School for scandal at the BARBICAN

Last night I yet again chose to make use of my age and got two free tickets to see School of Scandal at the Barbican. I love having my freeB tickets and this time I dragged James along to (in my opinion) the best performance at the Barbican I have seen yet. It was opening night and the new production of Richard Sheridan's classic was flawless. Directed by Deborah Warner the fresh production was wild, vibrant, big and relevant to modern day culture. Whereas you would expect to struggle with a four hour play written for an audience alive in 1777 Deborah converted the visuals and the meaning (although not the script) into "a scorching comedy with contemporary resonance as our own celebrity-obsessed culture collides with the gossip-ridden, high fashion world of eighteenth-century London."
  The acting was outstanding ( I mean really really brilliant) with big names taking leads such as Katherine Parkinson who we all know from her BAFTA award winning role in "The IT crown",  Harry Melling who played Dudley Dursely in "Harry Potter", Leo Bill who starred in Tim Burton's "Alice in Wonderland" and many many more. Every member of the 20 piece cast has an amazing list of credits (no surprise) and all trained at a very high level proving what drama school really can produce. The characterisations were hilarious and I would like to specially mention Gary Sefton and Adam Gillan whose pure physicality in characters was absolutely remarkable, fantastic and utterly hilarious. The energy coming from the cast and translating to the performance was really something else.
  The set, lighting, sound and costume are also really wonderful. Visually the production is completely and utterly gripping. The only hitch was a drunken member of audience dropping something down into the mechanisms under the stage during the interval resulting in a fairly long wait. Stupid old bag!
  After seeing this play my new favourite word is definitely "EGAD" ... I can't wait to use it! My love for acting and drama still remains. My strongest emotion.. however much I enjoyed watching it is still jealousy to the cast. And boy do I still want to be an actress. STOP. I am an actress.

Visit this sight for more http://www.barbican.org.uk/scandal/
AND PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE GET A TICKET!