Praise must also be heaped on the Finborough's Resident Designer and Deputy Chief Executive, Alex Marker, who has excelled even his own high standards on this occasion.
Not only does Marker period-dress and find room for a cast of 14 in this tiny space, he also perfectly creates the blue and white room that the text requires, complete with ornaments and parquet floor. He then stylishly transforms it through three incarnations and, for luck, adds depth to scenes with a street that changes character in the dark and even becomes an exemplar of the celebrations that follow Waterloo.’
Philip Fisher – British Theatre Guide 5-12-10 |
Moliere by Mikhail Bulgakov
I do admire the ingenious way in which Blanche McIntyre, the director, and her designer Alex Marker create the numerous settings in palace and church, on stage at Molière’s theatre and in various dressing-rooms. To suggest grandeur by little more than an ornate chair is impressive, likewise conjuring up terror by two hooded friars’.
Jeremy Kingston – The Times |
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Hangover
Square. Adapted by Fedelis Morgan from Patrick Hamilton's
Novel
'Alex Marker's ingenious design suggests a wealth of locations
including the streets of Earl's Court, squalid bedsits,
noisy pubs, and showbiz Brighton. Better yet, he comes up
with not one but two visual coups in the final moments.'
Charles Spencer - The Daily Telegraph
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Plague
Over England by Nicholas de Jong
'The director Tamara Harvey and the designer Alex Marker,
whose Victorian public lavatory is a particular triumph,
both achieve miracles of compression in the cramped surroundings.'
Charles Spencer - The Daily Telegraph
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Little
Madam by James Graham
'Alex Marker's endearing false-perspective design.'
Paul Taylor - The Independent
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Love
Child by Joanna Murray-Smith
'Alex Marker's cool, minimalist set, a room in Anna's London
home, sits elegantly in the Finborough's tiny space.'
Heather Neill - The Stage
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Eden's
Empire by James Graham
'The torn, faded map of Europe that underscores Alex Marker's
elegant design subtly evokes the radical shift in world
power that Eden was so comprehensively unable to navigate
in the aftermath of World War II.'
Lucy Powell - Time Out
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Red
Night by James Lansdale Hodson
'A review of this show which did not mention the ingenious
and imaginative design by Alex Marker would be incomplete
and indeed a travesty…
Marker's set evokes all the brutality and danger of the
trenches while opening and closing like a delicate but dirty
chocolate box.'
Adam Taylor - Rogues and Vagabonds
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'Designer
Alex Marker cleverly turns the tiny stage into a trench,
complete with sand bags and barbed wire.'
Fiona Mountford, Evening Standard
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Lark
Rise to Candleford adapted by Keith Dewhurst
'Alex Marker's set, whose rough hewn blocks, platforms and
stairways are wittily transformed by simple props and the
conviction of the performances into lively taverns, ploughed
fields, homely hearthsides and narrow cobbled streets almost
looks like a sepia tinted photograph…the staging is
full of inspired moments… the production… creates
an entire beguiling world that enfolds its audience in a
warm embrace- a big achievement in a small- scale theatre.'
Sam Marlow, The Times
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Hortensia
and the Museum of Dreams by Nilo Cruz
'Anyone who has been to Cuba will instantly recognise the
transformation the tiny Finborough stage has undergone.
The walls, hung with old photos and curling images of the
Madonna, are peeling, and brightly painted shutters struggle
to keep out the piercing Caribbean sunlight. Designer Alex
Marker has done a magnificent job.'
Fiona Mountford, The Evening Standard
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Trelawny
of the 'Wells' by Arthur Wing Pinero
'Stage sets at the Finborough are a minor miracle, and the
designer, Alex Marker, has shown great ingenuity.'
Michael Portillo, New Statesman
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