Max Jones is one of the most exciting graduates to emerge from the Theatre Design course at The Royal Welsh College of Music and Drama, which has been transformed under the guidance of Sean Crowley and his team to become one of the very best places to study in the whole of the UK. Max caught my attention with the flair and bravura of his graduate showcase designs back in 2001 and has worked with me on several productions since. With this year’s RWCMD graduates Theatre Design exhibition from June 5th -11th at the college itself and at Soho Theatre from June 26th – 28th, it will be interesting to see who is going to be following in the footsteps of the likes of Hayley Grindle, Rhys Jarman, Sophie Mosberger, Tom Scutt, Colin Richmond and Adam Wiltshire - all of whom, like Max, have been making exciting progress.
Max has established a good relationship with Clwyd Theatr Cymru also, working with both Tim Baker and Phillip Breen. So it was worth the trip to see how subtly and imaginatively Max had transformed the Emlyn Williams Studio at Clwyd for Phillip Breen’s recent production of Measure For Measure. The seating had been re-configured to a thrust setting and this lent a welcome intimacy to the performance, which was located in a fin-de-siecle Vienna of the late nineteenth century. Unless you knew the space, you might have been hard pressed to realise that Max had created a wholly new arched back wall, housing a beautiful, circular stained glass window, not unlike this…
Its central, dominating position lent underlying symbolism to the exploration of mercy and justice in the play, which I found unexpectedly moving. The subterranean jailhouse, situated directly and hellishly beneath, was also a nice touch.
Having seen the Complicite production at The RNT some years ago, I must say that I found Phillip Breen’s production had a deeply engaging clarity and coherence, whereas Simon McBurney’s production had been full of self-conscious artifice and distance. While McBurney, casting himself as Duke Vincentio, played the final scene in that production as a press conference into a microphone, Breen’s take on it offered greater rewards. Presaging the miraculous reconciliation of Shakespeare’s later play The Winter’s Tale, it quelled scepticism at its ending through the emotional charge of its playing and the accumulated impact of the storytelling.
Despite a deeply intelligent performance from Leila Crerar as Isabella, for once the powerful Isabella/Angelo storyline did not overpower the slightly problematic role of the Duke, which I was delighted to see my old friend David Fielder giving full value to. Indeed, there was strong work throughout the company with contributions from CTC regulars Steven Elliott, Brendan Charleson, Louise Collins, Richard Elis and others. The costumes, as one might expect from a company run by Terry Hands, were beautifully detailed and appropriate.
Some days later, Marc Rees and I had a chat and a drink in the late afternoon sun at Chapter. Marc has been invited by Volcano to be a guest director on a series of performances called Unknown Pleasures. Marc has chosen to develop a piece inspired by that great Swansea landmark The Palace Theatre, which is now, sadly, disused and dilapidated.
A Grade II listed building, The Palace is one of the first things you can see as you exit Swansea railway station (on the right hand side) and began its life as a music hall where the likes of Charlie Chaplin, Lily Langtry and Marie Lloyd performed. In the post-war years, it housed a short-lived repertory company that gave a debut to Anthony Hopkins and, later on, it became a bingo hall and then an iconic gay nightclub. Unfortunately, the building has struggled to find a use since it was sold in 2002.
Marc has been researching the history of the Palace and has even had access to a recent feasability study for its use a music venue. With the distinctive wedge-shaped building in danger of falling down, however, Marc is convinced that its most likely destination is to be converted into a block of flats, which I find incredibly sad.
Marc has also been interviewing people who have worked in the building, including a lovely old amateur actor called Kerry Wilcox (now aged 80) that I performed with at the Swansea Little Theatre when I was seventeen, and Keith Millward, who produced Sondheim’s Follies in the building when it was in a slightly better state of repair than it is now. There’s a wonderful symmetry about the idea of performing Follies at the Palace, rather than in a West End theatre, pretending to be crumbling and abandoned. Unfortunately, Marc’s show cannot take place at the Palace itself because it’s too far gone, but can be seen at The Taliesin Arts Centre on May 29th.
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