Latest news with #TheDumbWaiter
IOL News
5 days ago
- Entertainment
- IOL News
Aidan Scott's 'The Dumb Waiter': a directorial debut packed with tension and drama
Director Aidan Scott (centre) with actors Brent Palmer as Ben and Jock Kleynhans as Gus in 'The Dumb Waiter'. Image: Supplied Currently running at the Theatre on the Square, Harold Pinter's 'The Dumb Waiter' is being praised as a masterclass in tension, dark humour and theatrical precision. Performed by Brent Palmer as Ben and Jock Kleynhans as Gus, both hitmen, the play explores Gus's unravelling curiosity and emotional fragility alongside his much more confident senior partner. Director Aidan Scott, who has a wealth of acting experience under his belt, including playing a series regular on Netflix's 'One Piece', recently starred in Louis Viljoen's thrilling two-hander 'Mrs Mitchell Comes to Town' alongside Jenny Stead and in 'La Ronde', directed by Liela Henriques. On taking the director's seat for 'The Dumb Waiter', Scott shared: 'It is the brainchild of a collaboration between myself and Jock Kleynhans, who stars in the show. We felt a gap in the local theatre landscape for classic plays and Harold Pinter's work in particular. 'Unfortunately, plays like 'The Dumb Waiter' are a big risk for commercial theatres to produce, so we sought to independently produce the production together. 'We knew it was a risk, but audiences came and we sold out our run in Cape Town and are now working with Daphne Kuhn in our second rendition of the play in Johannesburg. This is the first time I have directed, and it's been an absolute joy.' As for the casting of Palmer and Kleynhans, he added, 'The idea to do this particular piece really originated from picturing these two actors together on stage. 'I couldn't imagine two other actors in the country playing these two respective parts, and when they both said yes, I knew I had the key to unlocking this strange puzzle of a text.' Video Player is loading. Play Video Play Unmute Current Time 0:00 / Duration -:- Loaded : 0% Stream Type LIVE Seek to live, currently behind live LIVE Remaining Time - 0:00 This is a modal window. Beginning of dialog window. Escape will cancel and close the window. Text Color White Black Red Green Blue Yellow Magenta Cyan Transparency Opaque Semi-Transparent Background Color Black White Red Green Blue Yellow Magenta Cyan Transparency Opaque Semi-Transparent Transparent Window Color Black White Red Green Blue Yellow Magenta Cyan Transparency Transparent Semi-Transparent Opaque Font Size 50% 75% 100% 125% 150% 175% 200% 300% 400% Text Edge Style None Raised Depressed Uniform Dropshadow Font Family Proportional Sans-Serif Monospace Sans-Serif Proportional Serif Monospace Serif Casual Script Small Caps Reset restore all settings to the default values Done Close Modal Dialog End of dialog window. Advertisement Next Stay Close ✕ Ad loading Actors Brent Palmer as Ben and Jock Kleynhans as Gus in 'The Dumb Waiter'. Image: Philip Kuhn On realising his vision with this offering, Scott pointed out: 'You come into a process with an idea of how the play looks, feels and sounds. And you then take that ball of thoughts and springboard it off your actors, which then morphs and emerges as a new vision. A collaborative vision. 'As a director, being open to that collaborative process is key. Retaining your voice but also allowing the voices of the team to mesh with yours brings about an end product you could never have imagined in the first place. I think our production does just that.' Following the second run in Joburg, they are looking at touring the shows to the rest of South Africa. When asked what else is in the kitty, Scott revealed: 'I'm currently rehearsing 'Noises Off' at Theatre On The Bay, which will have a two-week run at the end of August before transferring to Johannesburg from October 2 to 12. "I'm also currently learning Zulu for a secret, exciting project that will be announced in the coming months.' Where: Theatre on the Square. When: Runs until August 24, 7.30pm. No under 12s allowed.
IOL News
6 days ago
- Entertainment
- IOL News
Curtains up! Experience these Jozi theatre gems with heart, humour and a splash of colour
A scene from the infectious musical, 'Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat'. Presented by Pieter Toerien and the Luitingh Alexander Musical Theatre Academy (LAMTA), this production exudes the vibrancy and infectious ambience of the beloved musical by Tim Rice and Andrew Lloyd Webber. If you gravitate towards musicals, you don't want to miss "Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat". What can you expect? High energy performances to timeless tracks like 'Any Dream Will Do', 'Close Every Door', 'There's One More Angel in Heaven' and 'Go, Go, Go Joseph'. In this timeless tale, underpinned by uplifting themes of hope, resilience and destiny, Dylan Janse Van Rensburg plays the titular role. He is joined by powerhouse vocalist Lelo Ramasimong as the narrator and Chris Jaftha as Pharaoh. The rest of the ensemble cast comprises LAMTA graduates. This show is fun for the entire family looking for an exhilarating outing. Where: Pieter Toerien's Montecasino Theatre. When: Runs until September 28, 730pm. Weekend showtimes vary. The Dumb Waiter However, if you are looking for something less bustling and more thought-provoking, this production fits the bill. Dubbed a masterclass in tension, dark humour and theatrical precision, Harold Pinter's 'The Dumb Waiter' stars Brent Palmer as Ben and Jock Kleynhans as Gus, both hitmen. The play explores Gus's unravelling curiosity and emotional fragility alongside his much more confident senior partner. The show is helmed by Aidan Scott, who said, 'Pinter's world is a whisper away from reality - but once you're in, you're caught in the undertow. Where: Theatre on the Square. When: Runs until August 24, 7.30pm. No under 12s allowed.
The Irish Sun
17-05-2025
- Entertainment
- The Irish Sun
It was hard seeing Dad struggle – I won't make the same mistakes he did, says Danny Dyer's youngest daughter Sunnie, 18
DANNY DYER'S younger daughter Sunnie says seeing her dad's struggle with booze, drugs and rehab when she was a child keeps her grounded. Now Advertisement 5 Sunnie Dyer, left, with dad Danny and sister Dani at the Baftas last week Credit: Splash 5 Sunnie says seeing her dad's struggle with booze, drugs and rehab when she was a child keeps her grounded Credit: Instagram In her first newspaper interview, Sunnie opened up about how her working-class father has taught her how to deal with rejection in the industry. She adds that she loves his Disney+ hit Sunnie said: 'Dad's life lesson has been my life lesson. Seeing my dad struggle at times was very, very hard. 'Dad's past has made me more aware about when to stop drinking and that there is a limit. Advertisement Most read ON DANNY DYER 'Now if he was struggling we could have a chat, but when I was younger I couldn't have understood. 'I was very protected. I didn't understand at home but then I would go to primary school and people would talk about it and I wouldn't really have a clue. 'It's very sad. My dad is my best friend.' Fun experience Sunnie trained at the famous Sylvia Young Theatre School, attended by Advertisement Most read in News TV Exclusive Exclusive Last weekend she accompanied Danny on the red carpet at the Bafta bash, where he won best comedy performance for his role in She said afterwards: 'Like my dad I want to win a Bafta — and then an Oscar. Danny Dyer wins his first TV BAFTA as he shares emotional acceptance speech 'Marisa Abela won an award and said she used to watch her mum in the National Youth Theatre, and Dad said to me, 'That's going to be you up there one day'. 'And I was like, 'I'll be thanking you, Dad — and Mum, of course'. Advertisement 'I'm at college studying performing arts and this is the world I want to enter, so it's cool that I get to go to these events at a young age and know what the route is. 'I've wanted to be an actress ever since I could talk. Dad came into my college and did a workshop with us. 'He helped us run the lines, which was such a fun experience. I loved that — Dad teaching all my peers, him giving us feedback on what we should improve on. That was a nice moment.' And she added: 'I like serious roles. I also write poems and short stories.' Advertisement Mentored by Harold Pinter Danny was mentored by Harold Pinter and appeared in many of his plays before the playwright's death in 2008. Sunnie was delighted to be in a recent production of Pinter's 1959 play The Dumb Waiter, originally written for two male actors. She said: 'It was really fun to do. It's something I would probably never be able to do in the real world because it's two hitmen. He was proud of me. 'Any time I've got a rejection he says, 'Sun, this is the game you are in. You take the rejection and then you use it in your next role. Advertisement ''You concentrate more. You put ten per cent more in every time'. 'He tells me to ride the storm every time. 5 Danny with his Bafta award Credit: Alamy 'I'm very dark. Role-wise I'll do anything, especially horror or true crime — that would be good. But then I also love romantic comedies.' Advertisement Sunnie is close to her lookalike elder sister Dani, 28, who won Love Island in 2018, and younger brother Arty, ten. They live in a sprawling Essex home with mum Jo, which is a world away from Danny's own East End upbringing, as well as his years playing Sunnie said: 'I am very privileged to live the life I live. 'We do live in the middle of nowhere, where there are no buses for me to even get on. Advertisement 'I have been on a bus a few times in my life. I have never been approached by EastEnders and I don't want to do reality shows – I wasn't made for Love Island. Dani bigs it up to me but it's not something I would ever do 'Mum is more strict than Dad with the rules. You always need bad cop and good cop. 'I get pocket money every month from Mum and Dad. I do alright. I'm very lucky. 'But Mum halves my money and puts it in my savings. Advertisement 'I've got a job at home — I do the dishwasher and clean the sides in the kitchen. I get treated for doing that. 'I do get curfews, too — it just depends on where I am. 'Every Friday I stay in and have my Chinese takeaway. People ask me if I want to go out on a Friday and I say, 'Nope'. 'I have never been approached by EastEnders and I don't want to do reality shows — I wasn't made for Love Island, I haven't got the confidence for it. Advertisement 'Dani bigs it up to me, but it's not something I would ever do.' 'It's how we bonded' Cockney Danny swore several times during his Bafta acceptance speech on Sunday, but Sunnie is far cleaner with her language. She said: 'I don't have a potty mouth, I take pride in my words. I only swear if it's necessary. 'I don't swear at Dad. There is a level of respect and if I swear at him of course I get told off.' She added: 'I'm allowed a drink. It's always been normal to have a drink with dinner in our house. Advertisement 'I'm not a big drinker anyway. People offer me one and I'm like, 'Nah'. 'I notice with my friends that the ones with the strictest parents are the most lethal on a night out. 'I can have a drink whenever but I know my limit. I don't take the mick with it. I just don't like the way it makes me feel.' Sunnie was so enchanted with her dad in the Eighties-set drama Advertisement She said: 'I absolutely loved it, although I didn't watch the sex scenes with Dad in. I wish I had a boyfriend. That is what I want in life, just to be in love. I find it very difficult to find one, because I have to manage if they really actually want me and the life that I have, or they just want to be with me for the sake of it 'I had an Eighties birthday party and I was shocked that my friends didn't know about the Eighties. 'I was so excited. It's something I've dreamed of my whole life — a night in the Eighties. I grew up on Eighties films from when I was three or four. 'Dad has always shown me films. It's been how we bonded — Lost Boys, Weird Science, Stand By Me.' Advertisement One thing missing in Sunnie's life is a boyfriend — but she knows Danny would be strict. She said: 'I wish I had a boyfriend. That is what I want in life, just to be in love. I find it very difficult to find one, because I have to manage if they really actually want me and the life that I have, or they just want to be with me for the sake of it. 'So I've pushed boys away because of that. 'I'd love to meet a Spanish boy. I've never really brought a boy home. Advertisement 'Dad would have authority and shake the guy's hand firmly!' SEQUEL TO 'DYER' FILM DANNY has revealed he is making a sequel to his hit movie Marching Powder. And he promised that the flick, called Stoned Island – a play on the clothing brand Stone Island, favoured by football fans – will be less violent than the original dark comedy. He said: 'The movie had awful reviews, but people voted with their feet. We are making a sequel now called Stoned Island. 'I am proud of it but it was hard work. I thought we had too much violence. I don't think you need it. That's where it dipped for me.' Speaking at a Paul Strank Charitable Trust event for disadvantaged families, where he donated thousands of pounds, Danny added: 'I have got stories to tell as there are so many characters I have been brought up with. It goes, 'F*** the elite'.' SWEARY? IT'S JUST DANNY'S NERVES DANNY'S wife Jo says the East End actor is a 'softie' at heart, despite his sweary, lairy image. The mother to his three kids reveals he cleans up after the dog and they regularly enjoy date nights. 5 Danny's wife Jo says the East End actor is a 'softie' at heart, despite his sweary, lairy image Credit: Rex Features Advertisement 5 Sunnie with the family pet Credit: Instagram The couple are childhood sweethearts who met aged 14 and finally wed nine years ago. Jo says: 'I think Danny's swearing is part of a character that he uses to hide from his real self. 'I say that to him all the time. He is a softie. I've noticed he swears a lot in interviews when he is nervous or he doesn't know what to say.' Advertisement Jo shuns red carpets and awards ceremonies and says: 'I was at the rugby when the Baftas was on. I forgot all about it. I didn't fancy going. I don't want to be that public person. I know when I go out, people go, 'Oh, that's Danny Dyer's wife'.' Jo stood by Danny during his wild past and rehab stints and has seen him come out on the other side. Now life is calmer and she says: 'Danny's past has done wonders for my kids. My girls won't be ruining their lives on drugs. 'We have date nights and if we have a family dinner the wine is out. Advertisement 'We will have a nice bottle of champagne or sangria.' Jo keeps Danny in check by encouraging him to chip in with household chores and pick up after their dog Deborah, a French bulldog. She says: 'He does the dishes and looks after the dog – I don't have time for the dog at home. 'For five years I told Danny, 'You're not having a dog, you're not here'. Advertisement 'He begged and begged and then we went into Covid. 'He brought this dog home and I said, 'You've got to take her to work with you'. 'So he took it to EastEnders and then she went to doggy day care for about a year, and soon he was getting the hump. 'Every argument me and Danny have is over the dog. Bulldogs stink. They are like pigs. Advertisement 'So I will wake him up. If he's done a night shoot and has come in at 5am I don't care. 'I'll go, 'The dog's p**sed on the carpet – up you get'. And I will see the hatred in his eyes!'
Sydney Morning Herald
08-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Sydney Morning Herald
Sex, lies and hitmen: What more could you want?
THEATRE THE LOVER & THE DUMB WAITER Ensemble Theatre, May 7. U ntil June 7 Reviewed by JOHN SHAND ★★★★ You know when you walk in on an existing conversation, and automatically try to connect threads of what's being said? These two one-act plays by Harold Pinter are similar to that. No playwright was more influenced by Samuel Beckett, yet where Beckett gave us glimpses of universality, Pinter honed in on specifics, like looking at life through a keyhole. Those specifics are then shrouded in enigmas for the audience to decipher. Directed by Mark Kilmurry with a fine ear and eye, The Lover (1962) and The Dumb Waiter (1957) are ideally mated both in terms of those enigmas, and also pragmatically, needing just three actors between them. That The Lover, originally penned for television, is marginally the lesser piece is down to the other's complete enthrallment. The Lover concerns a married couple, Sarah (Nicole da Silva) and Richard (Gareth Davies), who matter-of-factly discuss her afternoon liaisons with her lover, Max, and his dalliances with a sex worker. Except Max is really Richard, and the sex worker is really Sarah: they playact for sexual titillation, which puts them on shaky ground. What if one of them breaks the game's unspoken rules? Written by anyone else, it would be a straightforward comedy satirising the bored bourgeoisie, but Pinter deepens the shadows of each word. Da Silva and especially Davies skilfully play the piece ever so lightly, while implying this element of danger, whereby the game-playing could spiral towards a point of no return. It's akin to watching two domesticated cats who could turn feral. But for combining tension with comedy, The Dumb Waiter, with its overt debt to Waiting for Godot, is supreme, and in just a few minutes during the interval, Simone Romaniuk's ingenious set is transformed from 60s swinging suburbia to the desolation and mould of a twin-bed basement which also has a dumb waiter – a miniature lift for delivering meals via a hatch in the wall. Ben (Gareth Davies, playing his third role, effectively) and Gus (Anthony Taufa) are hitmen, holed up in the room waiting for instructions on their next target. Despite Ben just lying on a bed reading a newspaper ('87-year-old man crawls under stationary lorry and is run over'; 'eight-year-old girl kills cat') and Gus being busy finding squashed matches and cigarettes in his shoes, Ben is swiftly established as the boss; Gus the underling. Davies, half the size of Taufa, is exceptional at conveying a menace and snappish temper from which Gus shrinks. Similarly, Taufa catches Gus' odd quality of being a bit thick, and yet having enough warmth and emotional and moral intelligence to be afflicted with a conscience.
The Age
08-05-2025
- Entertainment
- The Age
Sex, lies and hitmen: What more could you want?
THEATRE THE LOVER & THE DUMB WAITER Ensemble Theatre, May 7. U ntil June 7 Reviewed by JOHN SHAND ★★★★ You know when you walk in on an existing conversation, and automatically try to connect threads of what's being said? These two one-act plays by Harold Pinter are similar to that. No playwright was more influenced by Samuel Beckett, yet where Beckett gave us glimpses of universality, Pinter honed in on specifics, like looking at life through a keyhole. Those specifics are then shrouded in enigmas for the audience to decipher. Directed by Mark Kilmurry with a fine ear and eye, The Lover (1962) and The Dumb Waiter (1957) are ideally mated both in terms of those enigmas, and also pragmatically, needing just three actors between them. That The Lover, originally penned for television, is marginally the lesser piece is down to the other's complete enthrallment. The Lover concerns a married couple, Sarah (Nicole da Silva) and Richard (Gareth Davies), who matter-of-factly discuss her afternoon liaisons with her lover, Max, and his dalliances with a sex worker. Except Max is really Richard, and the sex worker is really Sarah: they playact for sexual titillation, which puts them on shaky ground. What if one of them breaks the game's unspoken rules? Written by anyone else, it would be a straightforward comedy satirising the bored bourgeoisie, but Pinter deepens the shadows of each word. Da Silva and especially Davies skilfully play the piece ever so lightly, while implying this element of danger, whereby the game-playing could spiral towards a point of no return. It's akin to watching two domesticated cats who could turn feral. But for combining tension with comedy, The Dumb Waiter, with its overt debt to Waiting for Godot, is supreme, and in just a few minutes during the interval, Simone Romaniuk's ingenious set is transformed from 60s swinging suburbia to the desolation and mould of a twin-bed basement which also has a dumb waiter – a miniature lift for delivering meals via a hatch in the wall. Ben (Gareth Davies, playing his third role, effectively) and Gus (Anthony Taufa) are hitmen, holed up in the room waiting for instructions on their next target. Despite Ben just lying on a bed reading a newspaper ('87-year-old man crawls under stationary lorry and is run over'; 'eight-year-old girl kills cat') and Gus being busy finding squashed matches and cigarettes in his shoes, Ben is swiftly established as the boss; Gus the underling. Davies, half the size of Taufa, is exceptional at conveying a menace and snappish temper from which Gus shrinks. Similarly, Taufa catches Gus' odd quality of being a bit thick, and yet having enough warmth and emotional and moral intelligence to be afflicted with a conscience.
