Our Reviews
A selection of show reviews from previous productions
Just So Stories
"The performance takes the form of a rehearsed reading with carefully-studied, wonderfully-evocative percussive accompaniment. John Story who adapted the stories for the stage, is a renowned Sound Designer who has worked on productions ranging from high opera to low comedy.
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He starts proceedings by quartering the audience giving each a sound to make – the desert winds, the noise of camels, the mumbling of their drivers, the chatter of the womenfolk. The hothouse Bedfringe studio transforms into an exotic caravan en route to the court of Suleiman-bin-Daoud where the first of our tales is set. It’s the kind of magic that would have had John Story burned at the stake for wizardry in more enlightened times.
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The little ones sprawled out on cushions at the front are enwrapped and enchanted throughout.
For me, a Kipling-inspired show has to be surprising. I wasn’t simply surprised, I was amazed. The stories were told in a way that suggested they might have been written yesterday. They were told fresher than the first week at university. They were told as evocative as the sound of leather on willow. They were told as expertly as you’d want the surgeon who carries out a loved one’s open heart surgery to be. Written on the hearts of each generation are sentiments and thoughts first put there by Rudyard Kipling. This show honours and amplifies that legacy."
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getyourcoatson.com
Woodbine Willie
"Spackman’s impeccable performance is quietly astonishing. The show is directed and adapted by Albert Welling, who assembles a number of rhyming dialect poems by the Rev. Geoffrey Studdert Kennedy, an Anglican priest who served in the trenches as a chaplain and later became an outspoken pacifist.
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Spackman’s achievement is impressive on more than one level. For starters, it’s a singular feat of memorization. For another, he manages to perform the material in a way that suggests narrative drive, even though the point is less to tell a story than to convey an experience. He handles the verse in a conversational, realistic style.
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The simple set suggests a World War I dugout as the nameless narrator recounts the foolishness, folly and fatality experienced by foot soldiers. Some viewers may have to tune their ears to the Cockney dialect in the early going, but Spackman’s delivery and emotional demeanor are crisp and clear throughout.
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Spackman, a member of the Blackout Theatre Company in Bedford, England, has performed in Kansas City before and his work has always been thoughtful and imbued with a dry sense of humor. This show, however, demands a singular level of discipline and the veteran actor shows that he is easily up to the task."
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Kansas City Star
Her Big Chance
"Her Big Chance was written by playwright Alan Bennett for TV series Talking Heads in 1987 but it feels just as fresh on stage in 2014.
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Natalie Castka is wonderful as Lesley, energetic and engaging throughout the 50 minute monologue. Her unfaltering enthusiasm and naivety makes us both laugh with and sympathise for her as she tells of seedy directors and crew members with dubious intentions.​
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Performed simply with just a few costume changes, Blackout Theatre Company, has created a show which has storytelling at its heart, and Natalie captures a sense of all the different characters in her story, while being the only person on stage."
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"Natalie Castka is a fantastic performer, sharp, witty, engaging who captivates our attention for the duration of the performance. The set is a simple front room with a sofa and telephone. Monologues are punctuated by lightning quick costume changes, directed by David Baxter.​ Blackout Theatre are a Bedford based theatre company to look out for."
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Wendy Thomson www.femalearts.com
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"On the bill Thursday night was “Her Big Chance” by Alan Bennett featuring actress Natalie Castka. It was a night of firsts for Castka: her first performance of the show, her first performance at the invasion and her first performance in the U.S. You’d think that might give a performer the jitters, but Castka was relaxed, precise and charming onstage.​ It’s a crisp bit of writing, performed with style by Castka."
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Kansas City Star
"Her Big Chance was written by playwright Alan Bennett for TV series Talking Heads in 1987 but it feels just as fresh on stage in 2014.
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Natalie Castka is wonderful as Lesley, energetic and engaging throughout the 50 minute monologue. Her unfaltering enthusiasm and naivety makes us both laugh with and sympathise for her as she tells of seedy directors and crew members with dubious intentions.​
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Performed simply with just a few costume changes, Blackout Theatre Company, has created a show which has storytelling at its heart, and Natalie captures a sense of all the different characters in her story, while being the only person on stage."
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"Natalie Castka is a fantastic performer, sharp, witty, engaging who captivates our attention for the duration of the performance. The set is a simple front room with a sofa and telephone. Monologues are punctuated by lightning quick costume changes, directed by David Baxter.​ Blackout Theatre are a Bedford based theatre company to look out for."
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Wendy Thomson www.femalearts.com
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"On the bill Thursday night was “Her Big Chance” by Alan Bennett featuring actress Natalie Castka. It was a night of firsts for Castka: her first performance of the show, her first performance at the invasion and her first performance in the U.S. You’d think that might give a performer the jitters, but Castka was relaxed, precise and charming onstage.​ It’s a crisp bit of writing, performed with style by Castka."
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Kansas City Star
Contractions
​If you've ever felt the line between your work and personal life is too thin then you have to see Contractions. The ink-black comedy about work relationships is wickedly funny but sickeningly twisted.
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A couple, contractually obliged to notify their employees of their relationship, are asked to estimate how long their flourishing love will last. One is relocated for six months but when things go well for the couple and they discover their having a baby they are forced to split up or face losing their jobs.
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With superb acting we see the complete mental breakdown of Emma as she gives up everything to meet the demands of her cold, calm boss.
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This play, written by Mike Bartlett and performed by Blackout Theatre, pushes contractual obligations to the extreme and made me feel scared to ever thinking about striking up a relationship with a co-worker.
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You'll feel bad for laughing but you won't be able to help it."
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September in the Rain
"The prolific John Godber is reputed to be the third-most-produced playwright in Britain after William Shakespeare and Alan Ayckbourn, but I don’t believe theatergoers in Kansas City had ever seen one of his works until the final weekend of “British Invasion 2011 and I have to say the Brits were a huge breath of fresh air. This a bittersweet play — sometimes very funny, ultimately hauntingly poignant. Baxter is a burly actor who inhabits Jack with no trace of artifice. Thomas is a short powerhouse who demonstrated an impressive emotional range in this piece.
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It all falls on the actors in a play that requires little more than two chairs and some suitcases. And they take us on a journey from the young Jack and Liz visiting Blackpool in their first car to the aged couple who can no longer drive but travel to Blackpool by bus. At the Sunday afternoon performance, it was a trip worth taking."
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Kansas City Star
No Direction
"This is a show that will delight actors, directors and theatregoers alike... Welling's play forces the actors to be versatile... the laughs come thick and fast. With two plays for the price of one, this show is well worth the ticket price".
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The Stage (4 Stars)
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"The dialogue is fast, furious and highly believable. Even the tea-making sounds realistic. At times, the tension in the air is palpable.
Both actors slip effortlessly in and out of multiple roles, arguing over the need for a director and whether sex is better than cheesecake. It’s a kind of Waiting for Godot meets Only Fools and Horses, with both characters playing variations of Del Boy, seasoned with hints of Grandad and Rodney and a handful of farce.
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Albert Welling’s writing is well observed and tight. The characters are believable and the camaraderie between them discernible. "
(4 Stars) Broadway Baby​
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"Quality of the production and performance… the bickering lines were very funny and the acting – of being actors – superb… It was hugely enjoyable, mostly comic but occasionally quite moving…. it is one of the funniest, best written, best performed new plays I have seen in some time. Let us hope it makes Edinburgh this summer. They will be in for a treat".
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Steve Lowe – Bedford on Sunday
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