FringeReview UK 2025
The Space In-Between
Margaret Curry, Deep Flight Productions
Genre: Music, Story Songs
Venue: The Crazy Coqs at Brasserie Zédel, London
Festival: FringeReview UK
Low Down
Margaret told us stories in songs and in tales from her life, her family: ‘the spaces in-between is where the magic happens’. She is a charming powerhouse and completely in control of her material. We saw an actress doing what she does best, using music, words and her craft to make us understand how she and we feel about the world.
Review
I had the privilege to review Margaret Curry’s performance at the Edinburgh Fringe in August this year, where she gave a master-class in acting in the one woman play ‘Who We Become Part 1: The Moonshot Tape’ by Lanford Wilson. I was thus keen to see what else she would do and went with a friend to London to hear Margaret sing at this one-off concert, her London debut. A few words about the venue: The Brasserie Zédel is a real find near Piccadilly Circus, a French themed venue with a café, an American bar, an enormous glittering and noisy restaurant and a small and intimate club, the Crazy Coqs, where this concert began at 9.15pm with a small but enthusiastic crowd attending. They had interesting cocktails for sale and the snacks were tasty, the portions generous. A lovely ambience, we decided that just coming here was already worth the journey.
Three musicians sat down on stage: the drummer, a solid David Silliman, struck up a pacy rhythm and in strode Margaret Curry – beautiful in a long black gown that showed off her toned arms, her hair golden and wavy – and began to scat-sing ‘Day In, Day Out’ (Mercer/Bloom) to a bare beat and with an energy that made me wonder how she was going to keep that up for the next 75 minutes (she did!). Soon Gregory Toroian, beautifully relaxed and creative on the piano and Skip Ward, confident on the bass, joined in and we were off on an adventure in songs that without any exception had lyrics worth hearing, if perhaps only this time. Margaret is an actor and she pays real attention to the words before she speaks or sings them. The line I feel sums up the evening best comes from Elvis and Me by Jimmy Webb, an almost corny ditty about a fan who meets his hero: “Let me tell you a story”.
Margaret told us story after story, in songs and in tales from her life, her family: ‘the spaces in-between is where the magic happens’ is how she explained the title of her show. It was hard for me to forget the Margaret I saw in Edinburgh, the grim, devastatingly hurt woman she played there against this smiling powerhouse, charming and completely in control of her material, her wonderful stories. I kept expecting her to crash, to tell us something dreadful, but that was then, this was a different show; still, again we saw an actress doing what she does best, using music, words and her craft to make us understand how she and we feel about the world.
Some very well known songs were almost forensically examined, for example ‘Ain’t nobody loves me better’ (David “Hawk” Wolinski) made famous by Chaka Khan, becomes the most beautiful and urgent love story when sung by Margaret Curry. The first lines “Captured effortlessly/That’s the way it was” are tempting to say out loud and even though the rest of the lyrics are almost trite when sung in the original version, we saw and felt now that this woman was deeply in love with a man, it was as if he was standing there in front of her, and she meant every word and made them suddenly sound not at all trite.
Many of the songs were linked to Margaret’s family story. She told us how she left Houston “Oh black water, keep on rolling” and went to New York City for, as she said, “creativity and joy to be her North Star”. She later visits Texas again in song, hysterically sending up the ladies who bring shared lunches with outrageous ingredients in the “Lime Jell-O Marshmallow Cottage Cheese Surprise” (William Bolcom). This and other songs showed off her ability to speed through patter like a demon without one word missing – her delivery crystal clear. And I shall never forget the little compressed laugh with which she characterised the main lady.
There were tender and emotional moments when Margaret described how her parents coped with dad having to care for mum after 50 years of marriage and quoted the song ‘There may be trouble ahead’ singing the sad and prescient line: “Soon, we’ll be without the moon” as part of the storytelling.
My friend and I loved it when Margaret sang with her full voice, giving us ballads about women and their fates, reminding us how far we have come, touchingly telling the tale of ‘The Ballad of Robin & Marian’ by Michele Brourman, and the angry and quite shocking ‘The Last Words of Bonnie Parker’ by Susan Werner, two female singer/songwriters I am excited to discover.
I would have wished for Margaret to have had a sympathetic hand at the sound engineering desk, someone who knew her and the songs well enough to softly support her on some of the more exposed notes with gentle reverb. After three weeks performing two very demanding plays at the Fringe, her voice could perhaps have done with a break before embarking on such a full on programme of songs. My friend and I were both a bit annoyed at the incidental music that played before and immediately after the concert, it sounded flat, was in keeping neither with the concert nor the venue, and gave us no chance to even clap for an encore. While everything there was beautiful and lovingly styled, the technician in his shorts and t-shirt looked like he had ambled in off the street and was not part of the event. But that is a tiny concern, it was a brilliant evening and we were both thrilled to have been there.
