#Bijan Sheibani

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A Los Angeles Theatre Review: 'The Brothers Size'

With The Brothers Size now performing at the Geffen Playhouse, this production kicks off the inaugural season of Geffen Playhouse Artistic Director Tarell Alvin McCraney whose play (that he also wrote) currently celebrates its 20th anniversary in the intimate Audrey Skirball Kenis Theater. Directed by Bijan Sheibani and with a strong tight ensemble cast that provides such a livewire energy which…

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Another shot of Shohreh Aghdashloo as Bernarda Alba in Federico Garcia Lorca's The House of Bernarda Alba directed by Bijan Sheibani at the Almeida Theatre in London, 2012.

[picolin]

The Cord

Written and dir. by Bijan Sheibani

2024年4月20日 Bush

演出家のビジャン・シェイバニの作品。若いカップル、アッシュとアニャの間に息子が生まれる。初めての子育てのストレスの中、アッシュはパートナーとその両親、ひいては自分自身の母親との関係を改めて見つめ直すことになる。

サマル・ブラックの美術。何もない無地の絨毯張りの囲い舞台の四方に椅子が置かれ、3人のキャストとチェリスト（コリン・アレキサンダー）が座る。キャストは裸足で舞台の上で演じ、また進行にともなって座る位置を変えていく。物語のトーンに寄り添うように色彩を変えるオリヴァー・フェニックの照明が美しい。

ステージングは大変に繊細でよいのだが、乳児の世話でただでさえ気が立っているカップルとお互いの両親に対する微妙な感情が一度爆発したあとは、ほぼ延々と3人が言い合う展開になってしまい、80分と短い作品ながら正直飽きてきてしまう。お互いの感情のわだかまりをそれぞれうまく説明することもできず、ぎりぎりまでお互いの期待と不満を相手にぶつけるのは実生活では普通のことなのだが、フィクションとして見せるにはもうひと工夫ないとちょっと厳しい。

[operarocks]

Who needs to be inspired today? http://www.crowdfunder.co.uk/loveopera (you could also be one of the ones doing the inspiring if you contribute!!!)

[pop-sesivo]

Groove is in the Heart. Escrita por Robin French y dirigida por Bijan Sheibani. Con Tobias Menzies y Ruby Ashbourne Serkis (vía The Guardian).

A tale of music and memory is unspooled through a schoolgirl's mixtape. Ruby Ashbourne Serkis and Tobias Menzies star in a microplay written by Robin French and directed by Bijan Sheibani, after a conversation with John Harris. Groove is in the Heart is the latest in a series of collaborations between the Royal Court and the Guardian.

[lovesicklobotomy]

Unicorn Theatre has revealed a new online production of Grimm's Tales, similar in form to the recent production of The Twits.

Each of the tales will be directed by a different artist, with individual actors taking on individual passages from Philip Pullman's version of the classic pieces.

The series will be filmed on the Unicorn Theatre's stage, with special graphics and effects added. On the creative team are designer Charlotte Espiner, composer and sound designer Jon McLeod, director of photography Phil Cooper and editors Todd MacDonald and Joe Young.

The show is streaming from 5 October to 21 February 2021 on the Unicorn's YouTube channel.

Appearing in the productions will be:

Justin Audibert directs Nadia Albina reading Hansel and Gretel Rachel Bagshaw with Le Gateau Chocolat reading Rumpelstiltskin Polly Findlay directs Colin Morgan reading The Devil With the Three Golden Hairs Tristan Fynn-Aiduenu directs Andy Umerah reading The Boy Who Left Home to Find Out About the Shivers Ola Ince directs Susan Wokoma reading The Brave Little Tailor Bijan Sheibani directs Cecilia Noble reading Cinderella

The venue will also re-release its hit production of Anansi the Spider Re-Spun to mark Black History Month, with the hit show available from 1 to 31 October on YouTube.

[brolinskeep]

Unicorn Theatre has revealed a new online production of Grimm's Tales, similar in form to the recent production of The Twits.

Each of the tales will be directed by a different artist, with individual actors taking on individual passages from Philip Pullman's version of the classic pieces.

The series will be filmed on the Unicorn Theatre's stage, with special graphics and effects added. On the creative team are designer Charlotte Espiner, composer and sound designer Jon McLeod, director of photography Phil Cooper and editors Todd MacDonald and Joe Young.

The show is streaming from 5 October to 21 February 2021 on the Unicorn's YouTube channel.

Appearing in the productions will be:

Justin Audibert directs Nadia Albina reading Hansel and Gretel

Rachel Bagshaw with Le Gateau Chocolat reading Rumpelstiltskin

Polly Findlay directs Colin Morgan reading The Devil With the Three Golden Hairs

Tristan Fynn-Aiduenu directs Andy Umerah reading The Boy Who Left Home to Find Out About the Shivers

Ola Ince directs Susan Wokoma reading The Brave Little Tailor

Bijan Sheibani directs Cecilia Noble reading Cinderella

[reviewsphere]

Barber Shop Chronicles @ Lyceum

THEATRE REVIEW: Barber Shop Chronicles @ Lyceum ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ @lyceumtheatre @FuelTheatre @LeedsPlayhouse @BarberShopChron @InuaEllams

The London and African barber shops frequented by the self-proclaimed strong black men in Inua Ellams’ hit play Barber Shop Chronicles, currently touring the UK in a joint production between Fuel, National Theatre and Leeds Playhouse, serve a similar social function to the dying and often derided working men’s pubs of Scotland.

They are both, as Ellams rightly notes in the programme, “sacred…

[centrestagereviews]

Casting for The Brothers Size

Casting has been announced for Tarell Alvin McCraney’s The Brothers Size at the Young Vic.

The production will be directed by Bijan Sheibani and will be lead by Sope Dirisu in the role of Ogun. He will be joined by Jonathan Ajayi as Oshoosi and Anthony Welsh who will play Elegba (a role which he previously played in 2008). 

The Brothers Size follows the story of two brothers who are reunited after various spells in prison.

The Brothers Size will begin previews at The Young Vic from the 19th of January with an official opening night on the 26th of January. The final performance will take place on the 14th of February. For more information or to book tickets head to the official Young Vic website.

Image courtesy of Google Images.

[curvecfd]

AN AMAZING CULTURAL EXPERIENCE: “Following two sell-out runs at the National Theatre and a world tour, Inua Ellams' acclaimed Barber Shop Chronicles comes to The REP.  • Newsroom, political platform, local hotspot, confession box, preacher-pulpit and football stadium. For generations, African men have gathered in barber shops to discuss the world. These are places where the banter can be barbed and the truth is always telling.  • Directed by Olivier award-winning director Bijan Sheibani and designed by Rae Smith (War Horse), Barber Shop Chronicles is a heart-warming, hilarious and insightful new play that leaps from a barber shop in Peckham to Johannesburg, Harare, Kampala, Lagos and Accra over the course of a single day.”  • #illustration #graphicdesign #photography #websitedesign #typography #calligraphy #videography #print #branding #curvecfd #barbershopchronicles #culture #african #caribbean #barbershop #hair #conversation #theatre #therep #birmingham (at Birmingham Repertory Theatre) https://www.instagram.com/p/B27je1BA4Fn/?igshid=1op19tyaxhszp

[afroklectic]

For African men the world over, the barber shop is more than a place to get a shave and a haircut. It’s a place to hear news, share views and talk politics, women and sport. It’s a place where a man can let down his guard, blow off steam, and leave looking sharp and feeling reinvigorated. The Nigerian-born, UK-based poet, designer and playwright Inua Ellams imagines these buzzing spaces on stage in a fresh, funny, truth-telling play, direct from the National Theatre in London.

The audience visits barber shops in London, Harare, Kampala, Lagos, Accra and Johannesburg to eavesdrop on individual problems, common obsessions, the complex legacies of colonialism and jokes without borders. This acclaimed production, directed by Bijan Sheibani and showcasing some of the finest acting talent in Britain, comes to Sydney direct from a successful UK run. VENUE SEYMOUR CENTRE YORK THEATRE CNR CLEVELAND STREET AND CITY ROAD CHIPPENDALE 2008 WHEN 18, 19, 23, 25, 26 JANUARY AT 8PM 20 & 27 JANUARY AT 2PM & 8PM 21 & 28 JANUARY AT 5PM (SMH Q&A ON 21 JANUARY AT 7PM) 24 JANUARY AT 1PM & 8PM BOOK TICKETS >>

[biofunmy]

Feuding Families Take Center Stage

LONDON — Family life doesn’t have much going for it in “The Duchess of Malfi,” the blood bath of a play from John Webster in which corpses are piled high by a conclusion that is merciless even by 17th-century standards.

Centering around an ill-fated Italian noblewoman and her two venomous brothers, this favorite of the London stage has resurfaced in a sleek, stylish production from the director Rebecca Frecknall, at the Almeida Theater through Jan. 25.

Frecknall made her name on this stage with a highly abstract production of “Summer and Smoke” in 2018 that made its way to the West End. The similarly stripped-back, installation-art feel to her latest production is of a piece with the Almeida’s Continental aesthetic, as filtered through such English directors as Robert Icke, a former Almeida artistic associate.

Much of Chloe Lamford’s set — itself ready for display in Tate Modern — is given over to a glass box that makes the characters into human specimens on display. Microphones appear on cue, and chapter headings let us know where we are in Webster’s labyrinthine narrative.

The characters tumble toward the abyss, as Lydia Wilson’s transgression-prone Duchess lingers in view of the audience even after Webster’s text has relegated her to oblivion: The onstage structure becomes a transparent mausoleum whose inhabitants won’t be so easily dispatched.

And so the play’s women become silent witnesses from beyond the grave to the bloodshed of the men, who behave like beasts. (One of them — Jack Riddiford’s Ferdinand, the more outwardly crazed of the brothers — starts thinking he’s a wolf.) It’s a play that honors its author’s near-contemporary, Shakespeare, while mining even further depths of depravity.

Politics, and not (thank heavens) the threat of spilled blood, weigh heavily on a father and his daughter in “Snowflake,” the Mike Bartlett play at the Kiln Theater through Jan. 25. The timing means that Clare Lizzimore’s lit fuse of a production will finish just a week before Britain is set to leave the European Union, as Brexit, after many delays, finally takes place.

Andy (Elliot Levey), the 48-year-old widower and father who gets the entire first act to himself, is pro-Leave, though he’s far more concerned about reconnecting with his estranged daughter than with matters of state, at least at first. That explains his jittery anticipation as he paces a church hall in the run-up to Christmas, in the hope that the child he hasn’t seen in three years will make a festive-season appearance to her still-devoted father. (Her affection for him, we quickly realize, is more ambivalent.)

After the intermission, Bartlett brings into the fray the errant Maya (a spiky Ellen Robertson). Her conciliation-minded girlfriend, Natalie (Amber James), arrives first so as to smooth the way for the set-to that follows. Maya, it comes as no surprise to discover, isn’t just emphatically pro-Remain but views Andy as a relic from a bygone era: a man whose enthusiasm for James Bond and “The X Files” consigns him to an uncritical past that the culturally hyper-aware Maya wants no part of. “The X Files,” to her, is merely “two white people scared of aliens.”

Bartlett has explored such competing mind-sets before, in the richer, more nuanced “Albion,” which will return to the Almeida next month. By comparison, “Snowflake” seems slight: an exercise in theater-as-showdown, but one that, to its credit, values both points of view.

Bartlett’s neat title refers to the wintry conditions of the holiday season when the play is set, as well as to those overly emotive, fragile members of the younger generation to which Maya and Natalie belong. And Levey, a reliable ensemble player too rarely given such a hefty part, tears into the play’s lead role as the well-meaning parent who can’t budge a child’s implacable resolve.

Can these two find a shared way forward, and will the divided country they inhabit? Bartlett suggests only that identity politics alone won’t take you very far. Within families, love is helpful, too.

That’s assuming, of course, that you know who your family is. The revelation of an unknown family member signals the provocative starting point of “The Arrival,” at the Bush Theater through Jan 18. This 70-minute two-hander is the bristling playwriting debut of Bijan Sheibani, the well-established theater director whose National Theater production of “Barber Shop Chronicles” traveled to New York last month, and who doubles as his own keen-eyed director here.

Set on an unadorned, circular stage that suggests a gladiatorial ring, the play introduces two British Iranian brothers, five years apart in age, who meet for the first time. Tom (Scott Karim), 35, the older, was put up for adoption before Samad (Irfan Shamji) was born.

Greetings have barely been exchanged before the brothers make clear their differences: Samad is more expensively educated and bookish, while the leaner, more impulsive Tom gives off an energy that Samad can’t match.

Told across 16 scenes, the last of which pushes events forward several years, the play has the feel of an uneasy mating dance.

Both performers are terrific. Shamji’s eyes hint at a reserve not easily cracked, while Karim’s volatility keeps pace with a restless sound design from Gareth Fry that suggests an amplified heartbeat. In the end, their arrival in each other’s lives merely leads to a further departure. The two may share DNA, but any emotional bond remains poignantly out of reach.

The Duchess of Malfi. Directed by Rebecca Frecknall. Almeida Theater, through Jan. 25. Snowflake. Directed by Clare Lizzimore. Kiln Theater, through Jan. 25. The Arrival. Directed by Bijan Sheibani. Bush Theater, through Jan 18.

Sahred From Source link Arts

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Shohreh Aghdashloo as Bernarda Alba in Federico Garcia Lorca's The House of Bernarda Alba directed by Bijan Sheibani at the Almeida Theatre in London, 2012.

(Photo by Robbie Jack)

[picolin]

Till The Stars Come Down

by Beth Steel

dir. Bijan Sheibani

2024年2月3日 NT Dorfman

ミッドランズ東部のマンスフィールドで、労働者階級の3姉妹とその家族を通して21Cの元炭鉱町の空気を伝える新作。『Barbershop Chronicles』も手がけたビジャン・シェイバニ演出。

Samal Blakによる芝生が敷かれた小さめの囲み舞台の真ん中は回転舞台となっている。家具等は場の転換時にキャストが運んでくる。ミラーボールを効果的に使ったパウレ・コンスタブルの照明や、遠くからディスコサウンドが聞こえてくるギャレス・フライの音響は全編物語に寄り添う。

全体的に流動的で流れるように進む演出とパフォーマンスは素晴らしい。個人的には社会を切り取った観察というにはちょっとソープオペラ的な物語には入り込むことができなかった。特に、ポーランド移民の微妙なキャラ作りとアクセント、姉妹のひとりのハイティーンの娘の類型的な「意識の高さ」と妙な自意識過剰な部分は物語のドライブを促進させるための「他者」キャラクターとしてもあまりにもいい加減な扱いだと思ってしまった。話をアップデートさせたりグラマラスにするためにつまらないキャラを入れないでほしい。

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‘“It feels like there are no barriers”: David Webber and Maynard Eziashi on life in the Barber Shop Chronicles’ by Jenna Mahale

Inua Ellams’ Barber Shop Chronicles is a new kind of theatre. This theatre scoffs at the stuffiness of the old guard. It flings its arms wide open to newer audiences, younger audiences, blacker audiences. Between sound bites of Skepta and J Hus, Barber Shop Chronicles takes us on a whistle-stop tour through Lagos, Nigeria, South Africa, Zimbabwe, Ghana, Uganda, and Peckham; we gain a piercing insight into the inner lives of black men, and the importance of community hubs in shaping them. As such, the production holds a very special place in the hearts of its actors, many of whom are thrilled at the opportunity to explore their culture and identity in a setting as vibrant and lovingly-crafted as the one Bijan Sheibani has created for them.

David Webber and Maynard Eziashi are two such actors. As the gloom of the early evening pushed through the windows, I sat down with them pre-performance in the café of the Roundhouse to talk about their experiences with the show and its strikingly original material.

Tell me a bit about your characters.

David Webber: I play Abram, I play Ohene, and I play Sizwe. Abram is a barber in Ghana, Accra, and he has a really sweet scene with a young man who is about to have a baby. It's one of the quieter, more intimate scenes. Then there’s Ohene, who is very opinionated and sometimes a bit loud. He's a Ghanian again, and he's in the London scenes. I also play Sizwe, who's an older gentleman. He's Zimbabwean, but he has scene in London towards the end. He's a bit nostalgic, always looking back.

Maynard Eziashi: I play three characters. There’s Musa, a Nigerian man from the Hausa tribe, who is a linguist. He's just come back from Mexico, where he's written a dictionary translating Swahili to Spanish. I also play Mensah, who is a Ghanian man who's very interested in football and getting his hair cut. And I also play Andile, who is a South African barber who is fulfilling his role as a kind of therapist to Simphiwe, who comes into his store slightly agitated: it's to do with the relationship that he has with his father.

Do you have any favourites?

Maynard Eziashi: Andile is probably my favourite character. I like the fact he's a very knowledgeable elder gentleman. He listens to people, but he doesn't judge, and hands out little nuggets of advice that people can choose to take or not.

David Webber: It's very hard to pick a favourite. It's like asking, 'Which is your favourite child?' I love them all, I love them equally, but I would say I feel a lot of love for Sizwe. I think the only time he gets to speak to people is when he goes into the barber shop. I find that very poignant.

Lots of critics have praised Barber Shop Chronicles for itsdiscussion black masculinity. Have your conceptions of masculinity changed at all since doing the show?

David Webber:It's not necessarily changed how I see masculinity, but it's maybe reaffirmed some things in a wonderful way. There are 33 black characters on stage, played by 12 of us. I'm really happy that the audience gets to see such a range of African masculinity, and hopefully it will mean people find it more difficult to put us into boxes. I think this show is a good way of looking at our culture and seeing it in a broad and diverse sense.

Maynard Eziashi: Although we're dealing with men's barbers, I think a lot of the topics are universal. They're about identity, they're about belonging, they're about dating! I think those things extend to everyone, really.

Obviously, the ethnic make-up of the cast is quite revolutionary for a show of this size. Tell me a bit about what it’s been like to work in such a large cast of black men.

Maynard Eziashi: One of the things that it's meant is that I no longer have to censor myself, or put myself through a filter. Because we all have a kind of shared experience. So if I come in and say, 'Oh, someone in a shop looked at me funny', people aren't going to turn around and say: 'Were you just imagining that though?' or, 'Are you sure that really happened? Maybe they were just having a bad day!' Instead, there is that understanding. It's wonderful to be in a company where we can share stories and experiences. It feels like there are no barriers.

What was the audition process like?

David Webber: I was called in to meet Bijan [Sheibani], and Inua [Ellams] and the casting director at the time at the National Theatre for a read-through. To be perfectly honest, I can't remember what characters I read. All I remember is that we had a big laugh about barber shops and stories, and how I'd share stories with my barber. I've got a Jamaican barber in Manchester where I'm from, who’s full of stories, and I've had a barber in London for a few years now, called Ninjaman. He'll be cutting your hair and then go off to the bookies in the middle of it, and leave you with half a haircut so you can’t leave. You meet characters like that over the years. We just laughed about our barbershop stories, and it didn't really feel like an audition, it just felt like sharing stories with friends.

How does this role compare to the other characters you’ve played?

Maynard Eziashi: It's probably not so much the role, but this story is quite different from a lot of the other stories that I've helped portray before. It's a story that shows you 33 different characters, none of them stereotypes, and they all have the same hopes, dreams, and fears, as all of us. It kind of shows a normality, but also the breadth of character. Because we often tend to get put in a box where we can only be one sort of person, which tends to be angry, violent, or highly sexual. In other shows I've been in, that breadth hasn't been there. Although the character I've played will have an arc, because you have many characters here, you can show much more.

David Webber: A lot of the things I've seen about black men have focused on quite negative things. And they're sometimes the plays or stories that get highlighted. The plays that are often produced feature black men in crisis, black men leaving their kids, black men stabbing each other, murdering each other, violence, that kind of thing. And that's very sensational, and those shows often make headlines. This show is not about that. I think that's a very powerful thing.

What would you like people to take away from the show?

David Webber:I'd like people to take away the fact that sometimes the differences between the races are actually smaller than the similarities. We have many, many things in common as human beings. I think that's why the show works for everybody. It's a celebration and an affirmation of humanity.

Maynard Eziashi: I suppose I'd like them to walk away, and perhaps question their notions of blackness. To look inside, and think, 'Do I make certain assumptions? Do I judge unfairly? How can I rectify and change that?' That's what I want.

Jenna Mahale is a freelance journalist and editor from London

Twitter: @jennamahale / Contently: https://jennamahale.contently.com/

[theedinburghreporter]

At the Lyceum - Barber Shop Chronicles

At the Lyceum – Barber Shop Chronicles

We all know that there is a lot of banter in barber shops and now a play which journeys from London to Johannesburg, Lagos and Accra confirms that the banter can be barbed and the truth is always telling.

Olivier award winner Bijan Sheibani directs this production of Barber Shop Chronicles which has had two sold out runs at the National Theatre as well as much success on international tour.