peter serres’ profile
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Seen, or going to see
- King Lear, Courtyard Theatre, Stratford-upon-Avon, Theatre Royal, Newcastle upon Tyne, and other locations, Royal Shakespeare Company, 24th March 2007 – 12th January 2008
- Romeo and Juliet, Shakespeare’s Globe (Bankside), London, 2003 – 2004
- Everyman, Royal Shakespeare Company, Stratford-Upon-Avon, 1996 – 1997
- Ion, Pit, London, Royal Shakespeare Company, 4th October 1994 (press night)
- Medea, Liverpool Playhouse, Wyndham’s Theatre, London, and other locations, Almeida Theatre, Bill Kenwright, and Liverpool Playhouse, 2nd September 1993 – 26th February 1994
- Armstrong’s Last Goodnight, Old Vic, London and Chichester Festival Theatre, National Theatre, 6th July 1965 – 1966
- The Royal Hunt of the Sun, Old Vic, London and Chichester Festival Theatre, National Theatre, 7th July 1964 – 1965
- Joined 20th November 2020.
- Last logged in on 25th February 2021.
Last five observations
- To National Theatre Company production of As You Like It, by William Shakespeare, Old Vic, London, 3rd October 1967 - 1968: “Ronald Pickup’s Wikipedia entry is deplorably lacking in the matter of his stage career, an unfortunate result of so much of the records depending on US media giants. A kind of cultural colonialism: if it didn’t happen on Broadway, then it doesn’t count, The As You Like It is totally ignored by Wikipedia. The USA would have been just as ignorant about Judi Dench if she hadn’t played “M” in Bond movies or Anthony Hopkins without Hannibal Lector. Not much can be done about people who have progressed from barbarism to Trump with only odd scraps of civilisation in between. Farewell cruel world”
- To production of Loot, by Joe Orton, Criterion Theatre, London, November 1966 - October 1967: “EARLIER THAN THIS was the production of 1965 ( here follows some detail from WIKIPEDIA to whom thanks. QUOTE premiered in Cambridge on 1 February 1965. The production starred Geraldine McEwan, Kenneth Williams, Duncan Macrae and Ian McShane and was directed by Peter Wood. Responses to the first production were extremely mixed, with many in the audience outraged, as Orton had intended, but largely negative reviews also affected the box office. The London Evening News called it “one of the most revolting things I’ve ever seen.”[2] The first run ended at Wimbledon on 20 March 1965 with the play considered a flop due to its problems with repeated script rewrites, uneven direction, a stylish but unsympathetic set, and what many considered the miscasting of Williams. Loot was successfully revived the following year, however, at the Jeanette Cochrane Theatre in Holborn. It opened on 27 September 1966 with Gerry Duggan as McLeavy, Sheila Ballantine as Fay, Kenneth Cranham as Hal, Simon Ward as Dennis, and Michael Bates as Inspector Truscott.[3] It was directed by Charles Marowitz and designed by Tony Carruthers.[3] The production transferred to the Criterion Theatre in November 1966. END OF WIKIQUOTE/ here continues my own comment – on the miscasting of Williams, the problem was that he was doing a comic turn while the rest of the cast were really acting. It created a clash of styles. I didn’t mind but I could understand the majority view, It was different, for me, being young and lapping up “absurd” humour. The Goons had already created a gulf between generations.”
- To Associated London Theatre and Bloomsbury Plays Ltd production of The Bed-Sitting Room, by John Antrobus and Spike Milligan, Bristol Hippodrome, Saville Theatre, London, and other locations, 20th February - 25th November 1967: “Did this play also tour? I’m reasonably sure I saw it but think it would have been at Brighton; or could there have been a London transfer? Only one clear detail survives in my imperfect mind, viz a line or possibly a poster lowered from the flies: BUDDHISTS USE ESSO. (A ref to self-immolation as protest against the Vietnam War.) PS I’v searched in vain for SON OF OBLOMOV (1964 ?). Is my failure down to technical incompetence?”
- To Royal Shakespeare Company production of King Lear, by William Shakespeare, Courtyard Theatre, Stratford-upon-Avon, Theatre Royal, Newcastle upon Tyne, and other locations, 24th March 2007 - 12th January 2008: “King Lear has a large cast. Mr Heffernan, in one of the smaller roles, gave an absolute gem of a performance. Critics rarely have space to do justice to such work. It’s a great pity .”
- To National Theatre production of Armstrong's Last Goodnight, by John Arden, Old Vic, London and Chichester Festival Theatre, 6th July 1965 - 1966: “As a most memorable moment, I’d have to cite the classic exchange between Albert Finney’s Armstrong and The Lady (clearly “attached” to Sir David Lindsay of the Mount) and deliciously played by Geraldine McEwen. The context was that Johnny Armstrong took it on himself to proposition The Lady , and was coolly rebuffed. Here, please, do your imaginative best with Scottish accents. NOW, as scripted – JOHNNY (incredulous) But yoor a Hoor ! LADY : Not yoor Hoor. Game, set and match to the Lady.”
Last ten changes
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