St Carmen of the Main

Visually stunning production is not enough to overcome a weak play. If I were not already a fan of Michel Tremblay, this play would not encourage me to become one.
The story is sparse - Carmen comes back from the States and wants to sing new songs about the lives of her firends - the hookers and junkies who inhabit the Main. The boss and boyfriend says no - she has to sing the old stuff. When she refuses, she is killed.
If the play is an allegory about Quebec and the cultural domination by the Anglos, it is merely very dated. And if the denizens of the Main represent Quebecers, they should feel insulted.
The use of the chorus allows the director (Peter Hinton) to pretend that this is a Greek trageedy, but I think it isn only fair to say that Tremblay was influened by Greek tragedy - he certainly did not write one here. Hinton has had great success directing real Greek tragedies, so this is a surprising lapse.
In spite of my complaints, there were strong performances by Diane D'Aquila as Harelip, Jean Leclerc as Maurice, Robert Persichini as Sandra and Karen Robinson as Rose Beef. JOey Tremblay as Toothpick was an odd menacing figure throughout the play, but came into his own for his big speech explaining the "story " of Carmen's death.
Laara Sadiq was the weakest of the principal characters, but she was not helped by her costume and wig, both of which were extremely distracting.

Ruined

Lynn Nottage won the Pulitzer prize for this play, largely I suspect because of the power of the material and the opportunity it provides for great actors to demonstrate their talents. The play still needs work - it is longer than it needs to be and has at least one scene that is unnecessary. Playing with the parott adds mothing - Kill the Parrot!
But this production was excellent- a very powerful cast kept the audience fully engaged. Yanna McIntosh as Mama Nadi was brilliant. She did not miss a step and managed to be tough, funny, sarcastic and vulnerable and always totally believable.
the rest of the cast were also strong. Sterling Jarvis as Christian was a perfect foil for McIntosh. Sophia Walker as Sophia gave a literally show stopping performance - her speech about what happened to her and her baby was so powerful and so powerfully delivered that the audience clapped spontaneously - probably because the only possible other reaction was to burst into tears.

King Lear

Another in the series of live Broadcasts by the National Theatre - this one from the Donmar - a 250 seat theatre in Covent Garden.
This was an excellent production - in large part because the setting was completely stark and bare. The focus was on the words and the movement and it worked really well. The pacing was fast, with people coming on and off from at least three points. As the only thing that had to change from one scene to the next was your mind, it enabled a potentially tedious play to maintain the pace without losing any of the words or the plot.
Derek Jacobi was outstanding as Lear - probably the best I have seen. He raged, he pranced, he cried, he shouted and he collapsed into madness.
Gina McKee as Goneril outdid Justine Mitchell as Regan in sheer evil. The sisters start out impatient with an aged, petulant parent and descend into his inheritors - wanting to have it all on their own terms with no regard for the law or morality. Pippa Bennet-Warner as Cordelia was good and true and very believable.
Gwilym Lee as Edgar and Alec Newman as Edmund are worth watching out for.

The Misanthrope

A new take on an old play. This updated version of the Moliere classic, by Martin Crimp, brings the language and the setting into modern times. The setting is fantastic - all white and shocking pink.
The cast were all good, in particular Andrea Runge as Jennifer, Michele Giroux as Ellen and Stuart Hughes as Alceste.
The play is funny, but thinking it over afterwards I came to the conclusion that it is not a very good play. The final renunciation of her lover by Jennifer is not unexpected - what does not ring true is his expectation that she will actually give up her whole life and run off to the country with him. the sartire ignores psychology, so the characters do not seem at all real, to the detriment of the play.
It will be interesting to compare with the upcoming production at Stratford, which judging by the promotional photos will be much more traditional, at least in costumes and setting.