SHANE RITCHIE NOT INCLUDED
My favourite book of all time is Gone With The Wind. I never saw the Trevor Nunn musical version because it closed about 45 minutes after it opened. I understand it was bollocks.
My second favourite book of all time is One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest. I once saw a stage version with Shane Ritchie as McMurphy. SHANE RITCHIE. One can only assume that the guy who cast Cliff fucking Richard as Heathcliff in Wuthering Heights was somehow involved.
Tonight I went to see a new version of Cuckoo’s Nest at Curve and I was expecting it to be shit. It was actually pretty great. The set is brilliant; clinical and goldfish-bowly (yes that’s a thing) but with bits up above that allow swirling mist-type lights to kick in when the Chief is having his trancey flashbacks. (I think one bit had a picture of Yoda dancing about as a gobo but it might’ve just been green.)
Fucking awesome performances as well. We will all always have Jack Nicholson in our heads when we think about McMurphy, but this guy does a decent job of him too. And because the whole cast are on fire, the show feels like an ensemble piece rather than some ego-vehicle. Plus, Nurse Ratchett is a stone cold bitch. Every play should have a stone cold bitch in it.
I’m really quite impressed. I was saying on twitter earlier that this has been a great week for theatre in Leicester, what with Entitled and Cuckoo’s Nest at Curve, and Hatch:fresh yesterday. I saw stuff there by Michael Pinchbeck, The Other Way Works, Kris Rowland, Dan Bye, Frank Abbott and Action Hero. I liked the Dan Bye and Michael Pinchbeck pieces the best, although was so over-stimulated and excited by it all that I got myself drunk by 8.30 and had to have a little sit down.
