Absolutely Spiffing … Just Terrific!!
Daisy Pulls It Off
by Denise Deegan
Questors Theatre, The Judi Dench Playhouse, Ealing, until 9th June
Review by Mark Aspen
“Uncommonly topping” are the remarks that are going into the end-of-term report for Questors’ delightful school-room spoof, Daisy Pulls It Off (or “Orff” if we adhere to the Headmistress’s proper pronunciation). And, of course, we must obey the Headmistress, as the audience soon finds out, as we are admonished by be-gowned monitors in mortar-boards to “hurry along to assembly”. We enter an auditorium transmogrified into the great hall of Grangewood School for Girls, an establishment for the education of young ladies of a certain type of upbringing.
Daunting enough for us audience “new girls”, it is more so for young Daisy Meredith, who has gained the first-ever scholarship to Grangewood. Worse, not all of the established pupils at Grangewood welcome a newcomer who has entered their revered portals from an elementary school (pause to sneer) rather than the usual route via prep with the help of pater and mater’s privilege and money. However, it is 1927 and things are changing, and Daisy is excitedly looking forward to learning Latin and Greek and becoming a “shining example of true English girlhood”. In these aspirations, she has been warmly supported by her widowed mother and her four brothers, Douglas, Daniel, David and Duncan.
Questors has taken the bold move of reviving its production of Daisy Pulls It Off of a quarter of a century ago, and recreating Norman Barwick’s original set design of 1993. Grangewood’s oak panelling, grand double staircase, and roll of honour plaque of head girls from 1912 to 1926 are all faithfully and effectively recreated by Stephen Souchon, and atmospherically lit by John Green. The original music of Paul Clark has been supplemented by musical director Graham Reid, who plays the piano live from high above the pass doors, and appropriately so, for the singing of rousing hymns and of course the school anthem are actively encouraged at Grangewood (and the audience equally actively coerced).
In the spirit of the revival, one of the 1993 cast, Phillip Sheahan, reprises his role as Mr Scoblowski, the music teacher, an enigmatic Russian émigré. Enigmas abound at Grangewood, for the school building was the ancestral home of Sir Digby Beaumont, who in fit of a pique at his young son, Sir David, tore down Sir David’s portrait and, it is said, hid all the Beaumont treasure somewhere in the building. Now the Beaumonts are forced to sell the estate to the school governors, although Sir Digby’s late elder son’s granddaughter, Clare, is head girl at Grangewood. Then there is the enigma of the gardener, Mr Thompson, who is always quietly whistling Ar Hyd y Nos.
Grangewood is situated majestically on a cliff above a chill sea, just right for bracing walks and exhilarating early-morning dips in the sea, all chaperoned of course. Mens sana in corpore sano, what! And the corpore sano is of course best exercised by hockey … sorry, jolly hockey. Mens sana is imposed, intellectually and morally, by the starched teaching staff, who like most starched items, are unbending. So are fixed rules and regulations, and honesty and honour.
Presiding over all is the Headmistress, Miss Gibson, a stickler for the rules, for after all the school’s motto in honesta quam magna, the right deed over the great deed. Ceri Jones is appropriately magisterial in the role, whilst allowing little chinks of humanity to shine through. Equally a martinet, Miss Granville, the Upper Fourth’s form mistress, rules with a steely glance, but has a shrewdness born of experience. Anne Neville, Questors’ Artistic Director, has this part to a tee; especially with her Gorgon-esque stares. She, incidentally, was instrumental in bringing the 1993 production to Questors, when even then she was on the play selection committee. The other Daisy veteran, Phillip Sheahan, gives a marvellous mix of bonhomie and bite as the baton wielding Mr Scoblowski, with his clandestine quest for the missing millions. These three actors skilfully flesh out what could otherwise be two-dimensional caricatures.
The Grangewood girls tend to go around in pairs, as may always be the case in girl’s schools, and we can observe that like attracts like in the half-dozen girls of the upper fourth.
Form Captain, Belinda Mathieson, who has the hard task of keeping the form in order and ensuring fair play, befriends Dora Johnson, who exists in a state of perpetual bemusement at all the goings-on. Severine Simone’s picture of controlled exasperation, as Belinda, contrasts nicely with Lindsay Patterson’s unchecked gobsmacked-ness.
Then there are the Upper Fourth’s rotters, and they are clearly rotters because they don’t like playing hockey, or playing the game in general. In fact it’s more playing up than playing the game. Sybil Burlington is the school bully. Being a girl’s school the bullying tends to be more psychological than physical and Sybil is a past-master at it. Her side-kick is Monica Smithers, the super toady of the school. Georgie Turner and Lisa Varty fully relish these roles, bringing out all the saurian squirminess of the pair, for Sybil and Monica’s machinations would make Machiavelli blush. Their sole aim, fuelled by a potent mix of snobbery and envy, is to get the “elementary school interloper” expelled.
Then there are the heroines, the eponymous Daisy and her chum Trixie Martin, a quirky “poetess”, who hits it off with Daisy right from square one when they become inseparably supportive pals. Charlotte Sparey brings an effervescent energy to the role of Trixie and to the vivacious attraction of the character. Daisy and Trixie hatch an adventure together, with the goal of finding the lost Beaumont treasure and they adopt the motto hinc spes effulget (here hope shines). Note that at Grangewood everyone speaks in Latin or in alliterations (which I thought was the realm of the theatre critic!).
At the top of the school, the Head Girl, Clare Beaumont and her Deputy, Alice Fitzpatrick exercise much authority and, it must be added, moral leadership. Clare, in spite of carrying the burden of the Beaumont misfortunes, constantly tells the girls to “buck up, kiddies” in a rather matronly way. She is quite a force in the school, although at one point admitting that she is not looking forward to becoming a “proper adult”. Alice adds much wisdom and Celtic fringe spiritual support to the head girl double act. Julia Marques and Nicole Kerr are dynamic and completely believable in these roles.
The part of Daisy Meredith is a difficult one, taking an audience forward with a concept that here is a lovely unassuming innocent girl, who it seems excels in everything she does, without it ever going to her head, or show anything but resilient kindness even when being abused by her peers, and always being honest and never being vindictive. Charlotte Thompson succeeds impeccably in captivating the audience, acting with great charm and veracity. Even your seasoned reviewer found himself feeling for this character and really concerned at the outcome, in spite of knowing it was a spoof of too-good-to-be-true. Hence, we accept that Daisy excels at languages (her mother, lately having been opera singers, taught her French and Italian), poetry, English, music (Thompson does have an enviable singing voice) and also at jolly hockey.
You can probably guess that it all turns out well in the end, but it is more so than you might expect. Along the way, truth wins out, fortunes are restored, and even the baddies’ lives are saved from a cliff tragedy.
The cast, which is complemented by Annabel Spinks-Jones, as both Daisy’s mother and the schools’ French assistante; Zara Hemati as Winnie Irving, a Second-Former; and Tristan Marsahll as Mr Thompson the gardener; works as an integral ensemble, which is one of the strengths of this production. Another strength is that the spoof becomes lightly so: the tongue is in the cheek, but we don’t see the bulge. If it were spelt out that this were a parody, it would undermine the excitement of piece. Much credit in this respect must undoubtedly go to the director, David Emmet.
I would not have thought that a spoof could be so gripping. I certainly didn’t expect to get excited by a hockey match, but now I know that the tactics are to “play as a team and keep passing the ball”. I think this serves as a metaphor for this play.
Keep the good work up gals (and the chaps too). Bully for you for a tremendous show: absolutely spiffing, I’d say. Now, where did I put those report forms …
Mark Aspen
June 2018
Photography by Rishi Rai
Beyond the Fringe
Tenancy
by C.E. Golding
So It Goes…Theatre, Hampton Hill Theatre until 2nd June
A Review by Eleanor Marsh
So It Goes.. Theatre was established in 2011 as a company specialising in new writing and radical adaptations of classics. They have a track record on the fringe and pub theatre circuit and now bring their latest offering to the leafy suburbs of Hampton Hill. There is a lot of the company and the play that screams “fringe” at the audience. No programmes, a very basic black box set, straightforward, no -nonsense lighting and costumes that have clearly been put together by the cast with no one to take an overall view or pay too much attention to detail. More of this later.
The tricky thing about reviewing a piece of brand new writing is that there are no comparisons to be made with previous productions. This is also the best thing about the task. Both reviewer and audience are forced to concentrate and remain in the moment in order to follow the plot. And this was a plot worth following. Clearly (as openly admitted by the author) autobiographical to a certain extent, the play focusses on a group of people living in the same house as tenants and landlord. We meet them first as one couple are moving out and another moving in. In Act Two we return to the same address some eleven years later. The house has undergone a radical extension programme, and everything has changed in the lives of and dynamic between the inhabitants.
C E Golding’s writing is sharp and funny, and the seven diverse characters clearly defined. The questions of whether we outgrow our past mistakes or are destined to repeat then come over loud and clear and are deliberately not adequately answered. Such is life. Oh to have known then what we all know now……
The first act, which introduces the characters and sets up the plot, works better than the second, which was slower to get going (without the aid of a programme it took a while to establish that we were now eleven years on and looking at the same people) and the play ended with a scene that was thought provoking on many levels – not least the question of what is real and what is in our imagination. In the right hands this play deserves a wider audience, but I’d question whether it might not work better as two one act plays to be played in rep.
However, the execution of the play in this production does not always do the writing justice. A lighter touch in both direction and acting would have allowed for far more and far more enthusiastic laughs from the audience. Except for Tom Thornton, the actor playing Ben, a failed actor with a failed relationship and zero emotional intelligence, the entire cast was so terribly earnest that they seemed to be unaware that humour not only gets most of us through most things ever day but that it is an excellent dramatic device for highlighting tragedy. What came across the footlights was that concentration had been paid so much to the inner angst of the characters that apart from set pieces such as the obvious “playing for laughs” singing of Irene/Eileen themed songs that director Douglas Baker had forgotten an audience was wanting to be entertained. All in all it seemed that everyone on stage was so desperate for the play to be a success that they just tried a little too hard to please. There may well have been a first night nerves element here, and the first night of a world premiere carries with it pressure like no other but nearly all of the cast looked uncomfortable and that, in turn made the audience feel uncomfortable. I’m sure that this issue will right itself as the run progresses.
It was an absolute joy to see the Hampton Hill stage used as a black box. This play was going to stand or fall on its writing and performances without any distraction and there is much to be said for allowing an audience the opportunity to use their imaginations. The “sets” of packing cases for the first act and sofas were simple but effective. Some of the costumes unfortunately did not work so well; an independent eye cast over what these characters would wear and to ensure that the costumes helped rather than hindered the actors in their portrayals, would I believe have made a significant difference to the veracity of the performances.
The overall production suffered from being a fringe play not being performed on the Fringe. An audience more in tune with fringe productions would have been less demanding in terms of signposting ideas and expectations of costume and set than one used to the comforts of a traditional theatrical experience in the suburbs. So It Goes…Theatre are hoping to take the play on tour and I wish them well with it. It is a darkly funny piece that shines a light on relationships, aspiration and those curve balls that life throws us all. It could go on to conquer many a fringe festival and I wholeheartedly support its efforts to do so!
Eleanor Marsh
June 2018
Photography courtesy of So Goes It … Theatre
Division Belles!
Out of Order
by Ray Cooney
Edmundian Players at Cheray Hall, Whitton until 2nd June
A Review by Mary Stoakes
In 2016 Terry Bedell and Dave Young demonstrated their considerable talent for comedic acting in The Edmundians production of Neil Simon’s The Odd Couple. Two years later they have very successfully renewed this partnership and moved on to full-blown farce, Out of Order, written originally in the 1990s by Ray Cooney.
As with many Cooney plays, the story revolves around the escapades of a man trying to lie his way out of an embarrassing situation. A married Conservative Junior minister, Richard Willey, meets with Jane Worthington, secretary to the Labour leader, for an extra marital fling in a Westminster Hotel. All goes promisingly until they discover a dead body protruding through their defective sash window. A tangled web of outrageous lies and improbable situations then follows, all concocted by Willey to protect his reputation both as a minister and husband.
Farce is a difficult genre to get right especially for amateur companies with limited resources and sometimes involves a lot of aimless door banging and rushing around the stage. This production was tautly and expertly directed by Jackie Howting and Terry Bedell who were aided by a very clever and attractive set design. The Westminster hotel room was convincingly and meticulously represented with only two doors, a walk in cupboard, mysteriously opening when least expected, and the pivotal sash window, which again had a life of its own – although one suspects that special effects man, Alan Smith, may have had something to do this! The window also featured a spectacular view of Westminster painted by scenic artist Peter Hogan.
High energy levels and quick fire repartee from all the cast were the order of the day. The many double entendres were slotted seamlessly into the dialogue and not over-cooked. Terry Bedell excelled as the MP attempting to direct a totally out of control situation of his own making with the help of his hapless PPS, George Pigden, played by Dave Young. This portrayal of the quiet, dim and bewildered assistant, worried about getting home to his mother, was an ideal foil to the bombastic machinations of his boss and the two acted together with great comedic timing which had the audience in stitches.
Supporting these two outstanding performances, Neelaksh Sadhoo had fun with some great physical comedy acting as ‘The Body’ and Jessica Young was attractively worried as Jane Worthington. To prove ‘The Body’ was alive, they joined the main characters in a hilarious version of Jake the Peg which brought the house down. As the hotel staff, Ellen Walker was suitably severe as the horrified Manager, while Matt Power, (in a dreadful wig), generated a lot of laughs as the grasping and incompetent waiter. Amelia Kirk supported both well as the uncomprehending Italian maid.
The second act moved at an even faster pace as the mayhem ratcheted up, with the appearance of Willey’s wife (Becky Holden) and Gladys, the Nurse, (Paula Young). Matt Ludbrook played Ronnie, Jane’s handsome but weak husband. As this was a farce, he lost his trousers but, as we were in a Church Hall, managed to keep a towel firmly in place!
The play ended more or less happily for the characters with reconciliations all round and for the audience, seated at tables in the Cheray Hall, the evening had been a joy. It is great sometimes to be entertained at the theatre and not educated, harrowed, deafened or even made to think too deeply! Thank you Edmundians – a great night out!
Mary Stoakes
June 2018
Photography by Diliff and The Red List.
Overseasoned to Taste
Monogamy
by Torben Betts
The Original Theatre Company, Ghost Light Theatre and Eilene Davidson; Richmond Theatre until 2nd June, then at the Park Theatre, Finsbury until 7th July
A review by Matthew Grierson
Watching Monogamy, it’s hard not to be reminded of Philip Larkin’s oft-quoted line about what one’s parents do to one, given the frequency with which the characters lament their upbringings. Writer Torben Betts will let you think you’ve got the measure of a character only to refer it upwards, and it’s hard to tell whether this is done in all earnest, and thus a pat way of telling us we all have our difficulties, or is itself being sent up, such is the dependence of his dramatis personae on it.
Part of the problem in deciding how to take it is that parent–child relations are only one of a spice rack’s worth of ingredients that Betts throws into this show about TV chef Caroline Mortimer. He’s intellectually ravenous: Sexuality! Mental health! Syria! Climate change! Senility! Property! Afghanistan! Alcoholism! There’s not a middle-class anxiety that doesn’t get thrown into the mix. Given that the show is called Monogamy, I found myself longing for it to find a nice idea and settle down together.
Another respect in which the play evokes Larkin’s poem is the soppy-stern quality of the characters in their cups. Caroline’s son Leo storms out when she makes a homophobic remark, only to be dragged back in with her mollification and assurance of her undivided attention. Recovering from his apoplectic reaction to his son’s sexuality, her husband Mike too splutters towards a declaration of love that he never quite manages. So much of the play depends on characters having conversations of this kind that don’t coincide with one another, an Ayckbournian accomplishment on the part of the script, and even moreso of the actors who keep the rhythm zipping along.
In fact, there isn’t a foot put wrong among the cast, which is odd considering how all but one of the characters are getting increasingly intoxicated. In the central role of celebrity cook Caroline, Janie Dee peels away all the layers of her character as the action progresses, from her bright screen persona in the camera rehearsal with which the play opens, through the breezy middle-class mother, nervous wife and desperate lover, finally kneeling before us covered in blood – admittedly not her own – wielding a kitchen knife. Dee’s every gesture communicates something about the character, from the dismissive flick of her hair to the definite placement of her wineglass on the table when she declares herself to be “giving up”; there’s also a telling sequence when her PA, Amanda is opening up about her mother’s death, and Caroline can only acknowledge her when the younger woman asks for a top-up on her own drink.
It’s with the return of her husband Mike that Caroline shifts from being the object of wry satire to a more sympathetic figure, for at least at first sight Mr Mortimer is the model of everything we can despise – enthusiastic golfer, banker and self-pitying drunk. Patrick Ryecart’s performance is every bit as engaging as Mike is repellent, though; and he relishes a part that sees him arrive onstage as pink as his polo shirt, and with an artfully applied sweat patch across his back he delivers a rhapsody in green about his first hole in one. But even he is afforded some depth as we come to know him, struggling to reconcile himself to his advancing years, troubled childhood and son’s lifestyle. His blustering incomprehension at Caroline’s final monologue is also shared by the audience, thought in this respect Betts again dodges serious consideration of any of his themes.
While both Caroline and Mike are broadly speaking recognisable types, albeit well-inhabited ones, the stand-out character in the piece is Genevieve Gaunt’s Amanda, who sweeps in and out of the kitchen set with nonchalance, or “non-SHALL-onz” as she insists it is pronounced, to keep Caroline abreast of various crises from the imminent visit of potential housebuyer Mrs Minto to a threatened spread of pap-snapped photos in the Mail on Sunday. Amanda is likewise layered, switching from her Estuary accent into an articulate and rococo range of registers and impersonations to create a veneer of professional bonhomie over her grief for the loss of her mother to MS, all of which takes her into a memorable meltdown in the second act.
Compared with Amanda’s life experience, Caroline and Mike’s son Leo is perhaps of necessity less well rounded, fresh out of Cambridge with strong opinions and feelings; but Jack Archer’s characterisation nevertheless makes him a focus of our concern in the midst of his parents’ preoccupation with maintaining their lifestyles. Drawn, too, into the vortex around the Mortimers’ kitchen sink is carpenter Graeme (Jack Sandle), at first a point of identification amid the bourgeois chaos, but later revealed to be harbouring feelings for Caroline that mean he squanders our sympathy with the appearance of Charlie Brooks as his wife Sally. Brooks herself gives a solid, engaging performance as a character doubly misunderstood: first by Mike and Leo, who imagine she is the promised Mrs Minto; but also, it seems by Betts himself, as her affecting battle with depression becomes a lazy excuse for attempted murder.
Such is the crowdedness of ideas, which begin to dominate the play like Ionesco’s chairs or rhinoceroses, it does seem to demand a dramatic resolution that it can’t provide, despite delivering on the foreshadowed death of one of the characters. If Monogamy ends up being “about” anything, it is not its titular concept as much as it is forgiveness, more often in the characters’ inability to offer or receive it. As such, making Caroline with her unlikely Christianity central to the play has a certain logic, because she becomes de facto confessor to the other characters. But despite her faith, she seems unwilling to take on this role, and the end of the play sees her deliver a monologue with the cadences of the Lord’s Prayer holding a kitchen knife in bloody hands à la Lady Macbeth, all the time relishing the silence of the other characters behind her.
Thus ends an entertaining evening’s viewing that, once digested, proves to have been overflavoured and less substantial than we thought. Inasmuch, Monogamy itself resembles TV cuisine.
Matthew Grierson
May 2018
Photography by Simon Annand
And Dolly Was There !
9 to 5, The Musical
by Dolly Parton, Based on a Book by Patricia Resnick
TOPS Musical Theatre Company, Hampton Hill Theatre until 26th May
A Review by Mary Stoakes
9 to 5 is based on the popular 1980s movie which starred Jane Fonda and Dolly Parton. The stage version was first produced in 2009 and, despite being nominated for several awards, ran for only a few months on Broadway. A UK production followed in 2010 but this, despite its feminist message and songs and lyrics by Dolly Parton, did not really grab the imagination of the theatre-going public and its exposure on the London stage was limited.
Based on a book by Patricia Resnick, 9 to 5 tells the story of how three female workers at Consolidated Industries attempt to get even with their sexist, lecherous, domineering, financially dubious and bigoted boss, Franklin Hart, a suitably misogynistic Tom Daniels. In a farcical turn of events and under the influence of pot, they live out their fantasies. Subsequently in ‘real life’ they kidnap the boss and in his absence give their workplace a makeover, increase productivity and take control of what had always been a male dominated environment.
TOPS’ 9 to 5 , under the direction of TJ Lloyd, provided great opportunities for a largely female cast. In the principal roles, Mandy Church as Violet, the leader of the conspirators, Alex Alderson as Doralee, the not-so-dumb blonde, and Ellie Barrett as Judy, the divorcee who finds her independence, worked well together with nicely delineated performances. American accents were good but some of the dialogue was lost due to over- strident and high pitched delivery. (Not only a feature of this production – some critics are blaming Eastenders !) Violet’s touching scenes and duet with Joe (Jasper Loxton) provided some of the quietest and most effective moments in the show.
Apart from the title number 9 to 5, this is not a show overfull of memorable tunes and some of the singing was rather forced – perhaps in an effort to sing over the expert, but at times overpowering, band (under the musical direction of John Davies). However, Mandy Church (Violet) excelled in Around Here and also in One of the Boys in which she was ably supported by the male members of the company.
In the role of Roz, Hart’s adoring and long suffering personal assistant, Becky Silverstein gave one of the most entertaining performances of the evening. Her big number Heart to Hart was a tour de force of comic acting and singing, much appreciated by the packed audience, as indeed was the whole show.
Ensemble work is one of the joys of any TOPS production and 9 to 5 was no exception. Choreography, especially for the male dancers under the dance captaincy of Charlie Booker, was fairly straightforward and the large number of dancers was fittingly and expertly managed by choreographer Lacey Creed on the relatively small stage at Hampton Hill Theatre. The opening chorus 9 to 5 was vibrant and set the scene for what was to follow. Costumes were nicely in period for the 1970s and the many scene changes were slotted seamlessly into the action, which the occasional back projections enhanced.
An enjoyable evening.
Mary Stoakes
May 2018
Photography by Ace Studios
Enjoyable, Effective, Epic
Peer Gynt
by Henrik Ibsen, adapted by Steve Fitzpatrick
The Questors at The Studio, Ealing until 26th May 2018
A review by Eleanor Lewis
Direction is a mysterious craft. Some think it’s easy: build a set, get a few actors to learn the lines and there you have it. Or not. Some evidently don’t think much at all about it and then wonder why nobody liked their show. A marvellous bit of direction though gives the audience a great theatrical experience – a statement of the obvious unless you’ve sat through any recent productions in which a director appeared to have played absolutely no part.
Friday night’s production of Peer Gynt in Questors’ Studio was a surprisingly good theatrical experience. Surprising because with the best will in the world you have to be in the mood for a five act play written in 1867 and adapted from Ibsen’s original Norwegian verse. This current adaptation was by Steve Fitzpatrick, who also directed it, and is clearly in the right job. Peer Gynt is an epic play on (simply put) the not-easy-to-pin-down subject of The Human Condition. The original work would have run to five hours or more, which leaves this particular reviewer grateful for Mr Fitzpatrick’s skilful adaptation running at just over two hours, yet still coherently telling the story of the eponymous anti-hero.
Peer Gynt is a man out of touch with himself. Unlike other works which take a central ‘everyman’ character through a learning process to arrive at a conclusion, Peer never quite achieves self-knowledge. Love, sex, ambition, duty to one’s parents and the integrity with which one should act towards others are all addressed inconsistently by Gynt throughout his life up to its arguably ambiguous ending when he finds he is almost without even an identity of his own, sinner or not, unless he can accept help from Solveig, the woman who loved him unconditionally all his life.
It was a pleasure to watch the Questors company of actors moving seamlessly from one episode to the next in this story. Their costumes were minimal but effective: linen dresses and caps, a change in jacket for a change in circumstances. Their props and scenery pared back to the essential (though the small Fortnum & Mason logo-ed basket rather jarred), and the accompanying music – Sibelius rather than the originally commissioned Grieg – gentle and unintrusive. The brisk pace, maintained for the whole performance, was effective. This was direction at its best and meant that the writing, and the performance of it, were foremost.
Mike Hadjipateras as Peer Gynt gave an excellent performance, ageing gradually with his self-delusion apparent but not laboured. The man’s inability to recognise his constant ‘missing of the point’ being a poignant illustration of Ibsen’s view of civilised society at the time. Credit must however, go to all actors in this piece as, with the of exception Peer Gynt, the performance burden was pretty much shared. Notable amongst the company were Lisa Day, wholly convincing as Gynt’s fraught mother, and Francesca Nicholls as a living, breathing Ingrid (and other characters) rather than a purely emblematic character. It must also be said that The Trolls were fabulous!
I suspect a performance of Peer Gynt mainly attracts people who already know the play which in some ways is a shame as Questors’ production is both highly enjoyable and straightforward in the best of ways.
Eleanor Lewis
May 2018
Photography by Peter Collins
Making a Splash
Lidos Alive Exhibition
The Richmond Environmental Information Centre at Alexander Pope Hotel, Twickenham, 23rd April
A review by Mark Aspen
There is something special about bathing in the open air. Lusty types brave the icy Serpentine on Christmas Day or swim the Channel. Yes, it was ever so. According to Shakespeare’s Cassius, Julius Caesar challenged him to swim the turbulent Tiber:
“ For once, upon a raw and gusty day,
The troubled Tiber chafing with her shores,
Caesar said to me ‘Darest thou, Cassius, now
Leap in with me into this angry flood,
And swim to yonder point?’ ”
Cassius took up the challenge, but had to rescue Caesar from drowning.
In contrast, for most of us, a nice summer’s day, swimming in safely contained (and preferable clean and well heated) waters seems much more civilised. Hence the rise of the Lido. The heyday of the lido concept was in the 1920s and 30s and, like many things, was wiped out by the Second World War. However, there is a renewed interest in the Lido and in the whole “lifestyle” concept that went with it.
Between the wars, the pre-1965 Boroughs of Twickenham and Richmond had a rich heritage of lidos and outdoor bathing, and a charity, The Richmond Environmental Information Centre (REIC) has recently been awarded a Heritage Lottery Fund grant to carry out a “memories project” about the these lidos. This formed the basis of the exhibition at The Alexander Pope on St George’s Day.
Tinside Lido, Plymouth Hoe
This weekend I was in Plymouth, and saw the splendidly restored Tinside Lido, which is reopening on 26th May, so it is not only in Richmond upon Thames that the interest is reviving. Built in 1935 for the Silver Jubilee of King George V, the Tinside Lido is a grade II listed building and a magnificent example of the Art Deco style.
Also built in 1935, the Silver Jubilee Year, Twickenham Lido was another such magnificent Art Deco example, and forms the prime example of the Lidos Alive project, running in conjunction with REIC. Twickenham Lido was closed for refurbishment in 1980 and has never reopened. It currently languishes in the centre of the controversial Twickenham Riverside planned development, where the creation of equally magnificent buildings is in abeyance. Twickenham Lido was enormous, and had two shallow ends, each with its own tall “wedding cake” three-storey fountain.
Twickenham Lido, 1960
There were eleven major lido sites in Richmond upon Thames that were mapped out in the exhibition. Of these only Hampton Pool (1922, but refurbished in 1985 after a four year closure) and the modern Pools on the Park (1966) remain. Some of these had wonderful names, such as the Palm Beach Lido on Taggs Island or The Nook, one of two pools in Bushy Park itself. The second Bushy Park pool, near Upper Lodge, was the more rustic Bushy Bathing Pool, much beloved between the wars by local schoolboys.
Schoolboys seem to have had a penchant for open-air swimming, sometimes unauthorised, as witnessed by an Edwardian photograph in the exhibition of a long-skirted policewoman brandishing a long cane who is chasing away from the Serpentine a gaggle of naked young boys! Effective? Who knows?
The exhibition, largely the brainchild of REIC Vice Chairman Berkley Driscoll, included six information boards with photographs of past and present lidos in the area, and two freestanding displays about Lidos Alive. There were continuous large screen projections, of images and maps, and a looped television screen showing interviews from within the memory project.
Lidos Alive Exhibition
Informative, lively, and evocative, this exposition attracted a steady stream of absorbed visitors, and much interactive discussion. The atmosphere was charged with nostalgia and regret for the loss of these social and sporting hubs, and much support for the Lido Alive campaigning to conserve what we have left.
Visitors were presented with complimentary copies of the very interesting Lidos Alive booklet, sixteen packed pages detailing information on the lidos in the project. Moreover, the culmination of the evening’s exhibition was a launch presentation for Lidos Alive, A History Of Our Lidos, a soon-to-be published book, featuring many dynamic paintings by local artist Dennis Gilbert.
Nevertheless, Lidos Alive is not simply about sentimental yearnings for past times. There is a very active thread looking towards the future. Architecture students from Richmond upon Thames College have been developing many highly imaginative ideas for a local lido of the future, Scandinavian, Polynesian, Japanese or Roman influences; marble, wood, acrylics; geometric designs, minimalism, infinity pools; all flowing from fertile young minds. From next year, the lido project may form part of its programme for new students, in which drawings and models of the students’ creative ideas for a lido in Twickenham will form part of their coursework
Outside of Britain, the word lido conjures up images of the Lido di Venezia on edge of Venice, or in Italy itself perhaps nothing more than a beach. But, in deference to its Italian origin, REIC insists that we use the pronunciation “lee-doh”. Julius Caesar would be pleased. Maybe he would like the idea of a warm, clean, calm infinity pool by the Thames at Twickenham. Much safer than a tempestuous Tiber and, that word summarising what Ancient Rome was all about … civilised!
Mark Aspen
May 2018
Photography by: Mark Aspen (Tinside Lido); Frederick Wilfred, (Twickenham Lido, 1960s) ©Russell Wilfred; Berkley Driscoll (Lidos Alive Exhibition)
Other-Worldliness of Delight
Iolanthe
by W. S. Gilbert and Sir Arthur Sullivan
Sasha Regan’s All Male Iolanthe
Regan De Wynter Williams at Richmond Theatre until 19th May, then on tour until 28th July.
A review by Eleanor Marsh
Let us get the preconception elephants out of the room first. They are:
1 – Iolanthe is a Gilbert and Sullivan comic opera, therefore it must be dated and boring.
2 – This is an all-male version so must cheapen the material and be played totally for laughs.
Neither is accurate and if this review can make just one person who doesn’t already know G&S, or knows them so well they think that any new interpretation is sacrilege, go to see this wonderful company then my work here is done!
The purpose of any review is to “tell it like it is” with honesty and ideally without cruelty. This is not always as easy as it might seem. The problem with Sasha Regan’s All Male Iolanthe is that it is both innovative and technically excellent and leaves little – if anything to complain about.
W.S Gilbert’s storylines are always complicated and a little silly. Iolanthe is no exception and requires more of the audience in their suspension of disbelief than most. Here, the initial premise of the discovery of a Narnian wardrobe and dressing up clothes is an excellent device to immediately transport the audience to a land of make-believe. There are later references to Neverland, too, just in case there is any danger of our forgetting that we are in a bizarre fairyland that also features the House of Lords. The antiquated appearance of the minimal set is complemented by an effective “dusty” lighting design and inspired costumes; fairies are obviously fairies because they have wings (made of bunting and other assorted haberdashery) and the Peers are obviously peers because they wear dressing gowns and hats that denote some type of “authority”. It is bizarre and wacky, and it works beautifully.
There is no reference on the programme to the pianist, so I assume that Musical Director Richard Baker is tinkling the ivories himself. He is totally exposed, with the grand pianos sited almost in the front row of the audience and is obviously enjoying playing the score. Well done to the Richmond Theatre audience for giving him a proper round of applause to himself. It is refreshing to see just the grand piano in evidence and, although there were a few musical “effects”, this pared back interpretation helped enormously to continue the “playing dressing up game” theme.
The music itself is a delight and credit must go to Mr Baker and Vocal Consultant Alan Richardson for all they’ve achieved on this show. It is not often a vocal consultant is mentioned in a review but what a job Mr Richardson has done to get all of those very obviously men to sing female roles at pitch without the necessity of a rather nasty Mediaeval surgical operation!
Now to the cast themselves. I must confess to a certain trepidation before the curtain went up and could not imagine how this whole event was to be pulled off without at least one drag queen performance slipping into the mix. I need not have worried. The female roles are all played as straight as a G&S script can be and I can only imagine the amount of study that has gone into the deportment and body language to make these chaps appear (and sound) so womanly. Joe Henry’s Phyllis would not look out of place as the ingénue in an Agatha Christie play. He also has excellent comic timing and made a role that could purely be a plot vehicle genuinely funny and engaging. Likewise, Christopher Finn as Iolanthe was delightful, and I think I had something in my eye when he sang “My Lord, a Suppliant at Your Feet”. It was beautiful.
The male roles are equally well played and sung with just the right amount of tongue in cheek to remain respectful. I was exhausted just watching the physical jerks of Duncan Sandilands’ Private Willis (think Tom Daley crossed with Windsor Davies’ Sgt. Major Williams), who can also sing a mean bass. And top marks to Alastair Hill’s Lord Chancellor whose famous “Nightmare Song” was a joy – every word clearly articulated without losing any of the pace of a patter song.
The principals are supported by an extremely strong supporting company. The choral singing is glorious, and they can all dance, too! Speaking of dancing, Mark Smith, the amazing choreographer for this show is deaf. He has built in sign language for the fairies, which is performed gracefully and adds enormously to the other-worldliness of the opening of the show. It is an inspired artistic device that also sends out a subliminal message of inclusivity to the audience.
In short this really is a must-see production. I urge you to throw your pre-conceptions and prejudices aside and make the most of the opportunity whilst you can – there are only three performances at Richmond Theatre left!
Eleanor Marsh
May 2018
Photography by Buckingham Photography
Retiring Collection
Sherlock Holmes, the Final Curtain
by Simon Reade after Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
Theatre Royal Bath Productions and Kenny Wax at The Rose Theatre, Kingston until 19th May, then tour continues until 28th July
A world premiere production
A review by Mark Aspen
Sherlock Holmes has hung up his deerstalker and extinguished his meerschaum calabash. In Simon Reade’s Sherlock Holmes: The Final Curtain, now playing at The Rose on its second leg of a national premiere tour, we find him eking out his time at a cottage on the coast in Sussex, dabbling in beekeeping and fly fishing; retired, bored and paranoid.
So, what has happened to Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s consultant detective? The world first learnt about Sherlock Holmes in A Study in Scarlet in 1887 and, within a few years were on the edge of their seats, reading Sherlock Holmes short stories in The Strand Magazine. After 56 short stories and four novels published he had progressed onto the screen in the 1900 film, Sherlock Holmes Baffled. At least two hundred films have followed, with Holmes portrayed by over seventy actors, most famously by Basil Rathbone, who starred in fourteen Sherlock Holmes films during the Second World War. Within the last few years, we have had, the BBC’s television drama Sherlock, with Benedict Cumberbatch in the title role. However, with Sherlock Holmes: The Final Curtain, there is a feeling that the concept is running out of steam.
It is 1921, and the BBC has started a new service, wireless broadcasting. Dr Watson, now a psychoanalyst, has been invited to present a talk on the fledgling service, and he tells about an incident that occurred a few years before, when a dead body of a young woman is discovered on Holmes’ private beach. Sherlock Holmes: The Final Curtain, takes its inspiration from The Adventure of the Lion’s Mane, in which the mysterious means of death of a body found on a Sussex beach is solved by Holmes as being the result of a sting by Cyanea capillata, the lion’s mane jellyfish. However, in this story, the venom is not from jellyfish, as first thought, but from bee stings. It seems that Holmes’ current paranoia is justified: someone is trying to frame him, and he suspects that it is by way of revenge for the death of Prof Moriarty at the Reichenbach Falls, some three decades previously.
This could have been a promising start for a sequel, but Sherlock Holmes: The Final Curtain is full of inconsistencies and confusions, where there could have been intriguing twists, and has a thin plot, and where there could have been verdant opportunities the seeds of promise fail to germinate. There are not one but two irrelevant codas to draw out. Moreover the plot is contained within the portfolio of Watson’s wireless broadcast. The broadcast serves to show how Watson is embracing the new technology of the twentieth century, as opposed to Holmes who is distrustful of it, although it serves him well in the denouement of the plot.
Timothy Kightly’s Dr Watson is warm and avuncular and Kightly takes up the opportunities to develop the character. In the radio studio, he has some telling conversations, about the pace of change in technology that could easily echo eighty years on in our own time, “it all moves so fast”, with Rose, Anna O’Grady’s icily supercilious BBC producer. She explains why she and the announcer are in black tie, “the listeners sense it”.
The story proper, within the story narrated by Watson, starts on the Sussex shoreline with Detective Inspector Newman, played brusquely and efficiently by Lewis Collier, examining the body on the beach, together with Sherlock Holmes, of whom Newman is acutely suspicious. He scoffs when Holmes pulls out the famous magnifying glass and boasts that he can identify all 184 types of pipe tobacco … there are 250 replies Newman … and the 42 different patterns of bicycle tyres. “We know it is a Dunlop”, retorts Newman. Holmes clearly has not kept up his Continuing Professional Development. However, Holmes gets his own back by pointing out the dead “man” is in fact a young woman, Tilly Simons, whom he had recently interviewed for a domestic post.
Unfortunately the enervated plot is not helped by a lacklustre set. To be sure, designer Jonathan Fensom’s set dressing of 221B Baker Street is well studied for the period, as are the costumes, but that’s all we get. Other locations are played out on the apron, front of curtain. The BBC studio is mocked up with a few props, a period microphone and a bust of Aristotle (that we later see parked at the back of 221B), whereas for the Sussex shingle, we have to be content with a breakup gobo projected on the front tab. Neither is the production well served by the stage crew: clunky scene changes and misdirected smoke machines lead to a less than slick presentation.
Holmes has been enticed back to 221B Baker Street by Mrs Watson, who has also come to the Sussex beach. She is living in adjacent rooms, although now estranged from her husband Dr Watson and using her maiden name Mary Morstan. (Sherlock Holmes aficionados might wonder why she is still around some years after her death.) Ostensibly Mary’s reason is that she is troubled by the apparition of her son James Watson, who was killed in the Great War. Arthur Conan Doyle had a notorious obsession with the supernatural and became a spiritualist, so probably would have approved of this plot development. Indeed we do see James Watson as a Pepper’s ghost, and the programme does credit a “magic consultant”, John Bulleid, but this may well be for the levitation of a table during a séance, which did indeed draw a gasp from some of the audience.
Holmes’ return to his old haunt, so to speak, at 221B is auspicious as it is on the thirtieth anniversary of the traumatic Reichenbach Falls incident, and Holmes paranoia is sufficiently aroused for him to arrive heavily disguised as a poor Irish patient of Dr Watson in his practice as a psychoanalyst. He also takes the precaution of inviting his brother, the indolent and insouciant Mycroft Holmes, to the séance. Roy Sampson gives an entertaining portrayal of Mycroft, who seems to get the best lines, but lines suitable to a self-confessed cynic. (He does after all reside at his club, named after Diogenes, the very first cynic.) He describes himself as “generally omniscient”, and even in retirement still carries out some sub-rosa assignments for the government. He has some witty one-liners, as sharp as his well-cut suit and fetching spats.
And talking of spats, it is with Mary Watson that the dramatic tension lies. Mary is an aloof and haughty feminist, active in the women’s suffrage movement, and the antithesis to the misogynistic Sherlock Holmes, who openly states, “Women have seldom been an attraction to me, for my brain has always governed my heart.” Liza Goddard plays a gritty but unconvincing Mary, a role which deserved more depth.
Robert Powell, who plays the eponymous Sherlock Holmes, is possibility an even better known and respected actor, but fails to ignite the role with the charisma and psychological insight that the part demands. He rather ambles through the role, proficiently yes, but without inspiration. Nevertheless, he has some fun with the Irish disguise and with a very competent Galway accent, and there is some nice banter with the Watsons’ housekeeper, Miss Hudson, daughter of Holmes’ former chatelaine, another role by Anna O’Grady, in a chirpy cameo.
Director David Grindley won a Tony Award for his Journey’s End, and has previously worked with Robert Powell and Liza Goddard in an acclaimed production of Alan Bennett’s double bill Single Spies, so it is disappointing that this production does not deliver its anticipated punch.
The problem possibly lies in the over-stretched script, which lacks the acumen of Conan Doyle in packaging convolutions without confusion. It also feels under-researched, lacking veracity. Would Americanisms like Mycroft’s “discombobulate” or Mary’s “raising children” have been in the Conan Doyle vocabulary? And then there are outright errors, such as muddling Twelfth Night, the eve of Epiphany, with Epiphany itself. This may be being picky, but it is illustrative of the general messiness of the script, which comes overwrapped in its wireless broadcast conceit. The previously mentioned two irrelevant codas come after the denouement of the play, when in typical detective fiction mode, the resolution of the mystery and explanation of the clues is served up neatly gift-wrapped by Holmes. Then follows a scene in a barber’s shop, “a sanctum where women cannot enter”, where Holmes and Watson philosophise about Epiphany moments. Then finally another contrasting scene with Mary in a lunatic asylum philosophising about motherhood.
These codas have no integrity with the rest of the play, unless we regard the whole as a piece of metadrama, which self-references with little tells, where Mycroft refers to Sherlock as being “like a demented actor” and Sherlock in his Irish psychiatric patient disguise quotes Jaques’ speech from As You Like It, life like an actor “struts on the stage”. If the play is intended as a metaphor for itself, sitting in its very title Sherlock Holmes: The Final Curtain, then most of us will have missed it. Otherwise it would be timely if Sherlock Holmes extinguished his calabash and hung up his deerstalker.
Mark Aspen
May 2018
Photography by Nobby Clark
Love Is Madness, Violence Is Sanity
The Ruling Class
by Peter Barnes
Teddington Theatre Club at Hampton Hill Playhouse until 18th May
A review by Georgia Renwick
“Lord”, it’s a word and a title with undoubtedly strong associations. Of power, of reverence, of subservience, of devotion. But placed on the head of a paranoid schizophrenic, heir to an Earldom? It’s enough to strike terror, inspire delirious laughter, and shake up the lives of everyone who must bow to him…
Peter Barnes 1968 play The Ruling Class, famously featuring the arresting performance of Peter O’Toole, was a subversive cultural landmark of the late 1960s stage and later, screen. It’s “sledgehammer satire” (Newsweek, 1972) took aim at British peerage, politics, public-schooling and our faith in the ‘powers that be’. Fifty years on surely, it must be antiquated, because we’ve sorted all that inequality stuff out since then, haven’t we?
Barry Evans (a self-confessed Barnes fan) boldly brings the first revival of The Ruling Class to the stage since Brexit joined the political fray. Fifty years on it turns out, it’s still timely and distinctly uncomfortable to be watching Barnes’ production disrobe our Lordly peers.
Stepping into the shoes of Peter O’Toole, Dane Hardie plays Jack, the heir to the title of the 14th Earl of Gurney. When his father, daringly played by Charles Halford, dies in an autoerotic asphyxiation accident, Jack is called upon to take up his title and place in the House of Lords. There’s just one problem. He believes he is a Lord alright, but it is the Lord all creation, Jesus Christ that he is certain he has a claim to be. His loud proclamations of “God is Love”, delusions of grandeur and insistence upon sleeping upright on a homemade crucifix are running the risk of ruining the family’s reputation, and so in a desperate attempt to continue the Gurney name, his meddling family vow to marry him off to dutifully produce an heir, and then have him put away in a mental asylum. Jeremy Gill brings an unpleasant squirming quality to Jack’s greedy uncle, Sir Charles – you just know he would be able to wriggle his way out of anything – whilst Charlie Golding’s artfully executed lisp and overt campness make Jack’s politician cousin a humorously endearing slimeball.
Unfortunately for them, their plots are foiled by the Earl’s German Psychiatrist (the straight-faced Stephen Boyd) who ‘cures’ Jack, treating him with ‘Old Testament’ electricity until he is able to learn to adapt and fit into ‘reality’. He remains a Lord, but of a different ilk; “Do you still believe you are Christ, my Lord?”. His sanity is proved by the Etonian rugby chants that replace his former Godly hymns, and his newfound realisation that in social circles it’s customary to “slaughter everything that moves”. Thusly, he is prepared to face his truly Lordly duty to his country. In Barnes’ bitingly satirical world, Jack is taught that love is madness, and violence is sanity.
Hardie, as Jack, cuts a figure of boundless energy in the first act, cavorting around the stage full-tilt with manic glee in a fetching white “God is Love” tank top. Listen closely, it can be hard to keep up! As he heaves himself up onto his cross and hurls himself down onto the floor with admirable, most likely a bit painful, dedication. In act two he retches, he writhes, and is prone to fits of anger as he struggles to fit into his sharp new suit, and his new attitude.
Barnes’ writing is rich with influences from a whole host of writers, from Sheridan to Shakespeare, it is customary therefore that the Lord is undercut and upstaged by his serving classes. In The Ruling Class this takes the form of Daniel Wain, who completely steals the show as Tucker the Bolshie Butler, “peeing on the Wedgewood dinner plates”. His simpering smile stretches from ear to ear as he picks up after the hapless Earls, then cracks into his own manically mischievous grin just when he thinks no-one is looking. His singing, dancing moments of rebellious glee are infectiously brilliant. As he dances over an ill-fated character he cries, eyes wide… “One less! One Less!”.
Wes Henderson Roe’s set design cleverly divides the stage space up with a skilfully rendered projection. Among other set pieces, the roving bed was a clear favourite, comically wheeled in and out at the opportune moments for, ah, missing the action.
Snatches of song and voiceover provide context and insight fitting with the time-period of the piece, thoughtfully designed by John Pyle. On occasion sound effects were perhaps a little too relied upon where they might have been rendered live, it would have been a treat to hear live singing from Rosy Addison-Dunne for example. One song we did have the chance to hear sung live was a lesser known verse of All Things Bright and Beautiful, which made quite a shocking appearance!
Reviewers at Mark Aspen don’t get tired of saying it, so we hope you don’t get tired of reading it, but TTC have once again made a very bold choice of material here. There was more than enough tittering in the audience on opening night to tell you that this off-the-wall 1960s humour is not to everyone’s tastes; Barnes’ relentless mad-cap humour is not for the faint-hearted, or the easily offended! But if you can stomach the titillation, the pay-off is richly rewarding. Although you ought to hope so, it won’t actually make you rich. If you learn anything from Barnes’ production, it’s better to be out when the executors come knocking!
Georgia Renwick
May 2018
Photography by Sarah J Carter
Mark Aspen 