Something Specials

Skaville Cockpit Theatre, NW8 The Court Jester Croydon Warehouse The Secret Garden King's Head, N1

There is nothing like the turning of the year for bringing home to you how many things you intended to do in the last 12 months, but didn't. All those films and plays you meant to get around to, then realised they were gone before you made the tr ip.

I Wish I'd Seen That, at the Cockpit Theatre, is an enterprising scheme offering an opportunity, at least until the end of this week, to make good some of your omissions, with a virtually round-the-clock programme of shows that came and went too quickly in 1994. It is a great idea - though, to be honest, the logistics of mounting this complex schedule for the first time mean that most of the shows are not the biggest must-sees of the year. Even so, though I hardly nursed a burning regret that I missed Skaville at the Edinburgh Festival, for instance, I'm very glad indeed to have caught it here.

On one level, Paul Sirett's bitter comedy is a celebration of ska music, but it is far more interesting than any of the compilation musicals that clog up the West End. Set in a dead-end seaside town during the two years between June 1979 and July 1981, during which the Specials came and went, it catches something of the mood of the time, pinpointing the shift in the country as Mrs Thatcher came to power and the late Seventies gave way to the Eighties.

Sirett focuses on four characters, all of whom are on a losing ticket; a teenage couple who hang around a struggling little record shop on the pier, the morose shop owner, and Rock Steady Eddie, an exuberant runaway who introduces the Specials and the spice of life to the others. Spliced together with snatches of the infectious, upbeat music of Madness, the Beat, the Selecter and the Specials, and performed with energy to match, the play illustrates ably why the 2 Tone bands offered such a great outlet for frustration. It has an element of ticking off the issues about it (unemployment, the rise of Fascism, gay bashing, single motherhood . . .), but it is written and performed with such wit and vivaciousness that you forgive any obvious tactics. It's compulsive viewing for anyone who misspent their youth at the end of the Seventies, but it attempts and achieves far more than a wallow in nostalgia.

There was a disappointingly thin audience last week - let's hope this does not discourage the Cockpit from doing the same sort of season again, for precious little forum exists to extend the life of good fringe productions. The bigger fringe theatres cantry their luck in the West End, allowing more people to see such gems as Beautiful Thing (though that move, as we all know, is a risky business). How encouraging it might prove to have a focus, too, for revivals of exceptional productions at the smallest fringe theatres. Erasmus Montanus, at Greenwich Studio Theatre, might have been a candidate last year, perhaps, or the occasional gems that emerge at places like the Old Red Lion, the Man in the Moon, the New End, the New Grove or Southwark Playhouse. Revivals and second productions of new writings are very important for the health of the theatre - almost as important, if not nearly as glamorous, as the sta

g ing of virgin texts (it is encouraging to see the National Theatre reviving Winsome Pinnock's Leave Taking, for example). I hope we see I Wish I'd Seen That again.

Another spark of light amongst the encircling pantomimes is The Court Jester at Croydon Warehouse, Roy Smiles's amiable comedy about a would-be jester who gets caught up in the struggles for the throne in 14th-century England. The scenario paves the way for plenty of Blackadder-style carry-on, but Smiles also incorporates quite a shrewd little political dig. Our man (Miltos Yerolemou) may fail as a jester, but his first-hand experience of the privileged and his meeting in the dungeons with the radical priest John Ball sets him on a new course of action. It would be unfair to reveal just who he turns out to be, let's just say he chooses a larger stage for his act. Despite a slow start, this is an immensely enjoyable, canny show.

As an alternative seasonal outing for children, Diana Morgan's musical adaptation of The Secret Garden at the King's Head is charming in all the right ways. It offers a clear and simple staging of Frances Hodgson Burnett's story about the spoilt orphan Mary Lennox, who discovers her uncle's secret garden. The music is a weak link in places - there are rather a lot of June-moon type rhymes - and Dan Crawford's production misses a couple of tricks: there is very little build-up of suspense, for i

n stance, as Mary searches for the source of the crying she hears in the night. But otherwise it is irresistible. Katey Crawford Kastin gives an excellent performance as Mary, blossoming from venomous little brat to kind young girl, and Felix Bell offersa lovely, open performance as Dickon, the generous youth who encourages her to flower. At the beginning of January, who could resist a tale about the return of spring to a neglected garden and to locked-up hearts?

For details see listings (right)