Critical Voices at the Suspense Festival

Macbeth from the Little Angel Theatre

What a breathe of fresh air to attend a seminar on constructive theatrical criticism and learn simple methods to tame your mind and write a constructive crit, after watching a theatre performance. For me it's always been tricky to know where to start, when writing about a production I've recently seen. My mind seems to jump all over the place and its quite difficult to know exactly where to begin and what to focus upon.

On Saturday afternoon, I was fortunate to attend Critical Voices at The Actor's Centre in London, as part of Suspense Festival 2013.  Now I realise that it's important to begin with an opening paragraph describing the logistics of the said production. The second point is to describe a particular moment - an image that sticks in your mind and you may describe how you feel about it? We can then go into your personal views about the production and it's impact upon you. Finally we may end with a short sentence in final judgement of the experience. I certainly realise that this is not the only way to write about a performance, but it has certainly given me the clarity that I previously lacked.

I am thankful to Jake Orr (A Younger Theatre & Dialogues), Honour Bayes (Time Out, The Guardian & Theatre Critic)  and Diana Damiau (Exeunt Blog).  Tonight I'm off to see Macbeth at the Little Angel Theatre, so keep tuned ..