The Uncensored Critic Podcast

Ray trained at Rose Bruford and has been a part of some of the best things across stage and screen since. 

His credits include, for Film:

• Hamilton
• Beauty and the Beast
• Hamlet, dir. Ken Branagh
• Summer in Cape Town 
• Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone

TV:

• Red Dwarf
• Death in Paradise
• Shakespeare and Hathaway 
• Silent Witness
• His Dark Materials

Theatre:

• Countless shows with the RSC - Pericles, Othello, Romeo & Juliet, Troilus and Cressida and The Merchant of Venice to name a few. 
• Macbeth at the Globe
• Guys and Dolls
• The Firm, Hampstead Theatre

Including one very special credit with the RSC in 2012, where he played Mark Antony in Gregory Doran’s African adaptation of one of Shakespeare’s best plays, Julius Caesar. Special mention to the whole company and creative team behind it (now available on Globe Player and DVD)!

We discuss his journey into the business and his monumental performance as Mark Antony.

How he found his version of the character, who he is to him and how approaching famous monologues like “the dogs of war” or “Friends, Romans, Countrymen, lend me your ears” is anything but difficult. 

You just understand what the character is saying and why they’re saying it. 

All this and much more, thank you Ray!

Oliver Gower

Spotlight Link: https://www.spotlight.com/9097-9058-5261

Instagram: @ollietheuncensoredcritic

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Track Name. Early Morning 

Simon is one of the most celebrated directors in the London theatre scene. He has tackled some of the most well-known texts in the literary canon as well as new writer’s work.

His directing credits include:

• Killer Joe, staring Orlando Bloom - Trafalgar Theatre
• Rubber Room, Old Vic
• The Resistible Rise of Arturo Ui, Donmar Warehouse, starring Lenny Henry and his sister Lucy Eaton
• Silence of the Sea, Donmar 
• Almost Maine, Park Theatre
• Alligators, Hampstead Theatre

Currently, he is the director of the smash-hit revival of Edmund Rostand’s classic play “Cyrano de Bergerac”,  playing now at the Noel Coward Theatre after a successful run at the RSC, starring Adrian Lester. 

On top of this, Simon also co-created, wrote and starred in “Staged”, a drama that brilliantly captured life in lockdown. Streaming now on BBC IPlayer starring Michael Sheen, David Tennant, Samuel L.Jackson, Lucy Eaton, Judi Dench amongst many more. 

We discuss making “Staged” during the lockdown, the rewards and challenges of putting a piece of television together during the restrictions, and how you can make a story out of anything. 

As well as, working with poet Debris Stevenson on reviving Cyrano de Bergerac, bringing it back to London audiences and how this play still has the power to make you laugh, cry and remind you of the power of words. 

Get your tickets now! Playing until 5th September. 

Thank you so much Simon!

Oliver Gower

Spotlight Link: https://www.spotlight.com/9097-9058-5261

Instagram: @ollietheuncensoredcritic

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Music from #InAudio: https://inaudio.org/ 

Track Name. Early Morning 

Welcome back to Shakespeare Saturday! 

Connecting modern hearts to timeless stories. 

Hosted by myself and Sarah Spring 🎭

This week we look at one of the Bard’s most performed comedies, Twelfth Night. 

The story starts at sea, a shipwreck, Viola thinking she is the only survivor between herself and her twin brother Sebastian, sets foot on the island of Illyria. “What country, friends, is this?” She asks. 

What ensues is a love triangle of all love triangles between Orsino, Cesario (Viola) and Olivia. 

Viola disguised as a boy (Cesario) meets the Duke, Orsino, who is infatuated with Olivia, who in turn is grieving the loss of her brother and father and is reluctant to return Orsino’s passion. Olivia upon a chance meeting with Cesario (Viola in disguise) falls head over heels in love with ‘him’ while Viola has become completely enamoured with Orsino, despite his constant wailing and self-deprecation. 

Whilst at the same time, pure chaos kicks off between Maria, Sir Toby Belch and Sir Andrew Agucheek, who plan to prank Malvolio. They do so by planting a letter supposedly written by Olivia to the pompous and irritating purist, making him believe that she has fallen in love with him in a cruel yet amusing plot to bring him down. 

Sarah and I discuss what makes this one of the most celebrated comedies as well as how far one could say this play is a tragedy in disguise. 

Not to mention how this play was inspired by one of Shakespeare’s favourite poets, Ovid, and his book “Metamorphosis” which promotes Sarah’s “Echo Theory” that she outlines in detail. 

Furthermore, how this play tackles themes to do with gender, cross dressing, false accusation, false hope, identity, sexuality and a celebration of Greek mythology, all in a way that makes you think and above all else, makes you laugh.

Special mention to the brilliant all male production at the Globe in 2012 (available to watch on Globe Player) led by Mark Rylance as Olivia and Stephen Fry as Malvolio. 

Stay tuned for more geek out sessions on Shakespeare Saturday, and until next time, keep finding the magic in your own life!

Follow Sarah on Instagram: @shakespearemadeclear

Her website: damesarahspring.com

Oliver Gower

Spotlight Link: https://www.spotlight.com/9097-9058-5261

Instagram: @ollietheuncensoredcritic

For enquiries and requests: [email protected]

Please Like, Download and Subscribe ✍️

Thank you all for your support!

Music from #InAudio: https://inaudio.org/ 

Track Name. Early Morning 

Chloëbeth is a classically trained singer who achieved a grade 8 in her ABRSM (Associated Board of the Royal Schools of Music) with distinction when she was only 17. 

She studied Contemporary Theatre and Performance as well as Popular Music at University in Manchester for 4 years graduating with a first in 2014. 

Her vocal interests stretch across genres such as jazz, musical theatre, pop, however her specialty is with the classics. The one that wows the crowds as well as men in Italian churches on Instagram!

She has also been involved in television with a leading role in a BBC 1 Drama Documentary, as well as playing “Carmen” and “Serena” in Fame: The Musical. 

Her vocals have been heard across luxurious events such as weddings to gigs all hanging on very note. For more clips and access to her music, follow her on Instagram where you’ll find more clips of her in action and much more. 

We discuss her opera training, approaching famous songs such as Now We Are Free from Gladiator to how embracing your own interests and following your heart is the best thing you can do. 

Thank you Chloë!

Oliver Gower

Spotlight Link: https://www.spotlight.com/9097-9058-5261

Instagram: @ollietheuncensoredcritic

For enquiries and requests: [email protected]

Please Like, Download and Subscribe ✍️

Thank you all for your support!

Music from #InAudio: https://inaudio.org/ 

Track Name. Early Morning 

Kate is now one of three women on the Equity Register of Fight Directors since 2001, and has enjoyed working as a fight director for more than twenty years. 

Being a retired competitive boxer and qualified coach, she knows how to choreograph a physical fight, be it a bar brawl to battle scenes to make it look as effective as possible. While making sure the actors do it as safely as possible. 

She is the one that creates those fight scenes that make you move in your seat, grip your arm rest a little tighter and make you gasp with shock. For all the right reasons!

Her work spans across screen and SO MUCH theatre!

For screen she has worked on: Coronation Street, Emmerdale, Hollyoaks, Sky Pilot including adverts for Toyota. 

Her stage and screen crossovers include, Death of England (2022) starring Rafe Spall, and Romeo and Juliet (2021) starring Jessie Buckley and Josh O’Connor for the National Theatre. 

For theatre, she has worked at The National, RSC, The Globe, West End, Donmar, Royal Court, Royal Opera House New York and Regents Open Air Theatre to name a few. 

Some honourable mentions of her fight work were found on:

• King Lear, 2018, with Ian McKellen
• Cyrano de Bergerac, with James McAvoy
• Midsummer Nights Dream at the Bridge Theatre
• Frankenstein, National, with Benedict Cumberbatch and Jonny Lee Miller
• Othello, National, with Adrian Lester and Rory Kinnear 
• Curious Incident, National and West End
• Salomé, NT, and King Lear at the Almeida, with Yaël Farber

In her words:

“I love telling the physical story of the play through my fights - exploring what motivates the characters to commit such hideous acts of violence. I always work closely with the actors and I see my job as guiding them to a place of choreography that becomes an integral part of their roles. 

Obstacles are always opportunities, and I do my best to embrace everything that is thrown my way”. 

We discuss her process of directing fights, getting assured and comfortable with her actors beforehand and executing a stage combat scene that’s both believable and safely conducted. 

We look specifically at her work on Othello and getting a great reaction from a scene in a play called “Sweat”. 

Thank you Kate!

Oliver Gower

Spotlight Link: https://www.spotlight.com/9097-9058-5261

Instagram: @ollietheuncensoredcritic

For enquiries and requests: [email protected]

Please Like, Download and Subscribe ✍️

Thank you all for your support!

Music from #InAudio: https://inaudio.org/ 

Track Name. Early Morning 

Katie has worked extensively in immersive and interactive theatre both as a script writer, collaborator and immersive theatre specialist. 

Her acting credits include:

• Manhunt
• Slow Horses
• Bluestone 42
• Call the Midwife
• The Crimson Petal
• Number of plays both at the National and Bush Theatre. 

In immersive theatre she has led a number of projects, those include:

• Paddington Bear Experience 
• Boots on the Ground - Promenade show dedicated to the soldiers of WW1
• Peaky Blinders: The Rise
• Race New World - Site Specific
• Johnnie Walker Symphony in Blue
• Above and Beyond 

The above immersive theatre credits include collaborations with several acclaimed devised theatre companies, including, Tangled Feet, The Path Entertainment Group, Immersive Everywhere and Private Drama Events. 

We discuss her love of immersive theatre and the experiences it gives its audiences that are far from what you will encounter in a west end venue, or indeed any other theatrical space! As well as the level of detail she goes into and what makes a show that makes its spectators part of the story in more ways than one!

For more information and to get in touch, visit her website and instagram:

katielyons.co.uk

Thank you Katie!

Oliver Gower

Spotlight Link: https://www.spotlight.com/9097-9058-5261

Instagram: @ollietheuncensoredcritic

For enquiries and requests: [email protected]

Please Like, Download and Subscribe ✍️

Thank you all for your support!

Music from #InAudio: https://inaudio.org/ 

Track Name. Early Morning

Hello guys and welcome back to Shakespeare Saturday! 

Connecting modern hearts to timeless stories.

Hosted by myself and Sarah Spring 🎭

Today we look at not only one of our most loved Shakespeare texts, but one of our favourite plays of all time, Othello. 

Set against a backdrop of a conflict in Cyprus, Iago fuelled with anger that Michael Cassio has become the Moor’s lieutenant and assumption that Othello has slept with his wife abroad, sets out to destroy his life and marriage in a cruel and jealous plot. 

Through his talents of deception he manipulates Othello into thinking Desdemona has been unfaithful to him with Cassio. His intelligent yet evil scheme causes havoc and stirs the base in Cyprus into disarray. 

The play is a masterful, poignant and beautiful insight into how jealousy can corrupt the mind, the games of a narcissist and how believing opinion to be fact, can cause more damage than you think. 

Special mention to the outstanding 2013 production of Othello at the National Theatre starring Adrian Lester as Othello, Rory Kinnear as Iago, Jonathan Bailey as Cassio and Olivia Vinall as Desdemona.

Directed by Nicholas Hytner. 

Production is available to watch on National Theatre at Home. 

Stay tuned for more geek out sessions of Shakespeare Saturday!

Follow Sarah on Instagram: @shakespearemadeclear

Her website: damesarahspring.com

Oliver Gower

Spotlight Link: https://www.spotlight.com/9097-9058-5261

Instagram: @ollietheuncensoredcritic

For enquiries and requests: [email protected]

Please Like, Download and Subscribe ✍️

Thank you all for your support!

Music from #InAudio: https://inaudio.org/ 

Track Name. Early Morning 

Grace trained at East 15 Acting School and has been a Boris Karloff Trainee Assistant Director at the Young Vic, a Catalyst Director at the North Wall, and participated in TalentLAB at Théâtre National du Luxembourg.

She is a Theatre Director and Community Artist from East London and her work is rooted in collaboration, bold storytelling, and amplifying voices. 

She has worked with theatres and communities across the UK. Previously, Grace was the Resident Assistant Director at the Donmar Warehouse. 

Theatre includes: as director: Holy Show, UK tour; Weeping Woman at Theatre503; Wild Actually at Islington Pleasance; after birth at Omnibus and Northwall on UK tour; Lysistrata at the Arcola; and WOOD at VAULT Festival. 

As associate director: Inter Alia at National Theatre; and Otherland at Almeida Theatre. 

As assistant director: Natasha, Pierre and the Great Comet of 1812, The Fear of 13, Skeleton Crew and The Human Body at the Donmar Warehouse, What If If Only at the Royal Court; and Ivan and the Dogs at the Young Vic Theatre. 

We discuss her role as associate director on the hit show Inter Alia at the National Theatre, the conversations it sparks and the process of putting the whole show together. 

The production is set to make its Broadway debut later this year. 

All this and much more, thank you Grace!

Oliver Gower

Spotlight Link: https://www.spotlight.com/9097-9058-5261

Instagram: @ollietheuncensoredcritic

For enquiries and requests: [email protected]

Please Like, Download and Subscribe ✍️

Thank you all for your support!

Music from #InAudio: https://inaudio.org/ 

Track Name. Early Morning 

Kate is an actress, writer and teacher, she graduated from RADA (Royal Academy of Dramatic Art) and her work can be seen across theatres, BBC and Channel 4. As well as in classes at Arts Ed, LAMDA, Rutgers Uni at the Globe, National Opera Studio and for the New Actors Centre. 

Her acting credits include:

Theatre:

• Echo - Royal Court
• The Old House - RADA Festival and Camden Fringe - Kate’s own one woman show
• Opening Skinner’s Box - devised by the Improbable Theatre company, written by Lee Simpson at the Northern Stage, West Yorkshire Playhouse and Bristol Old Vic
• One Cold Dark Knight - Bush
• Stone Circle, directed by Matthew Dunster

Film:

• Six Underground, directed by Michael Bay
• Flawless, dir. Michael Radford
• Seven Lucky Gods - nominated for Best Supporting Actress at the Milan International Film Festival 

Currently developing her new show “Murmurations”. 

In 1997 she met Scott Williams and discovered the Meisner Technique which she now teaches across the UK and Internationally. Her practice is helping actors with their “Present Performance”. 

On top of all this, she is part of the rejuvenation project of the New Actors Centre, formally known as The Actors Centre. Kate is part of the team, including Harry Burton, which is helping to get it back on its feet. By providing London based actors with a place that will run classes and help rebuild the actor and creative community that was under threat when it initially closed. 

More information about this and how to support the cause can be found via the websites below. 

newactorscentre.org

katemaravan.com

Kate and I discuss drama school training, her work on Meisner technique and how she has helped to rebuild The Actors Centre back to where it needs to be. 

Thank you Kate!

Oliver Gower

Spotlight Link: https://www.spotlight.com/9097-9058-5261

Instagram: @ollietheuncensoredcritic

For enquiries and requests: [email protected]

Please Like, Download and Subscribe ✍️

Thank you all for your support!

Music from #InAudio: https://inaudio.org/ 

Track Name. Early Morning 

Cassandra Woodhouse Part 3!

Cassandra returns to talk about her latest discoveries about playing Tessa in her latest tour of Prima Facie around New Zealand. 

As well as her debut book, “Sex, Power and Prima Facie: When Art Becomes Activism and the Creatress Rises”.

In this beautiful book, Cassandra delivers a powerful, poignant and vivid understanding of not only Suzie Miller’s play, but of the healing journey after the curtain comes down. Sex, Power and Prima Facie delves into her experience of taking this play around New Zealand, a one woman show in more ways than one, and the profound impact it had on the audiences and herself. From advice on how to regulate your nervous system after a demanding acting challenge, to having empathy for people sharing their stories for the first time. 

This book is not only for fans of the play, but for those discovering it for the first time. 

This is for you and the one in three. 

Get your copies now on from any major retailer, and it’s also available as an audiobook on Spotify. 

All this and much more!

Thank you again Cassandra always a pleasure!

Oliver Gower

Spotlight Link: https://www.spotlight.com/9097-9058-5261

Instagram: @ollietheuncensoredcritic

For enquiries and requests: [email protected]

Please Like, Download and Subscribe ✍️

Thank you all for your support!

Music from #InAudio: https://inaudio.org/ 

Track Name. Early Morning