Comedians - 27 October
A small group of Whatsonstage.com theatregoers made their way to Hammersmith last night for Sean Holmes’ first production as artistic director of the Lyric Hammersmith. Choosing to revive Trevor Griffith’s 1975 classic Comedians Holmes’ directed a stellar cast in a really entertaining evening of theatre.
A play in three acts, Comedians asks big questions about what it is to be funny, what is at the heart of the comedian’s art and how to push the boundaries of that art. Matthew Kelly plays Eddie Waters the retired comic training the six aspiring comedians while David Dawson does justice to the role of Gethin Price the one comic most willing to question the established norms. Reese Shearsmith, Mark Benton, Simon Kunz, Billy Carter and Michael Dylan as the other aspiring comics are all funny and touching by turns and play their specifc characters with striking honesty. Keith Allen as the formidable talent scout plays the cynic with style and is a fantastic counter to Matthew Kelly’s ideas of comedy as truth.
Having enjoyed this amusing and thought provoking play we were treated to a really interesting Q&A with almost the entire cast! They all told us about working in such good company as well as their own reasons for wanting to be involved in this revival. Highlights from this Q&A along with a podcast of the event will go up on the news site shortly and are definitely worth a look.
Please do feel free to email your comments and thoughts about the play, as well as any photos you have of the event and the evening through to feedback@whatsonstage.com, we love to hear from you.
Thanks for joining us for this event, and do check the homepage to keep up to date on all of our upcoming Outings.
Laura Norman
Club Manager