The Daily Telegraph from London, Greater London, England • 27

H' THE DAILY TELEGRAPH THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 18, 1997 27 ARTS The IS BBC pletely to the TV news latest shake- in TV and radio news has angered staff. Gillian Reynolds believes it should worry listeners too should bring in changes BBC right put logic? would not be far behind. But it entirely logical and com- that if Woman's Hour now has predictable that the Is the to its faith in no editor of its own, Today it runs its radio and wasn't. way operation. Whether it is managerial reply is that desirable is less certain.

How it can bring better service to listeners and viewers remains a complete mystery. Starting in just a couple of weeks, there is to be a huge reorganisation of all network news and daily current affairs structures. Five new executive editors will take charge of vast swathes of output. Radio 4's Today, BBC1's 6pm and 9pm news bulletins and BBC2's Newsnight will be among programmes which are to lose their own editors. BBC journalists will no longer belong to a programme team but to BBC News and Current Affairs as a whole.

From next year onwards they will all work together at a new glass-fronted complex, Stage VI, situated on the south face of Television Centre at White City in west London. It was the decision to go ahead with Stage VI and the consequent row over radio's own news being removed from Broadcasting House which lay behind Liz Forgan's abrupt resignation two as managing director of radio. It is the prospect now of not being a Newsnight or a REVIEWS Triumphant return of a jealous lover PRODUCTIONS of Othello are a rarity these days, especially in comparison with other great tragedies. This has nothing to do with the quality of the play Othello may lack the spiritual dimension of Hamlet, Lear and Macbeth, but its theatrical impact is shattering and a great deal to do with political correctness. It is no longer considered acceptable for white actors to black up for the title role, yet there are relatively few black actors with the authority and technical accomplishment to play Othello successfully.

This surely explains why the RSC, cravenly, hasn't staged this marvellous study of malign evil and overpowering sexual jealousy for eight years when it revives lesser works with wearisome regularity. It's a silly situation. Black actors, rightly in my view, are now given the chance to play roles traditionally taken by whites. We're all meant to be colour-blind these days, and I have no problem with it; but it is surely absurd that the traffic is all oneHaving got these thoughts off my chest, I have to say that Sam Mendes's new production at the Cottesloe is a stunning success. It features a young black actor who is clearly heading towards a great career.

David Harewood faced a formidable challenge. First he was a replacement for the superb Adrian Lester, who received an offer from Hollywood that he couldn't refuse. Secondly he has Simon Russell Beale as his lago, an actor so brilliant and so hypnotically charismatic that he often makes everyone else on stage look second It doesn't happen in Mendes's production, which, like so much of his work, is clear, direct, full of closely observed detail and displays a profound understanding of what makes the play tick. This is a very British Othello, set in the 1930s or '40s. The Venetian senators are members of the English establishment, coping with a Theatre Othello National Theatre foreign crisis from their desks in Whitehall over brandy and cigars.

Cyprus is a colonial outpost facing a bit of trouble from Johnny Turk. Othello is the black who has been allowed an uneasy place in these exalted circles because of his great gifts as a soldier, though racism simmers beneath the apparently affable surface. It's a setting that brings the play uncomfortably close to home without forcing it out of shape, and the military, oppressively male atmosphere in Cyprus is equally well caught, especially during the brilliantly staged, increasingly chilling drinking scene. It is inevitably Russell Beale who commands most attention. Plump and, one suspects, clammy, his lago puts one in mind of a terrifyingly articulate, obscenely cunning slug, and the only surprise is that he doesn't leave a trail of slime across the tiled stage as he glides across it.

It is a performance full of inspired improvisation and bitter disgust, disgust for his dupes, certainly, but also, one suspects, for himself. There's an extraordinary scene when, after decisively impaling Othello on his hook, he is left alone and retches violently. A reaction of delayed shock to Othello's pistol-wielding fury? Or a sudden awareness of just how vile he is? Russell Beale has the courage to let the character remain inscrutable lago's evil finally inexplicable but there is a fascinating sug. gestion that his hatred of the Moor may be inspired by guilty sexual desire. It's buried deep, so deep that lago hardly recognises it himself, but when he tenderly strokes Othello's cheek, a window is thrown open on the play.

Harewood is a conventional Othello, full of lofty orotundity in the opening FLYING MUSIC IN ASSOCIATION WITH PERFECTLY FRANK LTD present The Sinated UNDER WITCH MY CRAFT SKIN 4 Tribute to F1 FRANK SINATRA MI and THE BIG BANDS NEW YORK ANDY PRIOR NEW YORK featuring DONNA CANALE with THE ANDY PRIOR ORCHESTRA IN THE NIGHT NORTHAMPTON The Derngate 01604 24811 19th IPSWICH Regent Theatre 01473 281480 23rd EDINBURGH Festival Theatre 0131 529 6000 October 7th DARTFORD The Orchard 01322 220000 8th READING Hexagon Theatre 0118 960 6080 9th WORTHING Pavilion Theatre 01903 820500 10th ST ALBANS The Alban Arena 01727 844488 14th DERBY Assembly Rooms 01332 255800 17th NORWICH Theatre Royal 01603 630000 22nd BUXTON Opera House 01298 72190 November 7th HASTINGS White Rock Theatre 01424 781000 8th CHATHAM Central Theatre 01634 403868 13th BOLTON The Albert Halls 01204 364333 15th ABERDEEN His Majesty's Theatre 01224 641122 19th CRAWLEY The Hawth 01293 553636 20th KINGS LYNN Corn Exchange 01553 764864 21st ABERYSTWYTH The Arts Centre 01970 623232 23rd WOLVERHAMPTON Grand Theatre 01902 429212 24th HIGH WYCOMBE Swan Theatre 01494 512000 celebration of a unique musical legend! Today journalist, nor of being able to rise to editor of Radio 4's Thie World at One TV's breakfast news any more that has now roused the News and Affairs ranks to a state of high alarm and deep despondency. and viewers have grounds to worry too. Over the past year it has been possible to pick up a new pattern of story repetition. A report first heard on Radio 5 Live's breakfast programme is picked up later on Radio 4's Today, then again, with added pictures, on BBC1's 1pm news and may stick around until the 6pm bulletin. It's like watching the progress of a meal down a vast digestive system.

Stand by for even more. In November the new 24-hour TV continuous news service is to be launched. This is the BBC's first toe into the wide ocean of digital broadcasting, for which the Christopher Bland, has said more than once that he is not about to "mortage the but which, to many outside the BBC as well as within, looks like the Corporation's big. gest and most dangerous gamble. This expansion is based on much expensive research and consultancy, from which the message has emerged: go digital or die.

Finding money to go digital means making the most of every single piece of expenditure. Expenditure on news is huge, therefore it is being rearranged more economically, spread thinner. The result is that huge cuts are being made in all the programme budgets. That's the logical and inevita- Telegraph promotion Win £100 towards your telephone bill Picture: ALASTAIR MUIR David Harewood's powerful Moor contrasts terrifyingly with Claire Skinner's vulnerable Desdemona scenes and with massive nat- the early scenes she seems to ural dignity. His anger, how- glow with love and sensual- ever, is awesome, his distress harrowing and the scenes of domestic violence with Desdemona almost unbearable in their intensity.

This is perhaps the most claustrophobic of Shakespeare's plays, and Harewood fills its stifling dramatic space to bursting point. My only cavil is the irritating pauses he sometimes introduces in the middle of lines. In contrast to his louring muscular presence, the petite, -thin Claire Skinner makes a terrifyingly vulnerable Desdemona. In ity, but it is her pained, pinched appearance at the end, coupled with that wonderful unconditional love, that makes this production so poignant. There is space for only the briefest commendations of Colin Tierney's unusually compelling Cassio and Maureen Beattie's sympathetic, love- Emilia.

This is a tremendous production of a play whose recent neglect strikes me as being little short of scandalous. Tickets: 0171 928 2252 CHARLES SPENCER A fine romance with kite strings attached NICOLAE is not here. Not any more, anyway. In Lin Coghlan's new play presented by a fine collaborating ensemble of British and Romanian actors Nicolae is the man Maggie has never forgotten. They fell in love in London when he was a young Romanian dissident and she had just emigrated from Ireland.

Her son, Nicky, is his child. But Nicolae had to go as he explained to get his relatives out of trouble back home. Now, 18 years on, Maggie (excellent Nicola Redmond) has come to Romania nursing fond memories, with a recalcitrant Nicky in tow. She never finds Nicolae, but is welcomed into his family by his mother (homely Aneta Christ, communicating merrily in her native tongue) and brother Mihail (Iulian Enache, speaking charmingly rickety English). You might this play, directed Osdescribe, ment, as a holiday romance.

An attachment grows between Maggie and Mihail. Simultaneously Nicky and his cousin Gabi tentatively become sweethearts. Jonah Russell and Medeea Marinescu are touching and amusing as the teenagers, hovering around each other in an exquisite confusion of awkwardness and desire. But the romance is beset by difficulties. Coghlan pictures single people midand adolescent feeling lonely and unloved, some overwhelmed by jealousy and secret family griefs.

Nicolae's adoring sister ble side. It has been widely debated within the BBC and should have come as no surprise to those journalists gathering in heated groups yesterday at the Yorkshire Grey and other hostelries near Broadcasting House. But it did. What seems logical on a piece of paper to group all the radio news sequences together and have staff rotas that cross between programmes makes no sense at all to reporters on The World at One who long to scoop PM. It should have been evident the competition lies outside the BBC, not within, that they should all be massing up as one BBC to take on not each other but ITN and IRN and the Internet as well.

But it takes more than a piece of paper to get that across. It's a job for a real manager. The furore at the BBC over this latest reorganisation shows all too clearly that there's no such person there. Diktat, yes; leadership, no. It's a pity and bound to show where it matters, in the programmes.

And that, by any reckoning. is bad business fort the BBC. Playing up to the celebrity crowd THE first-night audience included singer Boy George, couturier Jasper Conran, agony aunt Clare Rayner, modern choreographer Richard Alston and Royal Ballet star Darcey Bussell. Whatever else Les Ballets Trockadero de Monte Carlo are, they are neither exclusive nor elitist in their appeal. Their first visit to London for 10 years was greeted by a cacophonous audience, ranging from total ballet ignoramuses to abject fans.

The Trocks should be a huge hit. For 23 years this bizarre American company has paraded men in tutus and on pointe, parodying both classics and those who perform them. They hark back as the names of both company and "cast" betray to a pre-Diaghilev era when every ballerina was either an imperial mistress or a nutter, and all were prima ballerina assoluta. Darcey Bussell, who delighted both audience and performers by handing out the evening's final bouquets, is much too modest and wellbalanced to find herself a Trock parody possibly to her relief. Their fortnight has two programmes: next week's Giselle and Parisienne should be fun, but this week's is perfect.

It begins very broad, with Swan Lake, and subtly fines down to the highlight, Paquita. Subtle, did I say? Can one use such a word of drag-ballet-comedy? Yes, most certainly. This company is funny, naughty, clever, expert subtle. The male physique may be the main joke, but it's put through a kaleidoscope of vivid personalities with 74 DE 27 01 00 67 01 Es 00 2 14 Les Ballets Trockadero de Monte Carlo Peacock Theatre, WC2 considerable polish. Bobby Carter (a blond-wigged negro who does a startlingly fleet Stars and Stripes and Paquita solo) is the Miss Piggy of the troupe.

Yonny Manaure, built like a brick outhouse, has weirdly delicate arms, a shimmering backward and looked utterly inconsolable as Esmeralda. Lanky Paul Ghiselin, variously an arthritic broiler of a Dying Swan, a hippie Rothbart and an inebriated one-eyed gipsy girl in Esmeralda, is collectable. And yet in some ways the chief charm of the Trocks is their corps de ballet- inserting a thoroughly modern backstage subtext into (mostly) classic steps, bitching mutely away to each other, shamelessly upstaging the soloists. I would give roses to Rashonn James, a 6ft 1in black pipe-cleaner, whose whole being lights up when he waltzes. And is the Trocks' pointework really any good? One can't pretend that these vast feet are pretty.

But an awful lot of people may now wince when they see "real" ballerinas. Not only because they feel for the women's feet, but because they rather wish some of them would bring that same sweet, uncomplicated joy in classical ballet that these Trocks, in their odd way, do. Until Sept 28. Tickets: 0171 314 8800 ISMENE BROWN Theatre With Love from Nicolae Bristol Old Vic Iuliana (Monica Mihaescu) treats Maggie alternately as a beloved friend and a threat. More fully explored is the tension and unarticulated affection between Maggie and Nicky.

Russell makes a hilarious bolshy adolescent, monosyllabically rude, acting cool but clearly fuming. Coghlan also captures the cruelty of teenage frankness when Nicky finally tells his mum what he thinks of the father whose idealised memory he hates. The company might, however, push the painful scenes still further. The play slips towards sentimentality when speeches are underlined with music. The parallels between the generations are slightly schematic and the last act goes into a tailspin.

Coghlan's symbolism can be clunking too, with Mihail pointedly helping Maggie to let go of a kite string to which she keeps clinging. No matter, most of Coghlan's dialogue is delightful and you'd think that Osment's cast a strikingly believable family had been together for ever. A round of applause for the collaborating companies: Bristol Old Vic, Clear Day Productions and Romania's Theatrul Dramatic Constantza. Until Sat. Tickets: 01179877877 KATE BASSETT Telephone Roulette Telephone Roulette application form 4 Every day this week we'll be spinning the Send this form to Telephone Roulette 4, PO Box 3826, Colchester CO2 8ES to to enable one to win £100 arrive by Monday, September 22, 1997.

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