helenistic, Author at Helen McCrory

Streetlife – Review

On September 4, 1995May 18, 2021 By helenistic No Comments

Superbly nuanced performance from National Theatre actress Helen McCrory

by Derek Elley | September 4, 1995 | Variety

Tough, funny, moving and totally truthful, “Streetlife” is a sock slice-of-life low-budgeter from the Ken Loach school of working-class drama. Motored by superbly nuanced playing from National Theatre actress Helen McCrory, as a gutsy single mom forced to deal with an inconvenient pregnancy, this BBC Wales telepic deserves wide exposure at Brit-friendly festivals in addition to its small-screen airings. It’s among the best work Welsh-born Karl Francis has done.

Setting is the town of Pontypridd, in the no-nonsense Rhondda Valley region of southern Wales, where Jo (McCrory) works in an all-femme sweatshop ironing clothes. Her life is raw but good: She has a perpetually horny married lover, Kevin (Rhys Ifans), and a young daughter; is studying to improve herself; and has managed to move away from her slobby father (John Pierce Jones) into her own place on a state housing estate.

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Dirty Old Town Video

VIDEO: Dirty Old Town

On February 5, 1995May 18, 2021 By helenistic No Comments

Rik Mayall presents…

by RikMayallScrapbook | You Tube | February 10, 1995

Rik Mayall is a tramp called Raymond who finds his life changes radically when he gets his hands on a sought-after script. First broadcast on ITV on the 5th February 1995. Cast also include, Helen McCrory, Brian McCardie, Frances Barber and Michael Kitchen.

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Devil's Disciple Print Media Reviews

The Devil’s Disciple at the National Theatre – Review

On September 12, 1994May 8, 2021 By helenistic No Comments

A Roisterous production of Bernard Shaw’s 1899 Melodrama

by Matt Wolf | September 12, 1994 | Variety

The National marks time pleasantly with a roisterous production of Shaw’s 1899 melodrama and at least restores to the Olivier stage some of the energy missing from it of late. If the play hardly seems worth such a fuss, it’s only because Shaw is relatively rarely done at this address; one yearns to see the same theater take on, say, “Man and Superman.”

Still, as directed with brio by Christopher Morahan against John Gunter’s scenic backdrop of a map of Revolutionary War New England, “Devil’s Disciple” will be a crowd pleaser. There’s no harm in that, particularly with as winning a central trio of performers as Richard Bonneville (Dick Dudgeon), Paul Jesson (Anthony Anderson) and Helen McCrory (his wife, Judith), all of whom barnstorm their way through a play that has not an ounce of depth or subtlety to it. The “devil’s disciple” of the title, Dudgeon is the family black sheep led mistakenly to the gallows in 1777 New Hampshire in place of the town pastor, Anderson.

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Print Media Reviews The Seagull

The Seagull at the National Theatre – Review

On July 9, 1994May 14, 2021 By helenistic No Comments

It is the women who dominate this show

By Irving Wardle | July 9 ,1994 | The independent

Besides allowing Dame Judi Dench to add another trophy to her collection of Chekhov leads, John Caird’s production of The Seagull has the pretext of restoring a picture frame to the open stage; or, rather, four picture frames, which descend one by one on John Gunter’s lakeside perspective, so that by the end you are looking through the accumulated settings of the whole play. The apparent aim of this romantically cumbersome design, supported by Dominic Muldowney’s wistful valses oubliees, is to break the embargo on Chekhovian ‘atmosphere’. The effect is contradicted once the opening image of the ghostly company drifting under moonlit birch trees gives way to the play itself, performed with full egoistic drive in a colloquially muscular version by Pam Gems.

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Print Media Reviews The Seagull

The Seagull at the National Theatre – Review

On July 3, 1994May 12, 2021 By helenistic No Comments

How does director John Caird avoid predictable performances?

by Clara Bayley | July 3, 1994 | The Independent

When actors portray actors, or worse, actors acting, it can become an excuse for over-the-top self-indulgence. Chekhov’s The Seagull, which is previewing now at the National, features both the celebrated actress Arkadina (played by Judi Dench, right) and the youthful aspirant Nina, performing in Konstantin’s experimental play. How does director John Caird avoid predictable performances?

‘That can be true of any ill-considered portrayal of a theatrical or of any kind of character,’ he points out. ‘You might cast someone who is 75 years old to play an old person, and they start playing old. You have to tell them to play young then.’

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