’ll find a clutch of links to news items and obituaries. Best thing to do, though, I think, is to listen to the man himself, recorded at the British Library shortly after the death of […]

An amazing week last week: finally, after months of preparation, there’s light at the end of the tunnel. The Urban Scrawl project - a partnership between TheatreVOICE, Theatre 503 and Rose Bruford College - went into major recording mode in Sidcup. Which meant that Gene David Kirk, indefatigable programming director at 503 - and newly […]

Sometimes you finish a translation, feel like opening a celebratory bottle of Buzet and find yourself thrown into a heated discussion concerning the German title with your publisher and the theatre doing the première. To translate certain titles can be a real nuisance, because if there is no immediately convincing equivalent, often the […]