ROMANCING MISS BLISS

ROMANCING MISS BLISS

Jubilant Productions
at the Headgate Theatre, Colchester
10.02.16


Romantic fiction – top selling literary genre, staple of the mobile library – what does it mean to you ? Rose-tinted Barbara Cartland and her team of amanuenses ? A cottage industry of prolific hacks, many of them pseudonymous men ?
These tropes, and much more, in Anne Pearson's gently amusing satire, full of word-play [dentistry puns, Austen titles] and lovely pastiche: “the heart is a strange organ”, in novels like The Heart Surgeon's Secret, The Dentist's Dilemma and To The Moon And Back. The scenes in the dentist's chair are particularly cherishable: “I'll be gentle with you,” he promises. “Open wide … you seem much more relaxed this time.”
Fliss Bliss – her real name – is persuaded to enter a competition run by Pomme d'Amour Press. Her prize: mentoring support by best-selling author Olivia de la Fontaine – not his real name. Using the indispensable manual for aspiring romantic writers, The Pathway to Passion.
Along the way there are dramatized extracts from work in progress, and guest appearances by Miss Austen in drag and assorted denizens of the local library. It's fast-moving and great fun, though the writing could sometimes be a little tighter. As Mike says to Felicity: “interesting characters and witty dialogue.”
Needless to say, romance blossoms between neophyte and old pro, and a quirky finale has them jump up from Remington and Apple in a triumphant dance routine.
This is a lovely two-hander – even the gushing compère [Helen Watson] could easily be a voice-over like publisher Veronica [Patricia Byford] – and Christine Absalom and Ben Livingstone relish every moment, with perfect comic timing and tongues just far enough into the cheek …
This rehearsed reading, directed by Ignatius Anthony and produced by Jules Easlea, is, one hopes, the last stage of development before the long-awaited tour to small venues in the region.

THINGS TO COME – ROMANCING MISS BLISS

THINGS TO COME – ROMANCING MISS BLISS

Jubilant Productions at the Headgate Theatre, Colchester

Since the success of Merry It Was To Laugh There back in 2014, we've eagerly awaited a new chamber work from Jubilant.
After a few hiccups and false starts, Miss Bliss is getting a rehearsed reading at the Headgate next month.
Romancing Miss Bliss or ‘The Dentist’s Dilemma’ is a new original and comic look at the secret lives of those who write romance fiction, the best selling literary genre in the world.
Dentist Felicity Bliss thinks writing a romance is as easy as falling out of bed. For a bet, she enters Pomme d’Amour Press’s competition to write such a book, and wins. Her prize is to be mentored in the art of romantic fantasy fiction by a seasoned scribe and soon she discovers it’s not all satin sheets and Chardonnay. Can she write another book? Is there romance in dentistry? Will she learn to love her readers and will her mentor find some new vocabulary?

Written by playwright Anne Pearson especially for Jubilant, the play features an original ‘book-within-a-play’ style as the scenes from Felicity’s book are dramatised.

This reading features Colchester favourites Christine Absalom and Ben Livingstone, and is directed by Ignatius Anthony.

8pm on Wednesday 10 and Thursday 11 February, tickets £8 [£6 concessions]
Headgate Theatre
14 Chapel Street North
Colchester
Essex
CO2 7AT

01206 366000

tickets@headgatetheatre.co.uk

ELLEN, HER TRIUMPHANT WOMEN

ELLEN, HER TRIUMPHANT WOMEN

Cambridge Devised Theatre at the Headgate Theatre Colchester

06.04.2012

for The Public Reviews

It's that Shakespearean shape-shifter Robin Goodfellow we see first, making a very Puckish entrance, upstaging a nervous Ellen Terry. She is preparing her first one-woman show, an illustrated lecture on The Women of Shakespeare, and she will spend the next hour frantically annotating the notes on her lectern, fretting that the memory is not yet in the body, but only in the head, agonising over the title.

Meanwhile our merry wanderer, her number one fan, will assume a dozen other roles – father, lover, critic, parrot – as we follow her life and career from the age of six, through the Lyceum years to her present American tour.

The show, devised by the actors from a script by Ros Connelly, is full of clever devices. The Victorian venticelli, "slanderous tongues" for the stalls-bar gossip, and the disembodied voices, such as that great Man of Letters Bernard Shaw, coming on like a surprise guest on This Is Your Life. A huge cast of supporting characters vie for our attention, her leading men and her lovers – Godwin, Watts, Reade, Irving, little Teddy who grows up to be Edward Gordon Craig.

Alan Mooney was a magical presence as the voice of them all; changing character in a moment. I liked his adoring echo – of the Desdemona speech, for instance - and the all-too-brief snatch of the "deliberate" Henry Irving style, and the Dresserly glimpse backstage. His Common Man Stage Manager was perhaps the least successful of his voices, but a useful extension of his "auditor" role.

Helen Cartwright was entirely convincing both as innocent girl and as grande dame. Her voice was wonderfully rich, and her thoughtful Terry interpretations of the great roles was fascinating to hear. She wore a striking gown – Miss Terry was so fond of her frocks – which recalled many of the roles for which she became famous, the first actress, we're told, to treat Ophelia, Portia, Lady M and the rest as real women.

It's a lot to pack in to 70 minutes: the incredibly colourful private life, the stage career, her thoughts on Shakespeare's heroines. We were left wishing for more [and granted it in a post-show talk-out] – perhaps a companion piece focusing solely on those American lectures.

this piece first appeared on The Public Reviews