one4review | On 23, Aug 2014

Kindred Spirits – 1*

The blurb is quite promising with lots of good words promising good things. However this is an overly-long confusing mish-mash of very amateur theatre which was quite uncomfortable to watch.

The storyline is slightly surreal and confusing with no real explanations of why the characters are doing what they’re doing. There are a multitude of costume changes but with glaring faults – e.g. army uniforms with the flies and pockets unbuttoned and with trainers on!

The cast are all miced (good) but they usually didn’t work or crackled (obviously bad). When they did work they were still too quiet under the overly-load backing tracks. The tracks had a lot of ensemble singing on it which did lift the big numbers but a lot of the time it was just too loud to make out the words. The two main actors did have good voices but were wasted on this material. Overall the acting was cringingly bad – the only upside was excellent choreography although sometimes it did seem a bit out of place.

The direction could have given us better clarity of scenes (and quicker scene changes), period changes etc. rather than reusing the same items quite so obviously. I would also rather see a more condensed version with fuller character development and a dramaturg to go through the script.

This has potential but it needs looked at honestly and with a fresh eye.

Reviewed by Alan.

Paradise in Augustine’s
2215-2345

Also at theSpace @ Surgeons Hall, 1545-1715.