Lovesong by Abi Morgan, featuring Siân Phillips, intertwines a couple in their 20s with the same man and woman a lifetime later. Celebrated for their physical style of theatre, Frantic Assembly return to Scotland following success with Beautiful Burnout.
Their past and present selves collide in this haunting and beautiful tale of togetherness. Read more …
All relationships have their ups and downs; the optimism of youth becomes the wisdom of experience, the lines between past and present become blurred, memory becomes unreliable and changes history.
Lovesong is inspired by the T.S. Eliot poem ‘The Lovesong of J. Alfred Prufrock’.
At the curtain call I found myself surrounded by sniffles – not surprising considering that Morgan mines such a familiarly nostalgic seam. Though Lovesong falls short of the almost industrial heart-tugging of Love Story, I wouldn’t be surprised if they start selling tissues in the foyer.
This portrait of ageing and enduring love tugs at the heartstrings, whatever your date of birth.
Like love itself, Lovesong can take your breath away...It provokes a higher hankie turnout than any play since War Horse.
It is a gentle, compassionate piece, but would be more moving still if it strove less hard to be so.
Scott Graham and Steven Hoggett’s production is often deeply moving...the writing, however, is sometimes flat, lacking the revealing detail that could turn a good production into a great one.
Scott Graham’s production is a little pretentious in parts – with strange, cinematic backdrops, this time of migrating starlings – but it is at its strongest when the old couple have to confront their youthful alter egos.
As the title suggests, Lovesong is a beautifully fragile elegy that's to die for.
What this beautiful 90-minute show has in glorious quantities, though, is skill and richness in theatrical presentation; in the poetry of Morgan’s text, in the powerful use of video and sound, and above all in Sian Phillips’s stunning central performance as Maggie, beautifully supported by Sam Cox as Bill, Leanne Rowe as Maggie’s younger self, and Edward Bennett as young Bill.
It’s elegiac stuff, with the use of William Galloway’s projected images – a wedding band here; post it notes left by Maggie to keep Billy right when she’s gone turning into starlings – and a subtle underpinning score, adding to the atmosphere.
Lovesong looks at beginning and end of a marriage
It's a coming of age
Citizens' Theatre, Glasgow from Tuesday February 7, 2012, until Saturday February 11, 2012. More info: www.citz.co.uk