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TIME OUT - 14 September 2004 War plays (of one sort or another) are all the rage this season, and Neil Simon's WW2 training camp drama, revived in an extremely strong production by Couch Potato Productions, deserves a chunk of that audience. Ostensibly a comedy, this 1984 award winner is trenchant about the nature of soldiery without ever appearing to be - the banter comes thick and fast and any moralising is always slipped in under the radar. |
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It's 1943 and six young Americans are travelling to Biloxi, Mississippi for basic training. The amiable Eugene (Pepe Balderrama) narrates the story, a budding writer (based on the playwright) who's for ever recording in his diary the squabbles, fantasies and personal habits of the five other conscripts. They are a decidedly un-gung-ho lot on the whole and the deliberately psychotic Sergeant Toomey rubs up against them like fingernails on a blackboard. The greatest clash, and the source of much of the humour, is that between Toomey (Will Norris) and the sickly intellectual Epstein (Tom Lawrence): the hawk and the nerd do psychological battle on a daily basis, each determined to wear down the other's resolve. The question they are essentially tussling over is this: does the Army dehumanise or inspirit the men it trains? In their stunning final showdown, somehow both arguments prevail. |
There are a couple of lulls but this is nonetheless a supremely slick production of a sharp and funny play. Gari Jones's cast is hard to fault, the audio-visuals - with full moon and the sultry sound of crickets - brings a slice of the deep South to Bloomsbury, and Simon's text remains pointedly relevant. When Epstein half jokes, "One of those idiots is going to become President of the United States," it's no longer Reagan who comes to mind…
Madeleine North
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EVENING STANDARD - 8 September 2004
"FINDING SOME SPIRIT
AMONGST THE MALICE"
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It is not often that the general public gets the chance to step through the august portals of the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art, much less to see a fully professional production therein. All the more reason, then, for hastening to the small but perfectly formed Vanbrugh Theatre to catch this highly enjoyable remounting of Neil Simon's 1984 Tony Award winner.
Biloxi Blues is the second in Simon's "semi-autobiographical" trilogy, so it is no surprise to find a young would-be writer among the conscripts on a train bound for ten weeks' basic army training in Biloxi, Mississippi, in summer 1943. Eugene Morris Jerome is our narrator and guide, and through him we meet the five men who will become his bunkroom mates and uneasy comrades in much adversity.
Simon's accounts of the ritual humiliations suffered by the recruits, the subjugation and brutalisation demanded by the Armed Forces, has the unforgettable tang of lived experience. In Sergeant Merwin J Toomey, the psychotic veteran in charge of turning the unlikely lads into a fighting force, Simon has created a comic monster and a gift of a role. Will Norris seizes it, and the best lines of the evening, with relish. The tempo noticeably stands at ease when Toomey and his unpredictable definitions of justice are absent.
Pepe Balderrama's Eugene is a decent guy in a world gone mad, holding the middle ground between Tom Lawrence's antagonistic intellectual Epstein and Gerard Monaco as the aggressively macho Wykowski. Director Gari Jones presents convincing scenes of spirited bantering underpinned by simmering malice, even if he struggles to maintain momentum during Simon's overlong and too neat conclusion.
In a programme note the show's producers described the 1,367-mile sponsored walk they undertook to raise funds. This fine result is surely worth the blisters.
Fiona Mountford
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ROGUES & VAGABONDS - 7 September 2004
Biloxi Blues
Jerwood Vanbrugh Theatre
At RADA
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Biloxi Blues, Neil Simon's bitter evocation of the American nightmare - international war - opened triumphantly at the Jerwood Vanbrugh Theatre, London, last night.
It is 1943, and Simon's semi- or even completely autobiographical account of his training during the Second World War is captured as completely and as frighteningly as a Picture News propaganda photo or a Pathé News movie promo. Gari Jones has directed the play with such integrity, such panache, that this fine piece of theatre blurs the generic boundaries between comedy, tragedy, farce and documentary, and the attention to period detail as fresh as any fly-on-the-wall journalism.
This is a young play full of young actors addressing an issue that touches the hearts and minds of all ages. Every character is utterly believable and impeccably reproduced by a faultless cast of obviously dedicated professionals. Each individual is a microcosmic reproduction of an entire life so far. Sometimes, when I hear the term 'ensemble acting' it has the same effect as biting into a Kitkat with the foil intact. For the regimented dehumanization of these young recruits, Biloxi Blues utilizes ensemble acting to great effect. For ensemble read a balanced production in which each individual performance adds to the overall effect in equal measure.
Chris Evans's design is skeletal, and perfectly suited to the action of the play. Several scenes and sub-scenes can be discerned at any one time. The sets are dressed by the actors with military precision and timing, a balletic martial dance of bunks and boxes. One such balletic martial dance is like the Edinburgh Military Tattoo meets The Full Monty, when the recruits perform a strip into fatigues so perfectly in unison it warrants its own curtain call.
Biloxi Blues has to be the hottest and most innovative ticket in town. It is a pleasure to support such young talented actors. These are the stars of the future; catch them in the ascendant at the Jerwood Vanbrugh.
Kevin Quarmby © 2004 |
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Ham and High - 17 September 2004
"This is not a play to feel blue about"
Biloxi Blues
Jerwood Vanbrugh Theatre
At RADA
*****
A five-star review does not mean that a production has reached some zenith of theatrical perfection.
This revival of Neil Simon's engaging Second World War comedy is not flawless - the American accents sometimes go astray and the ingenious choreography is not always executed with the sharpest precision.
But Biloxi Blues is a real treat of crisp direction, imaginative design and well-pitched acting.
Pepe Balderrama is hugely enjoyable as Eugene Morris Jerome, leading us through his adventures as a raw GI on basic training deep in Mississippi.
Gerard Monaco's brutish Joseph Wykowski is a study in misplaced pride and pent-up aggression, while Tom Lawrence excels as the nebbish Arnold Epstein.
Neil Simon's gags are still fresh, the emotionally charged scenes pull up short of sentimentality and the classy stagecraft is thought through for the whole two and three quarter hours.
Will Norris and Alastair Sims scraped together the £29,000 needed to put on Biloxi Blues by doing a sponsored walk from John O'Groats to Land's End.
And every step of the way was worth it, not least because it means we are allowed a peek at RADA's sparkling Jerwood Vanbrugh theatre, which would be a welcome regular addition to London's professional theatre scene.
Biloxi Blues may just be that rare beast - a play that's worth the price of the ticket. |
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