Sunday 15 May 2011

The Golden Dragon in Plymouth





Rehearsals at the Arcola in Dalston.


Jack and David aka Jacquie and Nina, the air stewardesses.












Plymouth time was fantastic. We teched in the theatre and then previewed on Thursday night. I always get very nervous for the opening of a show. My heart was thumping. The paper can be a blessing and a curse, but seems to work.

The Golden Dragon by Roland Schimmelpfennig tells the story of a young Asian man who travels to Europe in search of his sister. She had also moved West in search of work and better prospects. The young man ends up working in the kitchen of the Thai Chinese Vietnamese restaurant The Golden Dragon when he gets terrible toothache. The tooth is eventually wrenched out with a spanner in the kitchen and the boy bleeds to death. It's really a beautiful fable, sad, funny, moving and at times deeply dark. Everyone is mis-cast so to speak - elderly actors play young girls and men, younger actors play the old. Men play women and vice versa. It makes you look at things from a beautiful new perspective. Especially powerful for me...the young man playing the old man "I wish I could be young again" with the older actors looking into the dusk.

It will tour! Next stops: Holt festival in Norfolk, then Edinburgh Traverse, London Arcola, Oxford, Manchester, Hull, Bristol and...Bangalore?? Let's hope so.

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