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Over at my other place, or one of them, I broke news back in October about one of the strangest hits of the Parisian stage.
I wrote at Salut! Sunderland about the play that was taking the City of Romance and Light by storm.
That may have been a slight exaggeration. But I have heard nothing but good from critics and theatre-goers alike about Sunderland the play.
And soon I will be able to judge for myself. The tickets have been organised, travel is booked and at the end of the month four of us will take our places at the Petit Théâtre de Paris to see a French take on the old theme of It's Grim Oop North. This is how I summed it up at Salut! Sunderland in a piece that had Fleet Street, the BBC and other scurrying to catch up:
It sounds as if it might be something Molière would have come up with if given some old Likely Lads scripts and asked to portray life in a northern English town dominated by rain, factory closures, bird flu (bit out of date there, mind) … and the shortcomings of the football team.
A comedy à l’anglaise where emotion and laughter constantly intermingle, according to the blurb.
The play was written by a Frenchman, Clément Koch, who formed some affection for Sunderland and the North East generally while studying at Durham University.
Clément turns out to play guitar and prefers ice hockey and tennis to football; in exchanges we have had, he hints at having once followed the fortunes of Sunderland AFC but says he has been put off football quite comprehensively by such events as the French national team's disgraceful mutiny during the World Cup in South Africa.
Here are a couple of comments from theatre-goers that I have come across:
* “A lovely piece of theatre between emotion, belly laughs and love, carried off by a uniformly strong cast. No overacting and we are drawn into the story as in a film.”
* “Loved it, a beautiful production that really makes you believe you’re in the north of England. Very well written, lots of emotion and tenderness and sometimes some laughter. Excellent actors. We had a great time.”
Someone from L’Express confused football and rugby, suggesting that life in Sunderland revolved round that game played with an egg-shaped ball.
But she (I think I am right in recalling the critic as female) loved Koch's ability to produce brilliant comedy from characters including a woman bringing up her autistic younger sister after the child’s mother hangs herself, a lovestruck, spurned male friend and a flatmate who earns a living spouting telephone porn.
As the icing on the cake, there two also gays in search of the uterus, which sounds more Durham Uni than Stadium of Light. “With all that, and the lovely presence of Elodie Navarre," trilled L'Express, "the director Stéphane Hillel sweep us off our feet. Bravo!”
I shall report on my own impressions in due course ...
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