... 1980, the play charts the changing fortunes of the fast dwindling race of lightermen whose traditional skills employed in rowing their 'lighters' along the river are being threatened by the increasing use of tugs and containers. The conflicts and tension ...

... time to time shows a wind-torn landscape silhouetted against a night sky. the groupings and movements of the players and a row of five short pillars. The story line, if it can be so il- sulted, is about four odd females, who may be earthly or extra t ...

... strongly sexual Gertrude, John Nettleton as a jovially pan dering Polonius, Terence Wilton virile and fiery as Laertes, John Rowe an upright Horatio, Michael Howarth and Philip York conveying the puzzlement of Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, Robert Eddison ...

... Moreover, Estelle Parsons' authority in the role is sufficient to make members of the audience especially those in the front rows look distinctly nervous as she rails at them and leaves the stage to stride up and down the aisles If the play can be faulted ...

... with a symbolic set and skilfully controlled direction, the overall conception is as provocative as it is inventive. Sandra Rowe ...

... and makes us feel so impotent. We hear of the additio- fl nal reasons why some of the teen agers want to go generation gap rows with parents, restlessness, lack of qualifications, inability to settle to the humdrum routine of earning a living, etc. g ...

... bine the two forms, purists from neither camp could deny the en thusiasm from an audience that de manded two encores. Sandra Rowe REVIEWS ...

... there is comedy, with the filthy King Aegeus (of stable fame) and with the hero's rather dim friend, Iolaus, who sweeps whole rows of children on to the stage at one point while demonstrating just how 40 years of dung disappeared over night. Ashton directs ...

... Top of the World and looking like something from a more adventurous kiddies TV playtime programme. The audience in the front row were often in danger of being con cussed by a stray box or body. But to see such inventiveness it's almost u/nrth talrino nut ...

... 16) hilarious Rustic; Rupert Frazer, heroic as Pompey; Kenneth Gilbert in an Everyman rendering of Enobarbus; an intense John Rowe as Canidius; and ZBe Hicks as a knowing and intelligent Charmien. Designer Nicholas Georgiadis' autumnal shaded costumes brilli ...

... of attraction. He has too an understandable smugness which is twice as offensive as his verbal rudeness. As his wife, Pippa Rowe is touchingly sincere. Nicely subdued are Lesley Manville as his daughter and Katharine Schofield as the weaver. There are ...

... particu larly Gilbert's enduring favour ite about the lozenge with magical powers. The story ends just after the famous carpet row, when Gilbert refused to pay his share of the cost of recarpeting part of the Savoy Theatre, an incident which broke up the ...