ENCHANTED APRIL
Writtle
Cards at the Village Hall
25.06.15
Elizabeth
von
Arnim's
charming novel was a popular success in the 20s – this stage
version by Matthew Barber made something of a Broadway hit some
eighty years later.
It's
a sentimental piece, in which four ladies from the capital's
middle classes, united by a longing for wisteria and sunshine, find
both, and themselves, in San
Salvatore.
There
are nine scenes before the interval, four after. Barber suggests that
the actors, or costumed servants, should manage the props. Difficult
to achieve, but otherwise, as here, even an efficient stage crew
will slow the action and lose the flow. He also suggests that the sea
and the gardens should be imagined out behind the audience,
presumably leaving warm stone-work and wisteria as a back-drop. Pete
Goodwin's design effectively replaces the dull black and brown of
London with a riot of colour for the Genoese coast, earning a round
of applause for the big reveal after the interval. And
the incessant sound of English rain is replaced by continental
railways as Italy approaches.
Two
very different ladies plot their escape. Jodee Goodwin's Pollyanna
Lotty and Leila Francis's “disappointed Madonna” Rose, nicely
contrasted in Nick Caton's production. A much more dramatic contrast
between the other two women, who answer the advertisement to share
the cost of the castello. “Donna
Carolina”, Lady Bramble, is an elegant butterfly, played with some
style and fabulous frocks by Shelley Goodwin, and the redoubtable Mrs
Graves, delightfully done by Liz Curley, as she sheds her hat, her
stick
and her inhibitions in the Italian sunshine.
The
owner of the villa is Chris Rogerson, Costanza
the volatile maid, Sharon Goodwin.
The
menfolk who eventually join the ladies in Liguria are Arnott, alias
Florian Ayres, writer of “romantic biography” [Jeremy Pruce] and
Wilton, a scene-stealing Daniel Curley, plucking his nasal hair and
only just preserving his dignity with a bath towel. And his Italian,
at least, was meant
to sound mangled …
Some
fine performances here, with Lotty's character sympathetically
developed. But the middle-class metropolitan milieu sometimes proved
elusive, and on opening night there was some insecurity in lines and
names.
The
ever-resourceful refreshment team had come up with Paradiso Punch
this time, limoncello
the secret ingredient.
