Learning to Fly by James Rowland: Review
By Caroline Marsh
Learning to Fly by James Rowland and Attic Theatre Company, organised by Highlights North and Levens Arts and Film Society.
I had the chance to watch the production ‘Learning to Fly’ at the Levens Village Hall on Friday night, organised by the Levens Arts and Film Society (LAFS) in partnership with Highlights North, who organise and fund tours of various arts programmes and shows in rural areas, taking their shows to small villages around Cumbria, Northumberland and County Durham. You can read more about who they are and their programmes here and keep up with LAFS here.
The show was an enjoyable mixture of comedic interaction with the audience (quite glad I wasn’t on the front row!), and more traditional theatre, where the actor James told us the story of a friendship he developed when he was 11 with his ‘old witch’ of a neighbour - who turned out to not be a witch, or actually that old – after all. Armed with not much more than a record player, his story beautifully used the Choral Symphony of Beethoven as a backdrop to the key moments of this friendship that were carefully selected to tell his story of happiness, sadness, loneliness and loss. The record player and the music for me were the most impactful and enjoyable elements besides the skilful writing – by building up tension and emotion through the music which was then swiftly turned off with little warning, the audience was left to deal with emotion of his heart-wrenching lines head-on – no dramatic orchestral music to hide behind. This emotion was even more impactful as it clashed with humour, the swing between the two making both the more meaningful.
It was so exciting to be able to see this craftsmanship championed and performed just a ten-minute walk up the road in Levens, and to have such a Northern and rural-centric performance (James grew up in Burton-in-Lonsdale and Manchester) celebrated and available for all, even in an area that is so often left out of the Arts. He touched upon his relationship with London and his fading Northern accent, all the more meaningful thanks to the performance being in my local village hall. The institute was fully booked that night, showing the keen interest and genuine excitement for these events when they do come around.
Highlights North have a number of upcoming events in Cumbria and the Northeast, which you can keep up with here. The Attic theatre Company and James Rowland have a website, found here. Most importantly – Levens Arts and Film society are always looking for new volunteers, you can keep up with them and get involved here. They advertise their events on the village noticeboard, and we post the upcoming events on this website and our social media, so be sure to keep your eyes peeled for more exciting entertainment and show support for these incredible groups so that they continue to organise excellent arts events!