I have never heard the term “fringe theater” before, but … I wanted to see Witness for the Prosecution so bad because I love stuff like that, but by the time I went to get tickets, they were either 80 pounds or the rush tickets had sold out. A group of us still needed to see a fringe play, so we went to see The Lady in the Van in Stratford-upon-Avon. We paid around 10 pounds for the tickets, and to be honest, the show just wasn’t great. Granted it’s the end of the trip, and everyone’s so tired and doesn’t have much of an attention span left, but this just wasn’t interesting.
The theater had probably 100 people in it at most, and all of the audience was 70 years old or older except for us. The story itself was extremely hard to follow and kept jumping back and forth so much. The blocking was not good, so choppy, and did not make sense. Before they would start a scene, they would be in some theatrical pose, and then it wouldn’t even make sense with the scene they did next, and they let a millennial pause slip every time. It was truthfully just cheesy and corny but in a boring way, not even a comical way. Basically, I was fighting off sleep the entire play.
We ended up leaving at intermission because we just couldn’t do it anymore. I hate to do that, but it just wasn’t worth it to stay, unfortunately. I will give the play a few compliments, though! The costumes were actually really accurate to the time period and put together well enough to see everyone’s wealth and lifestyle. The colors throughout the play were really fun and groovy, which was a lot like how it would’ve been in the time period this play was set. The actors playing the older and younger versions of the main character were actually pretty good actors, but the actor playing the lady in the van was sooo bad!!!
Theatre in London U of A 