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MORE NY REVIEWS

noreply@blogger.com (Edward Petherbridge) — Sat, 27 Jun 2015 01:54:00 +0000

Petherbridge, lean of limb and blessed with a speaking voice that ranges over countless octaves, has a supremely light touch, muttering his wisecracks as if apologizing for their caustic content, corralling the most oddball comment until it gets the laugh it deserves. Staring at the perilously slanted stage, he says, “We were promised a level playing field tonight.” Covering the upstage wall with sketches of Lear’s daughter, which he then douses with paint, he dismisses the whole business, saying, “It looks like a bad day at MoMA.” When the scene with Lear on the blasted heath arrives, he is perfectly capable of slipping into a bit of “Stormy Weather.” And, when one isn’t looking, he launches into Shakespeare’s verse with an authority and clarity that leaves one stunned. LIGHTING AND SOUND AMERICA (Read full review)

Petherbridge seems to have lost nothing of his acuity or charisma, only the chance to play Shakespeare’s most famous king. That is a disappointment that My Perfect Mind seeks to remedy, offering Petherbridge snippets at least of that great role, principally Lear preparing to banish Cordelia and being reunited with her before his death. In these moments, even as unexpected and ephemeral as they are, Petherbridge glows as an actor of immense depth, intelligence and sensitivity. … My Perfect Mind is a perfect diamond in the rough, an opportunity to see one of Britain’s greatest living actors in a mesmerizing, funny, whip-smart and thoroughly human performance, a meditation on life and acting … To quote Robert Frost, “The afternoon knows what the morning never suspected.” My Perfect Mind is a tribute to the long, glowing afternoon of Edward Petherbridge. EXEUNT MAGAZINE (Read full review)

The theatrical “fourth wall” is expanded and collapsed as easily as a gentleman’s umbrella as the two seasoned performers meditate on the nature of theater itself. These quirky encounters are accompanied by generous helpings of the Bard, and Petherbridge fuels his Lear with a musicality and psychological spontaneity that illuminates the potency and evergreen relevance of Shakespeare’s poetry. ETHAN KANFER: NEW YORK THEATER REVIEWS (Read full review)

RAVE REVIEWS FOR MY PERFECT MIND IN NEW YORK

noreply@blogger.com (Edward Petherbridge) — Mon, 22 Jun 2015 00:24:00 +0000

My Perfect Mind has opened in Manhattan to a feast of a golden reviews. Here is a selection:

Mr. Petherbridge [assumes] the role of Lear with a truly affecting air of embattled vulnerability. At other moments, he is simply Mr. Petherbridge, a renowned performer with all of a first-rate actor’s vanity (we get to hear a lot about famous plays and famous people) and sensitivity. … Every performance is, in a sense, a fight against limitations. In “My Perfect Mind,” Mr. Petherbridge — who is just about to turn 79 and shows little evidence of the strokes that once felled him — does what actors have always done, turning handicaps into weapons to conquer an audience. NEW YORK TIMES (Read full review)

The players’ remarkable talent and mastery of craft make everything they do feel effortless, almost casual, immediate, spontaneous and personal. The fun they are having acting and play-acting, conjuring up different characters—such as Petherbridge’s parents, a New Zealand cab driver, Lawrence Olivier, Kenneth Branagh—is infectious. Even the bits that might seem a touch corny on paper—such as a pun about a level playing field in reference to the raked rostrum—the performers’ commitment and Ms. Hunter’s sharp, organic direction, turn into living moments one can take joy in unapologetically. STAGE AND CINEMA (Read full review)

59E59 Theaters, New York City.
Photo by Kathleen Riley

My Perfect Mind has not a whiff of pathos and bears no resemblance to those turgid my-road-to-recovery stories that litter TV screens. In fact, the story it tells is not linear, but rather kaleidoscopic as it jumps forward and back in time and slips back and forth between fact and fantasy with ease and élan. And it is a wonder and a delight to behold. … An actor’s life, be he a stroke victim or no, is a perilous one and it so very easy to lose one’s footing. But when the actor is Edward Petherbridge — who tells us he’s seventy-eight and “I’ll be seventy-nine in August” — it simply does not apply. He is charm and grace personified. Like another great Shakespearean character, age cannot wither him, nor custom stale his infinite variety. NY THEATRE GUIDE (Read full review)

Witty, wild, wonderful and thoroughly entertaining … You realize when you first enter the theater that something unique is being staged. The set is tilted, a sign that My Perfect Mind has a real zany side. Yet this is a comedy with serious undertones. … Petherbridge and Hunter master their roles. My Perfect Mind is a fast moving play and the two men work seamlessly to create an interplay that is so realistic that it seems spontaneous. Petherbridge as Edward deftly clings to the classic role of Lear while Hunter dazzles with his brisk character transitions. You never know who he will be next or what he will do. Amusing moments abound such as when he repeatedly slides downward on his belly onstage or pads his clothes and becomes Edward's pregnant mother. While there are moments of complete absurdity, My Perfect Mind is also a thoughtful, poignant story that you will remember long after Petherbridge and Hunter take their final bows. BROADWAY WORLD (Read full review)

Petherbridge’s extraordinary performance in this one-act two-hander is reason enough to flock to the theater, but the autobiographical nature of the story, together with a ridiculously funny performance by his costar, Paul Hunter, adds a fascinating dimension to this quite literally off-kilter story about Shakespeare, the craft of theater, and the regenerative power of the human mind. … Petherbridge adroitly brings that sort of improvisational quality to the show, with recitations of Lear delivered so naturally he seems to make them up on the fly. It’s one of the charms of this fragmented, hilarious, strangely lucid memory play about an actor performing a play about performing another play in his mind for a real (or imaginary) audience. With all its twists, turns, and contortions, My Perfect Mind is a delightfully entertaining brainteaser. THEATER MANIA (Read full review)

The set.
Photo by Kathleen Riley

Their performance gives us a new appreciation of the capabilities of the mind, its resilience and fragility, its beauty and mystery. Petherbridge’s performance is an uplifting affirmation that life is an adventure and we must continue to be engaged and enthusiastic about all it throws at us, especially when adversity comes knocking and what we most fear threatens to come upon us. Truly, Petherbridge has topped his former career endeavors with his role in My Perfect Mind. BLOG CRITICS (Read full review)

Esteemed actors Edward Petherbridge and Paul Hunter blow the roof off the house with their whirlwind of talent and humor. … It is no wonder that [Petherbridge’s] credits are so prestigious, considering that he uses his mind, body, and voice with such clarity and ease that he clearly read these tools’ instruction manual cover to cover. THEATRE IS EASY (Read full review)

Lear self-portrait by Edward Petherbridge.
Photo by Kathleen Riley

These scenes are performed with such eloquence that even if you’ve forsworn seeing yet another production of Shakespeare’s masterpiece, you will happily stand in line for tickets should Mr. Petherbridge take on the role in earnest. But for now, there is this joyous marvel of a work. The Inca lament for the dead sun god Atahualpa alone is worth the price of admission. TALKIN BROADWAY (Read full review)

My Perfect Mind gets its zing from its insouciant attitude to Petherbridge's stroke; it gets its literary scope from frequent flights into Shakespeare's play, the text itself an antidote to frailty. It's that rare thing, a play about the terrors to come that somehow operates on a wholly delightful level. Like Lear's own Fool, it makes us laugh at the storm. TIME OUT (Read full review)

MY PERFECT MIND TRANSFERS TO NEW YORK!

noreply@blogger.com (Edward Petherbridge) — Thu, 12 Mar 2015 04:20:00 +0000

Photo by Hugo Glendinning

We are delighted to announce officially that, after two triumphant London seasons, national tours and performances in Barcelona, My Perfect Mind will be heading to New York this summer. The show has been invited to the annual Brits off Broadway Festival at 59E59 Theaters, ‘the number one off-Broadway destination in New York City’. The show will run in Theater A for three weeks from 10th to 28th June. Tickets are on general sale from today. BOOK NOW.

This extraordinary story seems like the invention of a daring playwright. Only it happens to be true. It is told by actors – only this time the pivotal role is played by the unique real-life person who lived and survived this terrible ordeal. To blend the real and the invented into one whole, that at every moment rings true, is an impossible challenge. Edward Petherbridge, Paul Hunter and Kathryn Hunter, their director, have made it alive, very funny and heart-wrenching. PETER BROOK

This show about not playing King Lear is a unique treat: a wondrous mosaic of a great actor’s self-analysis, his talents for vaudeville and tragedy, his wisdom and his passion. En route, he illuminates Shakespeare and as in all the best theatre, leaves us moved, shifted into a world we could not have imagined unless he had led us there. IAN MCKELLEN

Edward as the Fool for the Actors’ Company

It is just over forty years since Edward made his New York debut at the Brooklyn Academy of Music in 1974, playing the Fool in King Lear for the Actors’ Company which he co-founded with Ian McKellen. Edith Oliver of the New Yorker declared: ‘Edward Petherbridge’s heartbroken, quicksilver fool … is the Fool forever; the part IS permanently his.’ In the 1980s, he appeared in two epic productions on Broadway: as Newman Noggs in the Royal Shakespeare Company’s landmark Nicholas Nickleby and as Charlie Marsden in Eugene O’Neill’s experimental Strange Interlude. Both performances earned him Tony Award nominations and the latter a Drama Desk Award nomination. He has also brought to New York two of his own productions, the first of them his vaudeville adaptation of R. D. Laing’s Knots. Now Edward returns to New York with an inspired masterpiece that showcases, as the Telegraph noted last autumn in its five-star review, the ‘tremendous sense of majesty that makes him a magnetic stage presence’.

Watch a ten-minute FT Arts featurette about My Perfect Mind.

SLIM CHANCES ON GOODREADS

noreply@blogger.com (Edward Petherbridge) — Sun, 15 Feb 2015 01:17:00 +0000

A 5-Star review for Slim Chances by screenwriter and crime novelist Douglas Watkinson:

This is a fascinating account of his life by one of our most accomplished actors. Beautifully written, it is full of detail, making it a book you can dip into at any point and, without being patronising, there’s an intellect at work here giving insights into some of the world’s best loved plays.

WIMSEY RETURNS TO UK TV

noreply@blogger.com (Edward Petherbridge) — Thu, 15 Jan 2015 04:46:00 +0000

Good news for Wimsey fans in the UK: the Dorothy L. Sayers Mysteries, starring Edward as Lord Peter Wimsey and Harriet Walter as Harriet Vane, are currently being repeated on Drama, 8pm each Thursday.

AND the DVDs of the series (PAL, Region 2) are once again available from Amazon UK. These are the discs that include an exclusive interview with Edward among the special features. Watch below an excerpt from the interview, recorded in 2002.

MY PERFECT MIND IN SCARBOROUGH

noreply@blogger.com (Edward Petherbridge) — Wed, 12 Nov 2014 21:13:00 +0000

This week My Perfect Mind is at the Stephen Joseph Theatre in Scarborough where, as ever, it is receiving golden accolades.

REVIEW

Oh yes it has, the pantomime season has arrived early in Scarborough.

My Perfect Mind is not billed as such – in fact its title, a line from King Lear, may lead audiences to think it’s far too cerebral for that.

Then there is its lead actor – Edward Petherbridge – not a performer one would normally associate with ‘it’s behind you’ unless talking about his career.

The self-deprecating Mr Petherbridge will not mind in the slightest that gag – My Perfect Mind is littered with such asides – thespian in jokes, waspish remarks about modern art and it positively encourages audience participation.

But let’s be serious – it is not a panto in the conventional sense.

It is the story of Petherbridge’s longing to ‘play the king’. He was two days in rehearsals for King Lear when he was struck down by a stroke which robbed him of that ambition. This collaboration with experimental theatre company Told By An Idiot is his consolation prize.

It is the story of how he did not play Lear – and so much more. Taking that as its baseline, the audience is treated to a look at the highlights of Petherbridge’s career, his relationships with his family and others in the profession.

Petherbridge – who is breath-takingly, effortlessly brilliant – plays himself and Paul Hunter – physically and stylistically the perfect foil, the rough with the smooth – plays everything from his doctor to his mother, his brother to Olivier.

There are lots of glimpses at the Lear Petherbridge would have delivered – and the one he would have refused to do.

The scenes of his frustration at his illness and Lear’s madness combined are heart-breaking. At other times it is tender and poignant as it explores the fragility of life. It is also screamingly funny.

In 90 minutes this play offers so much – oh yes it does.

Sue Wilkinson, The Scarborough News

The art deco façade of the Stephen Joseph Theatre.
Photo by EP

MORE FROM BIRMINGHAM

noreply@blogger.com (Edward Petherbridge) — Fri, 07 Nov 2014 05:51:00 +0000

My Perfect Mind continues to garner stunning reviews in Birmingham.

My Perfect Mind is a unique and wonderful production by the endearing company Told by an Idiot.

With a previous success of Don’t Try This at Home, recently performed at The REP, this production is just as fun-filled and extremely touching.

It is a two-man show ln which, through the exploration of Shakespeare’s King Lear, Edward Petherbridge and Paul Hunter reflect a struggle between what the body is able to do versus the power of the mind.

The concept of the show takes inspiration from Edward Petherbridge, an esteemed and talented classical actor due to play the role of King Lear, but who suffers the effects of a stroke.

Whilst in the process of recovery, Petherbridge discovers that his Lear was not entirely lost. In fact, the role was still completely present in his mind. The moving tale resulted in a story never told before, and with playful direction by Kathryn Hunter in an imaginative style that is a hallmark of this company, it is a production that you won’t forget any time soon.

My Perfect Mind is a wonderful celebration of The Bard’s great work, but also sheds light on an individual’s determination, perseverance and tells us to look on the bright side.

The renowned and exquisitely talented Edward Petherbridge plays both himself, King Lear and any other character that bursts into his mind while Paul Hunter plays every other part in between.

Both actors work in harmony with each other to fashion an atmosphere of creativity and fun, setting off fireworks of inspiration. Hunter and Petherbridge invite us into their wonderful space with open arms.

Constantly talking to the audience they make us feel that we have an equal part in the company with the players. Amongst the laughter and fun, there is a story that is just as moving. Petherbridge and Hunter are masters of leading us through a journey of emotion as they relay the story of Petherbridge’s recovery, also staying true to the awe inspiring tragedy of King Lear.

Told by an Idiot celebrate Petherbridge’s past successes and current talent as we see a focused and emotive portrayal of Lear. Hunter captures our hearts and imagination as the narrator of the piece, including resembling those who have influenced Petherbridge’s life, and indeed the many characters in King Lear.

Petherbridge and Hunter’s on stage relationship is another element to the magic that Told by an Idiot never fail to produce. One truly captivating moment was during a portrayal of the final scene of Lear, Petherbridge playing the king and Hunter playing Cordelia. Both had an awe-inspiring understanding for each other to create a heart-stopping scene of intensity that stripped the audience of breath.

Throughout the production, the perfect balance was created with an enlightening artistic flare with the ability to move the audience to the height of emotion.

The performance space is a reflection of Told by and Idiot’s unruly imagination. The set is literally a blank canvass, allowing for their sparkling minds to thrive and play out whatever they like. Both actors make the set their own playground. At first the audience see a white sheet, but it soon becomes the embodiment of colour as Petherbridge and Hunter use it as a canvas for their imagination to run wild.

Told by and Idiot are beautiful innovators of art and always push the boundaries of the imagination. My Perfect Mind is a totally engaging production, constantly allowing the audience to feed off their instant creativity. As well as being an emotional exploration into King Lear, we see a wonderful piece filled with charm, laughter and fun. (Elizabeth Halpin, A View from Behind the Arras)

Precious sublime madness.

Some shows are very special; this is one of them.

In large part this is due to the power of the story being told. Edward Petherbridge was rehearsing the role of King Lear when he had a stroke which left him nearly paralysed. As he struggled to recover he discovered he remembered the whole of KING LEAR virtually word for word. But there’s another large part, too – the extraordinary wit and joy with which the story is told.

On the one hand you have a tall, rather gaunt, and elegant Petherbridge off-handedly relating parts of his life (including a phone call for an ambulance) and from time to time going into powerful extracts of King Lear. On the other hand, you have a maniacal Paul Hunter adopting a range of wild characters – frequently bordering on the offensive(!) to great comic effect.

The result is that you never know where the story may go next, nor what physical or verbal fireworks may come at you.

It’s truly laugh-out-loud time. Yet you never lose sight of the cruel twist of fate that underpins the play, nor the joy of watching Petherbridge performing, once more, in front of you.

The Lear storm scene is marvellous. Lear painting and splashing at the walls, with Hunter running between rain machine, wind machine and thunder sheet – a very unstill centre for the storm.

This is a multi-layered story; and the magic lies not just in the way this marvellous pair tell it, but in the way they do it too. (Alexander Ray Edser, Reviews Gate)

Edward Petherbridge is a fine old actor of 78 years.

In 2007, shortly before he opened as King Lear in New Zealand, he suffered a major stroke. His body was temporarily paralysed, but his mind wasn’t. He could still remember every one of Shakespeare’s lines.

He’s now fully recovered and sprightly with it – and is retelling his strange story live, on a sharply raked stage, with the “Told By An Idiot” theatre company….which has snuck into Birmingham Rep’s ‘Door’ this week, apparently by the tradesman’s entrance.

There are two Lears in evidence here. We get decent chunks of The Bard; impeccably acted by Petherbridge himself, with his sole stage companion Paul Hunter playing his Fool, his daughter and everything else. But there are shades of Edward Lear too. For it would be an evening of delightful, utter nonsense – if only it wasn’t largely true.

Director Kathryn Hunter (who has also played a notable King Lear) seems to have torn all the pages out of Petherbridge’s autobiography and strewn them haphazardly. The rules are binned. We get all the right moments …. but not necessarily in the right order. And the absurdity – to any student of the theatre – is hilarious.

Petherbridge slopes around like an addled old love [sic], taking the rise out of himself at every opportunity. He dispenses wonderful witticisms and about how he once reduced a reviewer to gnawing his own kneecaps; and how the best advice he can offer to anyone unfortunate enough to be cast as King Lear is to find a light Cordelia.

With a face deader than a pan, he describes once being offered a vignette; “which is one down from a cameo”. Then he chucks paint across the back wall and throws away a line about how it resembles “another bad day at the Ikon Gallery”. The Birmingham audience was in hoots of love and laughter.

His sidekick Paul Hunter, by contrast, dashes dementedly around…plugging all Petherbridge’s gaps. One of the most memorable revelations concerns Petherbridge’s Rumanian cleaner, who turns out to have been a lecturer in Shakespeare, back home. A wig and a Hoover do the trick. And when it comes to the climactic scene upon Lear’s blasted heath, the two men create a perfect storm with paint, props and old-fashioned sound effects.

There’s a casual spontaneousness about the whole show; yet it runs like clockwork and you sense that even the most outrageous ad-libs have been carefully honed.

It’s all marvellous, madly brilliant stuff; almost meaningless to someone who’s never been to the theatre, but an absolute treat to those of us who can’t keep out of them. (Chris Eldon Lee, Midlands What’s On Live)

The Bard backed by bound copies of Punch,
Shakespeare Memorial Room, Library of Birmingham
Photo by EP

Read Edward’s interview with Steve Pratt for the Northern Echo, ‘Keeping tragedy in mind’.

MY PERFECT MIND IN BIRMINGHAM

noreply@blogger.com (Edward Petherbridge) — Thu, 06 Nov 2014 01:08:00 +0000

More golden reviews as My Perfect Mind continues its tour this week at Birmingham Rep.

Petherbridge is both vulnerable and commanding … Like Shakespeare’s great work, the play is about frailty and the deterioration of the mind but, unlike the eponymous king, Petherbridge is a survivor. He has recovered not only to tell his story but to crawl around under the stage and generally chuck himself around a bit. This autobiography speaks to us all: a stroke need not be the end of one’s personality, identity or indeed one’s active life. … Gloriously silly, often touching but never less than intelligent, My Perfect Mind is one of those rare and remarkable pieces of theatre you never want to end. Bum on a Seat (Read full review)

Told by An Idiot’s “My Perfect Mind” stuns The Door of The Birmingham Rep, with its simplistic yet meaningful set and with its mastermind-like quality of acting. … Petherbridge’s story shone brightly on stage, as he played himself and the situation so vividly, it appeared we were witnessing the event real-time. … We were left wishing we could hear Edward perform “King Lear” for real. The dramatic device Edward used with splashing paint over the wall was epic, as he belted Lear’s storms speech. The Gay UK (Read full review)

Petherbridge, perhaps best known for his portrayal of Lord Wimsey in the BBC adaptations of Dorothy L. Sayers’s novels, has elegance and a remarkable stage presence. … The surreal action, with its underlying truth, makes for a compelling performance. … It reveals Petherbridge’s craft in such a charming, brave way that we cannot help but be moved by it. … My Perfect Mind is a gracefully honest, whimsical portrayal of a difficult time in Edward Petherbridge’s life. It is a piece of devised theatre – clever and courageous theatre which sheds light on his recovery from a potentially life destroying condition. Stage Talk Magazine (Read full review)

Curtain call Tuesday night, Birmingham Rep.

And Jami Rogers, who is working on a project about Multicultural Shakespeare in Britain, has tweeted: ‘Blown away by Edward Petherbridge AGAIN. What an astonishing evening “My Perfect Mind” still is. Thank God for Petherbridge!’

View from the top of the new Birmingham Library, next door to the Rep.
Photo by EP

Next week My Perfect Mind travels to North Yorkshire and the Stephen Joseph Theatre in Scarborough. Hear Edward and Paul Hunter talking on BBC Radio York yesterday afternoon (interview begins at 3:12:10 ).

5 STAR REVIEWS FOR MY PERFECT MIND IN LIVERPOOL

noreply@blogger.com (Edward Petherbridge) — Thu, 23 Oct 2014 04:37:00 +0000

A clean sweep of lovely 5-Star reviews as My Perfect Mind returns to Liverpool’s Unity Theatre.

Standing on the shoulders of giants is never easy, but the view that you see, the distance and insight made possible because of their shining example is worth more than mere currency, it is the opportunity granted to learn and take note. Such is the effect that the return to Unity Theatre of Told By An Idiot’s My Perfect Mind has on the audience that it time to come it will surely be looked upon as a classic piece of theatre of the early 21st Century.

The Human brain is such a fragile piece of complex machinery, a computer more powerful and with the ability to do so much, that one tiny breakdown, one small clot that forms in its narrow passageways, can cause the machine to send error messages that have the intricate and complicated synapses terrified of knowing what’s to come next. For Edward Petherbridge and Paul Hunter, My Perfect Mind is not just a play; it is an exercise in reconnection, of producing the delicate balance between the devastating effects of synaptic misfires and stroke and the humour in performance. It is a moment in time to treasure as they succeed perfectly.

My Perfect Mind is a response to Edward Petherbridge’s stroke as he was starting rehearsals in New Zealand for King Lear. The might of King’s wrath against his daughter bought more damaging fruit that would ever be thought possible but also allowed something sensational, something only the Human brain could perhaps allow, to surface. Lear’s Fool can be said to be unseen, that only the aged monarch can truly see him, the whispering ghost of conscience, much like a brain sent out of phase by illness, only the fool can bring Lear back to a safer place.

For Paul Hunter to perform every other part in Mr. Petherbridge’s life, from his mother who by some sort of genetic breakdown also suffered a stroke two days before she gave birth to the classic actor, to an outrageously superb Laurence Olivier, taxi drivers, the young Australian actor fresh out of Drama School to the Doctor who treated him in the weeks after the stroke, all the players had their parts to play in the life and rehabilitation of the man and Mr. Hunter was exquisite at connecting those dots.

It is though Mr. Petherbridge who holds the play and the his life up for scrutiny, a herculean moment on stage as all is laid bare but with grace, humility and the right amount of laughter in which to show that the Human mind may be fragile, might be imperfect and capable of being bruised and haunted but like Lear himself, capable of reaching out through the darkness and creating something stunning and noble.

If in 2013 My Perfect Mind was one of the finest plays to come to Liverpool, then in 2014 it doesn’t just stand on the shoulders of giants, it whispers down its ears and points the way forward. Spellbinding!

Ian D. Hall, Liverpool Sound and Vision

This is a larger than life show, achingly funny at times and brings together all that a night out at the theatre should be. With a clever script and set design and two wonderful actors that lead you through ninety minutes of sheer joy and merriment, My Perfect Mind is a must see.

Janie Phillips, WhatsOnStage (read full review)

He’s compelling as Lear, delivering his regal speeches and dejected ramblings in a wonderful low-key manner, but he’s even more of a delight as himself – offering in an hour and a half a beautifully layered self-portrait, revealing a self-deprecating, generous and determined individual. If this is the real Edward Petherbridge, no wonder Hunter wanted to work with him again. … The play has a tremendous sense of balance. It deals with a great big difficult subject with a brilliant lightness of touch that doesn’t for one moment undermine the seriousness. There are some delightful jibes at the acting profession, but it never tips into thespian self-indulgence. And Shakespeare is given just the right amount of space. My Perfect Mind is an impeccably crafted piece of theatre. Bold storytelling, packed with joyous humour and full of fresh ideas.

Jo Beggs, The Public Reviews (read full review)

Yesterday Edward and Paul Hunter were interviewed about the show on BBC Radio Merseyside. Hear them on BBC iPlayer (the interview begins approximately 40 minutes in).

Liverpool Anglican Cathedral’s massive Vestey Tower by night.
Photo by EP

From the Unity audience comment board.
Photo by EP

MY PERFECT MIND IN LEEDS

noreply@blogger.com (Edward Petherbridge) — Wed, 22 Oct 2014 05:06:00 +0000

A review by Mark Smith for British Theatre Guide:

Having debuted this show last year, Paul Hunter and Edward Petherbridge now return for another tour of their superlative two-man ‘comic tale of a man not doing King Lear’.

Told by an Idiot, a feisty twenty-one years old this year, ploughs some of the same fertile territory as devising behemoth Complicite, and in fact this show is directed by that company’s founder member Kathryn Hunter. But, where Simon McBurney’s enterprise turns visual imagery and gigantic-scale international productions to the service of adaptation, Paul Hunter’s company remains resolutely human-sized—Complicite’s chatty, personable, more nimble younger cousin.

So part of what you get from this 90-minute two-hander is an absolute masterclass in comedy and clowning of all kinds—both physical and verbal. Unassuming in person, Hunter has honed his comic instincts with an expertise which seems always organic, never forced. If there’s one thing this man knows, it’s how to deliver a punchline; ‘here’s a good fool’, as Petherbridge aptly announces.

The pair are a match made in heaven, the Morecambe and Wise of theatrical anecdotage. Some of the audience have clearly come to hear Petherbridge recount tales of his previous roles, and in this they were not disappointed. Now aged 78, he has done service with a number of distinguished companies, notably as one of the first members of the National Theatre company, where he was the first Guildenstern in Stoppard’s breakthrough comedy.

The clowning sensibilities and sharp mind required for that mammoth role have not diminished in the intervening years, and Petherbridge gamely sends himself up, swapping the roles of straight man and comic lead repeatedly with his co-performer and deviser.

Structurally, the show again evidences the company’s trademark devising expertise. The rule of threes, the repeated gag or catchphrase, extended setups and callbacks, and the return of certain anecdotes ‘once as tragedy then as farce’—all are in strong evidence here.

There are moments of anarchy and lines which could have been lifted straight from The Goon Show: ‘I never forget a pair of legs!’, exclaims Hunter at one point. But he also plays obedient sounding board to Petherbridge at key moments, with his hunched attentiveness evidencing his onstage generosity and the clear bond between the duo.

Photo by Manuel Harlan

To say too much about the twists and turns of the evening would be to spoil some of the joy, but Paul Hunter welcomes us in to a scenario which sees us genuinely uncertain as to who is playing whom in the show. As a ridiculous German scientist, he warns us that the man soon to enter the stage is suffering from a dose of Edward Petherbridge Syndrome, believing himself to be ‘a tawdry actor in West Hampstead’, liable to flog us his autobiography at the entrance to the theatre.

The evening hinges around the relationship between the pair—or the three if you count the ever-present ghost of Lear, of whose presence the Arden text becomes a poignant totem. Petherbridge was signed up to a performance of the emblematic role for a company in New Zealand, but suffered a severe stroke before rehearsals could get properly under way.

This performance that never was haunts a superbly comic evening which manages simultaneously to provoke guffaws and probe the actor’s attack and thwarted ambitions. Various other ghosts are conjured over the evening as the show probes Petherbridge’s autobiography touchingly but never mawkishly, irreverently but never disrespectfully.

There is so much to take away from the show, whether you’re a Petherbridge fan, an aficionado of the theatre (joyous dramatic gags and puns abound), or just a lover of well-crafted comedy which asks with lightness of touch and moving perceptiveness: ‘where does memory end and imagination begin?’.

This week My Perfect Mind is at the Unity Theatre, Liverpool.

BBC RADIO LEEDS: ONE ON ONE

noreply@blogger.com (Edward Petherbridge) — Tue, 14 Oct 2014 22:16:00 +0000

This week My Perfect Mind continues its successful national tour at the West Yorkshire Playhouse in Leeds (Wednesday, 15 October-Saturday, 18 October).

At 2pm on Thursday, you can hear Edward interviewed live on the BBC Radio Leeds programme One on One, which is similar in format to Radio 4’s Desert Island Discs. The interview will also be available on BBC iPlayer after the broadcast.

Photo by Manuel Harlan

BRISTOL REVIEWS

noreply@blogger.com (Edward Petherbridge) — Fri, 03 Oct 2014 05:54:00 +0000

My Perfect Mind has been most warmly received at the Tobacco Factory Theatre in Bristol.

In My Perfect Mind Petherbridge and Paul Hunter make an unlikely but effective double act. Petherbridge tall, dignified, craggily handsome; Hunter, shorter, more rotund, giving the impression he would wear a lampshade if it got a laugh. On a vertiginously raked stage the pair manage to deconstruct King Lear and Edward’s career in a manner both anarchic and structured at the same time. Petherbridge either plays himself, or Lear, but Hunter plays multiple roles. … a satisfying combination of wit, invention and actorly skill gave the audience food for thought as well as a refracted vision of one of Shakespeare’s best plays. (Bristol Post. Read full review)

An inventive, hilarious biographical show ...If there is a Lear in Petherbridge’s future, well its hard to see how it will be a better artistic triumph then what has been produced here. (WhatsOnStage. Read full review)

Mural by German street artists Herakut on the

side of the Tobacco Factory Theatre.

Photo by EP

EDWARD ON BBC RADIO BRISTOL

noreply@blogger.com (Edward Petherbridge) — Thu, 02 Oct 2014 01:42:00 +0000

Yesterday Edward was interviewed by Graham Rogers on The Afternoon Show, BBC Radio Bristol. You can hear this delightful interview online. It begins at 1:37:30 and is available for the next seven days.

Edward with Graham Rogers at Radio Bristol

Edward is currently appearing in My Perfect Mind at the Tobacco Factory Theatre in Bristol. Next stop Leeds.

Despite being viewed through the prism of Lear’s madness, My Perfect Mind is far from an out-and-out tragedy. As a two-hander, it’s performed with great sensitivity and involves its appreciative audience from the start. The play may question identity and contain serious reflections on the resilience of the human spirit, but it is ever draped in the warm overcoat of comedy. Ultimately, this renders the theatrical experience all the more moving, because it becomes a tender celebration of a life retrieved. (Claire Hayes, The Public Reviews. Read the full review of the first performance in Bristol)

MY PERFECT MIND ON TOUR

noreply@blogger.com (Edward Petherbridge) — Mon, 29 Sep 2014 00:32:00 +0000

If you missed My Perfect Mind during its recent sell-out season at the Young Vic, you still have a chance to see it on tour. Venues and dates below (click on the name of the theatre to book tickets):

TOBACCO FACTORY, BRISTOL
30 Sep, 2014 - 04 Oct, 2014

WEST YORKSHIRE PLAYHOUSE, LEEDS
15 Oct, 2014 - 18 Oct, 2014

UNITY THEATRE, LIVERPOOL
21 Oct, 2014 - 25 Oct, 2014

BIRMINGHAM REPERTORY THEATRE
04 Nov, 2014 - 08 Nov, 2014

STEPHEN JOSEPH THEATRE, SCARBOROUGH

11 Nov, 2014 - 15 Nov, 2014

TEATRE LLIURE, BARCELONA
20 Nov, 2014 - 21 Nov, 2014

Photo by Manuel Harlan

Read the outstanding 4 and 5 Star reviews here.

TONIGHT AT 9.30

noreply@blogger.com (Edward Petherbridge) — Thu, 25 Sep 2014 03:25:00 +0000

If you happen to be at tonight’s performance of My Perfect Mind at the Young Vic:

EDWARD IN THE GUARDIAN

noreply@blogger.com (Edward Petherbridge) — Thu, 25 Sep 2014 03:21:00 +0000

Edward has a contributed a piece on playing Stoppard’s Guildenstern to the Guardian series ‘Monologues: actors on acting’. Read it here.

Edward with John Stride. Photo by Anthony Crickmay

RAVE REVIEWS FOR THE REVIVAL OF MY PERFECT MIND

noreply@blogger.com (Edward Petherbridge) — Thu, 18 Sep 2014 05:45:00 +0000

My Perfect Mind, now playing at the Young Vic until 27 September, has received a fresh crop of outstanding reviews (4 and 5 Stars).

Photo by Tristram Kenton

As [Petherbridge] approaches his 80th birthday, he has acquired a tremendous sense of majesty that makes him a magnetic stage presence: I sincerely hope he may yet get to play Lear and deliver the lines that remain so stubbornly in his head.
In the meantime, this is a great showcase for these talents and a fascinating insight, too, into the mind of a great, all too often under-appreciated, actor who clearly refuses to go gently into that good night.

Telegraph, 17 September (Read full review)

My Perfect Mind is an inspired fusion of styles, and brings a light but inventive touch to a story that should have been anything but funny. Instead, it is hilarious, with Paul Hunter as Olivier offering menacing, gnomic advice to young actors one of many highlights. It also achieves moments of real depth, not least when Petherbridge repeats Inca chants from his role in Peter Schaffer’s landmark The Royal Hunt of the Sun. For a brief moment the legendary 1964 production flickers back to life before our eyes. My Perfect Mind achieves the perfect balance, where the glory of playing the King comes with the inevitable casting as the Fool.

Londonist, 11 September (Read full review)

Don’t miss it, is my advice … The show is peppered with such carefree erudition and plenty of jibes about the National and the RSC, the greatness of Olivier, even the slapdash pretentiousness of this show itself; EP’s ghostly daubs on the back panel he describes as ‘a bad day at Tate Modern’ and the fashionably sloping truckle stage is derided as often as it is cleverly negotiated. What amazed me at the Young Vic last night was how a packed, and predominantly young, audience lapped it all up, even the nostalgic recherché-ness of EP’s acidulous reminiscence.

WhatsOnStage, 11 September (Read full review)

Edward Petherbridge’s greatest claim to worldwide fame comes from playing Dorothy L. Sayers's Lord Peter Wimsey for the BBC in the 1980s. His greatest artistic achievement, though, may well be this invigoratingly odd account, first seen here last year, of his doomed attempt to play King Lear.
This mix of memory play, acting masterclass, comedy lecture and double act has a playful charm to match its sense of investigation. … It’s also full of ironies and symmetries, running gags and compassion as it apes the brain's way of threading together the past and the present. There’s nothing quite like it.

The Times, 15 September (Read full review - subscription only)

Edward Petherbridge is perfectly cast as Edward Petherbridge – giving a heightened portrayal of himself with a nifty nonchalance that neatly underpins the play’s abundance of absurdity with deliciously dry digressions. … Both actors are adorable and spark off each other in style, creating flashes of brilliance that light up the jaunty rake.

Gay Times, 10 September (Read full review)

The actors negotiate their way around the physically challenging set well – especially Petherbridge who is now 78 years old. Various covered objects set near to the wall of the theatre come into play later on during one of King Lear’s most powerful speeches. The stories told by Petherbridge are fascinating – we are taken through his childhood in Bradford where his ancestors moved from Devon, told of how his mother suffered a stroke while she was days away from giving birth to Edward and Petherbridge re-enacts a talent show he entered as a young boy. The walk down memory lane provides Petherbridge with the opportunity to act out some of the more well-known scenes from King Lear.

Broadway World, 12 September (Read full review)

Artistic autobiography, entertaining anecdotes, lashings of well-spoken Shakespeare, meta-theatrical commentary and the opportunity to spend 90 minutes in the company of one of the most charming of veteran actors, all filtered through inventive verbal and physical clowning, make this return of a 2013 production (on its way to a national tour) very welcome.

The Stage, 10 September (Read full review)

My Perfect Mind is a love letter to Shakespeare, and to the theatre, with scenes from Lear beautifully interspaced around the narrative, perfectly echoing the emotion or action happening. The energy that Petherdbridge brings to the stage at 78 is astounding, and he seems just as truthful and alive as Lear as he does camping it up to play an exaggerated version of him self. Supported gamely by Hunter playing every other role, the pair have developed a wisecracking, side splitting to-and-fro which is at times as heartbreaking as it is hilarious.

The Public Reviews, 10 September (Read full review)

Edward Petherbridge gets his magic in the end and is King Lear but it’s a magic fashioned and derived from the detritus of a tragic event that could have turned out differently if other perceptions and choices were made. The play’s a great teacher and has some wonderful comic moments and is a nice complement to the Young Vic’s main house show, A Streetcar Named Desire, where the longing for a different kind of magic hyper reality has disastrous consequences.

Theatre Bubble, 10 September (Read full review)

See also the wonderful ‘vox pops’ recorded at the Young Vic and posted on YouTube:

LOOSE ENDS, RADIO 4

noreply@blogger.com (Edward Petherbridge) — Sat, 13 Sep 2014 22:13:00 +0000

Edward is one of Clive Anderson’s guests on this week’s edition of Radio 4’s Loose Ends. Hear him talk about My Perfect Mind which is currently being revived at the Young Vic ahead of a national tour this autumn.

Edward at Broadcasting House

The show has once again received rave reviews. Read Michael Coveney’s review for WhatsOnStage here.

BEAN, DOG OF THE WEEK

noreply@blogger.com (Edward Petherbridge) — Sun, 22 Jun 2014 02:28:00 +0000

Having previously featured in my blog, both in her ambassadorial role and as artist’s model, Bean has this week attained a new celebrity. She is seen here against a verdant Sussex backdrop.

Click here to see Bean featured as Dog of the Week in Town & Country Magazine.

MY PERFECT MIND RETURNS

noreply@blogger.com (Edward Petherbridge) — Thu, 27 Feb 2014 06:30:00 +0000

After its triumphant London premiere last spring, My Perfect Mind returns to the Young Vic for a limited season in early autumn. Produced by Told by an idiot and directed by Kathryn Hunter, the show stars Edward and Paul Hunter.

Booking is now open on the Young Vic website.

Dates: 3-27 September.
Performances: 7:45 p.m.  Saturday matinees (except 6 Sept): 2:45 p.m.
Running time: 90 minutes without an interval

Photo by Jane Hobson

Last year Edward was nominated for a UK Theatre Award for his role in the show that was described by the Guardian’s Lyn Gardner as ‘an exquisite piece of tomfoolery [that] offers a playful and moving exploration of life as an ongoing performance’.

The production returns as part of Told By An Idiot’s 21st birthday celebrations. A national tour (dates and venues to be announced) will follow the Young Vic season.

My Perfect Mind is a show unlike any other. (Telegraph)

Petherbridge gives a layered performance that combines candour, wit, quizzical vagueness and a dry dignity. His understated yet heartfelt work is essential to the success of this playful and highly unusual piece. (Evening Standard)

Photo by Jane Hobson

EDWARD AS GEORGE III

noreply@blogger.com (Edward Petherbridge) — Sat, 09 Nov 2013 04:55:00 +0000

Edward will appear as guest lead in an episode of the forthcoming television adaptation of Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell, the 2004 debut novel by Susanna Clarke. The story is an ‘alternative history’ set in nineteenth-century England at the time of the Napoleonic Wars and is based on the premise that magic once existed in England and has returned with two men, Gilbert Norrell and Jonathan Strange. Edward will play the part of King George III.

The book was longlisted for the Man Booker, shortlisted for the Whitbread First Novel Award and won a total of six awards, including The Times Best Novel of the Year.

The seven-part TV series is adapted by Peter Harness and directed by Toby Haynes. It will be broadcast next year on BBC One and BBC America.

MICHAEL COVENEY ON SLIM CHANCES NT 50

noreply@blogger.com (Edward Petherbridge) — Sat, 02 Nov 2013 03:04:00 +0000

From Michael Coveney’s WhatsOnStage blog, ‘Superb BBC films celebrate the National; so does Edward Petherbridge’, (1st November):

As we all gear up for tomorrow night’s anniversary gala in the Olivier – I count myself lucky and privileged to have a ticket – which is broadcast live on BBC2, there’s just time to acknowledge another important contribution to the literature surrounding the occasion (no sign yet of Daniel Rosenthal’s “authorized” history): a reissue of Edward Petherbridge’s Slim Chances.

Petherbridge’s new sub-title – “NT 50: Personal, Partial, Unofficial” – is a treasure trove of wonderful stories, poems and memories of his time in Olivier’s company, from playing small parts in Othello and Royal Hunt to Ferdinand Gadd in Trelawny of the Wells and Guildenstern in Stoppard’s debut play; and then beyond to his participation in the Hall regime (he ran a company with Ian McKellen) and Trevor Nunn’s.

He’s particularly touching in conveying the downside of being an actor, the odd feeling of being lonely and undervalued in an otherwise happy ensemble, something Michael Blakemore doesn't quite catch in his own wonderful account of five years with Olivier, Stage Blood (Petherbridge had six with “Sir”).

“No job gave me a stronger sense of desolation, of being nothing” writes Petherbridge, “than standing in the plainest of 17th century garb with Christopher Timothy, on Dutch Courtesan nights, waiting to lay a carpet to give Billie Whitelaw somewhere to lounge.” Who’d be an actor, even at the National?

To read the post in full, click here.

Order a signed copy of this special edition of Slim Chances, complete with bonus 78-minute CD, from Peth’s Staging Post.


From the book: The Old Vic rehearsal room. Left to right: Gillian Barge, Frank Wylie (seated), Laurence Olivier, Michael Turner (in back), Edward Hardwicke, Margot Cunningham, EP, Kenneth Mackintosh. Photo by Chris Arthur

PUBLISHED TODAY!

noreply@blogger.com (Edward Petherbridge) — Tue, 22 Oct 2013 04:13:00 +0000

Today marks the National Theatre’s golden anniversary and the official publication of Edward’s NT 50 special edition of Slim Chances, complete with bonus CD. The CD features a feast of extras and surprises.

The book will be available to purchase from Amazon and the NT Bookshop and signed copies are exclusively available from Peth’s Staging Post.

View the trailer here.

************

In a recent poll conducted by the Telegraph to decide the ten best productions of the National Theatre’s first decade (1963-1973), Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead (1967) was voted No. 1.

John Stride and EP in Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead.
Photo by Anthony Crickmay

PRE-ORDER SLIM CHANCES NT 50 SPECIAL EDITION

noreply@blogger.com (Edward Petherbridge) — Sun, 06 Oct 2013 02:20:00 +0000

Back cover design

Pre-order your signed copy of the NT 50 special edition of Slim Chances, complete with bonus CD, from Peth’s Staging Post.

The official publication date is 22nd October 2013.

EDWARD NOMINATED FOR UK THEATRE AWARD

noreply@blogger.com (Edward Petherbridge) — Fri, 27 Sep 2013 02:53:00 +0000

Photo by Manuel Harlan

We are delighted to announce the exciting news that Edward has been nominated for Best Performance in a Play for My Perfect Mind in this year’s UK Theatre Awards.

The UK Theatre Awards, established in 1991, recognize stage productions presented throughout England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland.

This year’s awards, presented by the Theatrical Management Association (TMA), will be held at London’s Guildhall on Sunday, 20 October.

See the full list of nominations here.

And a reminder of some of the plaudits Edward received for his performance last spring:

Petherbridge’s mixture of bravado and frailty brings real heart to the enterprise. GUARDIAN

Petherbridge deliver[s] the mad king’s lines with a rare, spellbinding gentleness … My Perfect Mind is a show unlike any other and one that captures Petherbridge’s endearing personality, both as an actor – who can forget his extraordinarily moving Newman Noggs in the RSC’s Nicholas Nickleby? – and as a man. TELEGRAPH

Petherbridge gives a layered performance that combines candour, wit, quizzical vagueness and a dry dignity. His understated yet heartfelt work is essential to the success of this playful and highly unusual piece. EVENING STANDARD

In the guise of Lear, Petherbridge is both fragile and volatile – a great actor feeling at home in a great part. THE STAGE

What came out of all the heartbreak, physiotherapy and intense work Mr Petherbridge had to overcome was this stunning and incredibly beautiful production that in the case with all great works, left the audience laughing with the two actors but also more importantly empathising, a rare treat for any play to deliver in such great quantity. LIVERPOOL SOUND AND VISION

With Paul Hunter. Photo by Manuel Harlan