Sparks at Hammersmith Apollo (18 June 25)

Sparks are now about the only band that I try to see every time that they play in London who still play in London who still play in London with some regularity, the rest have either stoped playing altogether or only tour here occasionally.

They somehow manage to play a different venue each time and this comes with different seating/standing options. This was their first visit to Hammersmith Apollo (in recent years at least) and when I booked, which was when the bookings opened, there were only standing places available and so I went for one of those at £45.

I had been seated the last few times that I had seen them so was quite looking forward to a standing show.

You may have noticed that they played two nights and I have only mentioned one. Unfortunately I had a much earlier booking for Glyndebourne on the 19th, otherwise I would have gone to both nights.

Not having a lot else to do on the day I found myself in the queue around 6pm whereas I was already behind a good number of serious fans.

The entry system whereby you had to show tickets on their app twice, once to get into the building and again a few seconds later to get into the auditorium delayed me a little bit more than it should but I still got a place about three rows back, on Ron's side of the stage and with no tall people  in front of me.

The picture below shows the view I had.

Sparks came on around 8:30 and after two and a half hours of mostly standing I was ready for some music and some modest dancing.

The first song was no surprise, So May We Start has been the obvious opener  since being released in 2021 as part of the Annette soundtrack.

Sparks have an extensive back catalogue, almost thirty studio albums, and are able to pull out any track from any time so each concert is full of some surprises as well as some greatest hits and some newer songs from the latest album. 

This time the surprises included three songs from Nº 1 in Heaven played in reverse order of familiarity so that when the third song, the title song itself, it came as surprise. An even bigger surprise were the two songs from 1973's A Woofer in Tweeter's Clothing. That is when I first got into Sparks via John Peel, of course.

In addition to The Number One Song in Heaven, the greatest hits included Reinforcements, When Do I Get to Sing "My Way" and This Town Ain't Big Enough for Both of Us.

I was very happy!

Standing in a cramped area got to me slightly after a while and I slipped towards the back, helped myself to a refreshing pint, and settled down to listen to the rest of the show and enjoy the light show. It was still excellent from their and I liked the different perspective.

Sadly Sparks have yet to announce any more London dates so I will just have to wait until they do.

Cat on a Hot Tin Roof at Apollo Theatre was blistering

There are several names on the poster for Cat on a Hot Tin Roof and the one that made me buy a ticket was Tennessee Williams. I love modern theatre but I like seeing the classics too, especially if I have not seen them before, and so this was an obvious choice to make.

It was a Young Vic production at a west end venue so it came with eye watering west end prices and so I found myself up in Grand Circle, seat B12, with part of the safety rail obstructing my view and still paying £35 for the privilege (top price was £99). The play had to be pretty good to justify that.

It was pretty good.

In a format I am beginning to think of as American Standard we watched a family in almost real time across an evening in one room.

In what felt like the first of three acts (and the internet suggest that it might be that) there was a long conversation between Maggie (Sienna Miller) and Brick (Jack O'Connell) where Maggie did most of the talking and Brick did a lot of drinking. His drinking was one of the things they discussed. Sienna Miller rose highly in my estimation (admittedly from a position of obscurity).

There was also a fair amount of nudity which felt unnecessary to the story and a little distracting. They were in their bedroom, and Brick was having a shower, so the nudity was natural but unhelpful.

In the second act the main conversation was between Brick (still drinking heavily) and his father, Big Daddy Pollitt (Colm Meaney). Colm I did know because he had appeared in several great films including Layer Cake and, or course, Under Siege. This was a more equal conversation about the future. Big Daddy was celebrating his 65th birthday and had big plans for the future. Women featured in these.

In the final act all the family dramas came together and the other people at the party became more prominent, including Brick's mother, brother and his wife who had designs on Big Daddy's substantial wealth, and a couple of old family friends.

The plot helped to move things along and gave a point to the conversations but, as with other American Standard plays, it was the conversations themselves that mattered with the crisp use of language to convey emotions and ideas. The dialogue fizzed because Tennessee Williams wrote a great play and the cast did it full justice.

Let The Right One In at the Apollo Theatre was stupendous

I am on lots of theatre mailing lists and still I almost missed this one. It was Twitter that saved the day, as it often does.

Somehow I had missed the source book and two film versions too, this was a story that I should have known but did not. Not knowing may have been an advantage as one the delights of the play is the number of surprises thrown at the audience.

It is derived from John Ajvide Lindqvist’s Swedish horror novel, which puts it firmly in the Nordic Noir camp, which is why I should have known about it earlier and was happy to accept seats away from my comfort zone to make sure that I saw it.

The best seats I could get were in Row D of the Grand Circle (D12) for £39.50. I have no idea what happened to the bookings on that night but when I collected my ticket at the box office I had an upgrade marked on it in biro. I was moved down one level from the Grand Circle to the Dress Circle and forward from the fourth row to the first (A19). This is where I would have chosen to sit all things being equal, though the standard price of £80 plus would have been sufficient deterrent.

My view from there was perfect as the photo below shows.

The tone was set quickly when one of the people walking through the woods is approached by a stranger who the murders him and hangs him from a tree by his feet.

From there the story developed in two directions, the horrors in the woods continued and alongside this two young people, not quite teenagers, start to fall in love.

Populating these stories were the strange companion to they young girl, the young boys estranged family (he lived with his mother) and the students and staff at the boy's school where he was repeatedly bullied.

The stories raced forward in a succession of short scenes with the stage changing just as rapidly as the action moved from location to location. Each short scene jumped the narrative on a jolt and some of these jolts were quite big.

The narrative was dramatic, fast-paced, horrific and also tender. It was obvious why the original story had spread easily to other media.

The narrative did not need much help put it got plenty anyway. In addition to the imaginative sets there was moody lighting and a tense musical soundtrack. And yes I did jump at the big moment. The acting was also superb.

As it's a horror story, Let The Right One In is not going to appeal to everybody but it certainly appealed to me. It was a truly excellent and distinctive piece of theatre.

Jerusalem at the Apollo Theatre

The long list of 5-star reviews made seeing Jerusalem an obvious choice. Having done so I am not sure what the other reviewers saw.

Yes it is good but I am not convinced that it is that good but let's start by saying what it is.

Jerusalem is Shameless set in Dale Farm.

Johnny Byron is lives in a caravan where he holds wild parties, sells drugs and holds court over a mixed group of other people living on the edge of society. "No hopers" may be a cruel but accurate description.

 All the action, such as it is, takes place in and around the caravan in the woods. Having just one scene to play with means that the set designers can go to town, and they did. The caravan is surrounded by thick trees, the yard is appropriately cluttered, a large water tank keeps the beers cool and chickens scratch around under the caravan.

The large cast of secondary characters (they are all secondary to Johnny Byron, despite being strong characters in their own right and are all portrayed by good actors) comes and goes and through their banter we learn more about them and a lot more about Johnny's past, present and possible future.



There are some plot lines but these hardly matter, what engages us is the dialogue. And a word of warning here, the language is very strong throughout.

The mood changes as we discover more about the situation. At first the impression is of a lovable Gypsy living the hippie dream (free love and drugs) who draws kindred spirits to him but there are some dark moments too with, just to name a few, a missing child, a broken marriage and a few acts of cruelty. We also have a heady mix of humour and hope to add to the concoction.

The mood-swings keep us guessing whether we are heading towards a happy or a sad ending until we realise that does not matter either, just as we do not need Godot to arrive to make that play work.

The ending that we are led to reminded me of The Lady or The Tiger except here the choice is between bulldozers and giants. My money is on the bulldozers, but that's just a guess.

The play is all about Johnny Byron and its abiding strength is Mark Rylance's magnificent performance in that role. We care for him, are jealous of him and are shocked by him.

Jerusalem grips and enthrals you and showers you with a mix of strong emotions. It's both a draining and a rewarding experience, which is entirely appropriate.

Blithe Spirit at the Apollo Theatre

Blithe Spirit is an absolute gem that delights throughout and reassures you that ghosts can be sexy as well as scary.

The clue that you are in for a good night comes from the phrase "by Noel Coward" who certainly know how to write a good story as I discovered with Hay Fever at The Rose last year.

The story is quite simple. An author in search of a plot asks the local clairvoyant to dinner and to perform so that he can see the tricks of the trade. In the seance he makes contact with his former wife who is then conjured back in to a half life where only he can see and hear her, to other people she is invisible and mute.

A lot of the humour derives from this situation but Coward also has fun with the characters and their foibles along the way.

To make best use of good characters you need good actors, and this production does.

Alison Steadman plays the rumbustious and somewhat dotty clairvoyant with exuberance.

Robert Bathurst is utterly convincing as the feckless author and husband who is never in control of the situation.

I only know Hermione Norris from her ruthless role in Spooks so it is with a lot of credit that she morphs successfully in to a suave lady of leisure.

But missing from the poster is the real star of the show, Ruthie Henshall who plays the ghost.

Ruthie sizzles on stage as she weaves her mischief. Every movement, gesture and look is gleeful and sprightly, particularly when she plays with the people who cannot see her. And she looks fantastic too.

After the extreme disappointment with Betrayal just a few days before it was good to have my faith in the theatre reaffirmed with a play that delights in it own humour and carries its audience happily with it to the very end. A real treat.