Irish Times writers review The Odd Couple at the Civic Theatre, Tallaght, Joan Armatrading at Vicar Street, Hamel, Tobin & Goudarzi-Tobin at the NCH and Leonard & Owen at the Hugh Lane Gallery, in Dublin.
The Odd Couple
Civic Theatre, Tallaght
Review by Gerry Colgan
There is no need to offer an opinion on the merits of Neil Simon's play. Since it first saw the stage, in 1965, it has been one of the most successful comedies ever written, with a classic film and TV series to prove it. All one may usefully ask is whether it retains its comic effervescence or has dated in the near 40 years of its existence.
The answer? It still sparkles like the best champagne, which is reputed (never got at the really good stuff myself) to have a long cellar life. The characters are credible and hilarious, and their situation remains a delightfully constructed take on a plausible scenario. We laugh at possible versions and variations of ourselves, a release akin to a tragedy-free catharsis.
This production, directed with unflagging pace by Sighle Toibin, gets off to the best of starts with Oscar's weekly poker game in uneasy session; where is Felix, the most regular of regulars? Thrown out by his wife, that's where, and when he finally shows up the divorced Oscar must, in all camaraderie, offer him a bed for a night or more. A terrible beauty is born as the natural slob begins to cohabit with his neurotic, absurdly domesticated guest. The rest is theatrical history.
It is delightfully acted, with the benefit of Bairbre Murray's costumes and set. The two lead actors get inside the skin of their characters. Nicholas Grennell brings his comedy experience to bear on Felix and makes his neuroses blossom. Michael James Ford is something of a revelation as Oscar, finding new vocal and physical dimensions. Together, they are irresistible. All the other actors fit perfectly: Mal Whyte, Karl O'Neill, Jack Walsh and David O'Meara are the poker players, and Karen Egan and Iseult Golden are the glamour girls from the upstairs apartment.
This production, by the Civic Theatre, is a serious dose of the best medicine.
Runs here until May 10th, then tours
Joan Armatrading
Vicar Street, Dublin
Tony Clayton-Lea
If nothing else, Joan Armatrading's career is a salutary lesson in how to survive trends. She could have become a one-hit wonder (she hasn't had a UK top-10 hit since 1976), like so many before and after her. She could have become the female singer-songwriter's answer to Miss Havisham and turned into a bitter old prune.
Instead, she has continued to record and release albums at pretty much her own pace - signed to major labels (A&M, RCA) for the best part of three decades, only in the past few years becoming a victim of the corporate cull, when her sales figures dropped.
A good portion of the audience seemed by no means familiar with her latest material, something the singer herself picked up on. It's the curse of once extremely successful pop artists: how to get mature audiences to buy their latest records when all they want to hear are the handful of songs they grew up with or fell in love to.
To this end, at least, Armatrading is aware of her commercial limitations.
Several songs from her latest album, Lovers Speak, were duly performed and politely received. It was the more familiar tunes, such as Drop The Pilot, that generated the whoops of delight and sustained applause.
Despite Armatrading's static stage presence and a show of shyness that rapidly squashed any rapport with her audience, she reached a satisfactory quid pro: greatest hits equal contented punters. A riveting experience? Hardly.
Hamel, Tobin & Goudarzi-Tobin
NCH John Field Room, Dublin
Review by Douglas Sealy
The refined playing of Candice Hamel (flute) and Luke Tobin (guitar) fell gently on the ear in two duets, Ibert's Entr'acte and Rodrigo's Serenata Al Alba Del Dia. Although both of these short works have their inspiration in the Iberian peninsula, the players avoided the temptation of exaggerating the local colour and concentrated on a delicate intimacy.
Even the work for solo guitar, Albeniz's Asturias (arr. Segovia), where one might have expected some brashness, was quietly reflective.
Shirin Goudarzi-Tobin (piano) played four of the Spanish Dances by Granados with spirit and then was joined by Hamel in Sonate En Concert by Jean-Michel Damase. Like much French wind music, this is accomplished and light-hearted and seeks to do no more than entertain, which it did most agreeably.
The three players joined only in their encore, a foot-tapping little piece by Reinhardt and Grappelli, much appreciated by the audience.
Leonard & Owen
Hugh Lane Gallery, Dublin
Review by Douglas Sealy
Sonata No 4, Op 23 In A Minor - Beethoven. Adagio - Kodaly. Three Preludes - Gershwin. Garden Scene - Korngold. Ukelele Serenade - Copland
In a diverse and diverting programme, Catherine Leonard (violin) and Charles Owen (piano) showed there was life after Beethoven, even if that composer's Sonata No 4 was the most substantial and rewarding work they played.
Like partners in a dance, they shared the action, skilfully matching their parts to the flow of the music, advancing or retreating as the moment demanded, self-reliant but always conscious of the needs of the partner.
Kodaly's Adagio, a full-blown flower of Romanticism with no hint of Hungarian folk idiom, showed Leonard's ability to shape a long line like a verse of a song and give it a vocal intensity.
And Korngold's Garden Scene (from Much Ado about Nothing Op 11) was similarly alluring, a richly scented
rose.
The Three Preludes For Piano (arr. Heifetz) were faithful representations of Gershwin's endeavour to wed classical and jazz idioms, but they sounded pale beside the energetic populism of Copland's Ukulele Serenade, a piece whose vulgarity is also its charm.
It didn't sound a bit like a ukelele, but it had the necessary spirit and was enthusiastically rendered by the duo.
