• Advertise
  • Request Review
  • Write for Us
  • Privacy
  • Login

Theatre Bubble

The UK Theatre Network

Privacy & Cookies: This site uses cookies. By continuing to use this website, you agree to their use.
To find out more, including how to control cookies, see here: Cookie Policy
  • Reviews
  • News
  • Features
  • Spotlight
  • Opinions
  • Interviews
  • Guides
  • Ed Fringe

These are your lives- The Yard Theatre

September 20, 2014 by Verity Healey Leave a Comment

Review of: These are your lives
Price:
£12.50/ £10

Reviewed by: Verity Healey
Rating:
3
On September 20, 2014
Last modified:September 28, 2014

Summary:

Geste Records, their performers and six chorus members are to be congratulated for a carefully controlled and detailed piece

More Details

‘It’s a different experience, it flows in a different way’ a character proclaims ¾ of the way through These Are Your Lives, a dance, physical theatre and performance piece which offers not just a deconstruction of the- it must be said- imagined world of a celebrity- but of one celebrity in particular, film star Tom Cruise.

t

Going through the motions, photo Rob Logan

Verbatim scripts, sound bites, interviews in hotel rooms and excerpts from his most well known films, are chopped up, mish-mashed together, replayed rewound and replicated by the main actor Jack Johns, who plays himself playing Cruise as he totters from chat show to chat show, with the exaggerated air of a man continually on the fake. At one point Cruise is accused of smiling too much and he answers- with a smile. On an ordinary level what’s wrong with that? Most folk barely smile.. but as this is the world of celebritism it has to be assumed that it is fake, and more so in Cruise’ case, because, as we are led to believe, he can’t resist the draw and pain of the spotlight.

It’s a clever, if repetitive look at the nature of truth. Every tilt of the head, point of the finger, spreading of the legs, is carefully replicated, mocked and shown as false [we are all body language readers in this day and age- but perhaps we are all so busy looking for disingenuousness that we often miss authenticity]. And we are made to believe that there might be more spontaneity in the actors’ attempts to mirror scenes from Cruise’s films, than in Cruise’s own carefully choreographed interview appearances.

But the piece raises an important question surrounding complicity. I found myself objecting to the almost clichéd portrayal of the public man in his more private moments- it can only have validity if it is a comment on how the media and the public wish to perceive a celebrity [vacuous, hollow we are led to believe] due to a lack of imagination and perhaps unconscious revenge for what we imagine to be a lavish life style [depending on your value system] and how complicit we are in that false belief, which then for the believers, becomes the perceived reality, whether it is or not. And many other hinted at complex meanings are lost in long drawn out movement sequences that only seem a repetition of scenes before- for example, the interplay between the fantasy of the films’ narratives and the actor’s real life. However Geste Records, their performers and six chorus members are to be congratulated for a carefully controlled and detailed piece.

Comparisons with the surreal world of David Lynch have already been made but I’d like to mention Be Kind, Rewind.. not least because I felt I’d like the piece to be a little bit kinder towards its main subject- after all, we make the truth. It is also not totally clear how much ‘inside the picture’ or this complicit world we all are. The assumption is that with fame comes a destruction of a person’s individuality and the rampant personal pain that comes with that, based on the persona Tom Cruise may or may not project in public. Stripped down, this is really about what it means to be an authentic individual who has the courage- or not- to share his own light and truth with the world. But how truthfully the world is able to perceive that individual will be dictated by its particular spiritual perceptions of the time.

It certainly is ‘a different experience’ but I am not sure about any truthfulness it can bear to any inner experience Tom Cruise has of his life. It is about agony and artifice but even in these things, there’s the truth of the man to be found somewhere. Perhaps this is the point.

These are your lives continues at The Yard Theatre until 4th October

book here for tickets

Produced by

Geste Records

Directed by

Alexander Rennie

Written by

Alexander Rennie

Cast Includes

Brian Gillespie, Jack Johns, Ottillie Parfitt, Lilian Schiffer

Choir

Elisa Kiki Adams, Esther Dee, Elly Hopkins, Katy Robinson, Clare Treacey

Verity Healey

Author: Verity Healey

I write about theatre, I write short stories/ poetry www.verityhealey.blogspot.com, I also sometimes make films.

Filed Under: Review Tagged With: celebritism, Geste Records, The Yard Theatre, These are your lives, Tom Cruise

Join the discussion Cancel reply

NEWS / Living Record Festival of digital arts announces programme

Living Record Festival is a month-long Digital Arts Festival curating and presenting over 40 original pieces from a range of [Read More]

INTERVIEW / Open Bar on A ChristMESS CAROL

Tell us about Open Bar Theatre and also how you came about and how the name came about. OBT: Open Bar [Read More]

NEWS / Ayomide Adegun awarded The Luke Westlake Scholarship 2020

22 year old South Londoner Ayomide Adegun is currently in his 2nd year of the BA Acting course at Royal [Read More]

NEWS / Late Night Staring at High Res Pixels announced

A new play repurposed for online viewing from the creative team behind Scrounger, and the first of the Finborough Theatre’s [Read More]

NEWS / Crimes Against Christmas becomes an audio advent calendar

Typically at this time of year theatre company New Old Friends would have just finished an Autumn tour and be [Read More]

Top Posts & Pages

  • 10 Tips to Help You Prepare for Your Reality TV Auditions
  • Katy Owen: Auditioning for Oxford School of Drama
  • 5 Stage Elements to Consider for a Rousing Theatrical Production
  • How to Applying for Arts Grants and Funding
  • EdFringe 2017 - SiX The Musical at Sweet Grassmarket
  • Boudica at Shakespeare's Globe
  • Crowdfunding In Theatre - An Overview
  • Katy Owen: LAMDA Audition (First Round)
  • Interview with Alan Flanagan, writer-performer of Bingo
  • Short-List Announced for Mimetic Commission Award
  • Verity Healey

    Verity Healey
    Author

  • September 20th, 2014
  • comment iconNo Comments
  • FacebookTweetLinkedInEmail

    Newsletter

    Enjoyed what you've read? Get even more great content directly to your inbox - Completely Free

    About Theatre Bubble

    Theatre Bubble is the news, review and blogging site created by Blue Pie Media and run by a dedicated team of outstanding editors and writers: we're always looking for new contributors - to find out more click here.

    Contact Us

    News: news@theatrebubble.com
    Reviews: reviews@theatrebubble.com
    Website: webmaster@theatrebubble.com

    Privacy Policy

    Copyright © 2021 · Blue Pie Media

    Share this ArticleLike this article? Email it to a friend!

    Email sent!