A MONTH OF SUNDAYS

A MONTH OF SUNDAYS
A Queen's Hornchurch production
at the Queen's Theatre, Hornchurch


26.09.2016

for The Reviews Hub

This gentle comedy from sitcom master Bob Larbey celebrates its thirtieth birthday this year. Its West End production, starring George Cole, won Best Comedy of 1986. Jason Robards played Senior Citizen Cooper in the American version the next year.
But, though the piece continues to be popular on the amateur stage, this Hornchurch production is its first major revival since then.
Cooper – no-one calls him John – is living out his end days in a well-appointed Surrey rest home (a believable set by designer Anthony Lamble, opulently old-fashioned, but with an annoyingly reflective rear window). Along with his mucker Aylott, he endures the round of mealtimes and visiting hours, the palliative platitudes (“I hope I'm as lively as you at your age!”) as well as the natural shocks that flesh is heir to. The staff are the Panzer Division, the demented are the Zombies.
Variously described as a dirty old man and the acceptable face of senility, Cooper is engagingly played by William Hoyland, hardly ever off the stage, pottering about his spacious room, confiding in the audience. Jonathan to his David, Aylott (Robin Hooper) is a fussy little man, physically much more spry, but terrified of losing his mind. Their final scene is almost unbearably affecting, played with sensitive timing and understated emotion.
Good support from the staff: Connie Walker as the elliptical Mrs Baker, with her carpet sweeper and her obliging song. And Anna Leong Brophy as Nurse Wilson, caring for Cooper perhaps more than she should, touchingly human beneath the starched uniform. Cooper's daughter and son-in-law, whose reluctant monthly pilgrimages from Milton Keynes give the play its title, are Sophie Russell, whose scene alone with her father is one of the strongest, and Gareth Clarke, as her flat-roofed husband who could have strayed in from an Ayckbourn, a fine study in awkwardness.
“There's no drama, it just goes on ...” says Cooper of his life in the luxury of the home. And, as with Waiting for Godot, we see the day repeat itself: the mantras - “Much the same … mustn't grumble” and the difficult micturition. 
Russell Bolam's production has some lovely moments – the mime at the start of the children's second Sunday visit – and delightful dream sequences between the scenes, flashing lights, an ironic Wakey Wakey from Billy Cotton, bizarre characters entering through wardrobe and fireplace, sand-dancing nuns, WG Grace, Aylott as a punk on skis. The song and dance to Flanagan and Allen's Miss You is particularly poignant.
The play is not always convincing – the children's change of heart in particular – and though there are chuckles of recognition there's little comfort for the silver heads in the stalls; the corridor, with its occasional tables and walking aids, runs through the auditorium. But the ending, with the 11th man in the 1947 MCC side still un-named, strikes just the right note of wry resignation.

photograph: Mark Sepple

AT THE MOUNTAINS OF MADNESS

AT THE MOUNTAINS OF MADNESS

Icarus Theatre Collective at the Cramphorn Theatre, Chelmsford

27.09.16

HP Lovecraft's cult classic from the early 30s is a natural for the stage.

It's narrated in the first person by geologist William Dyer, reluctantly reliving the horrors of the past in order to dissuade others from following in his snow-tracks to the white, dead world of the Antarctic.

Other voices are quoted. In this uncomplicated adaptation they emanate from the old-fashioned wireless receiver, part of an evocative soundscape with music by Theo Holloway.

Icarus Theatre's hour-long version trims the text of some of its worst excesses, concentrating on the narrative and the mounting sense of buried horror. There's little to distract from the voice and the visions it conjures up: the shimmering medieval castles and the towering cathedrals of the ice cap, the arcane animals, the sculptures left by the Old Ones [Lovecraft's Elder Things], the giant eyeless penguins.

Dyer is played by Tim Hardy, who adapted the piece with director Max Lewendel. His compelling voice, often subdued and broken with emotion, skilfully draws the audience into the tale.

The show is impressively polished technically, with the timing of the sound and light impeccable. The setting is simple, with a lectern, a chest, a chair, a lantern and the radio, and on the floor, a pentagon of Persian rugs …

We see the terrors only in our mind's eye, but who needs CGI with such a captivating story-teller ?

NO SEX PLEASE, WE'RE BRITISH

NO SEX PLEASE, WE'RE BRITISH

Blackmore Players at the Village Hall

23.09.16

for Sardines

The intrepid Blackmore Players – one of the best village companies in the area – breathe new life into this old farce, penned back in '71 by Foot and Marriott, not alas credited in the programme.

The critics panned it then, but it did excellent business in the West End, and has been popular with am-drammers ever since.

It's a huge challenge, though, not least because an amateur group will lack the rehearsal time – and the audience previews – when slapstick and repartee can be honed.

And there were some slow moments at Blackmore, with the all-important doors poorly co-ordinated and actors waiting for an interruption.

But Andrew Raymond's production was great fun, boasting some excellent performances and a splendid set, with orange doors, lovely works of art, and an efficient, if bizarrely placed, serving hatch. An excellent period radio for Jupiter, but some other props failed to convince: the super-8, the “1001 Perversions” and the camp snaps, possibly due to a commendable ignorance of the ins and outs of erotica.

Matthew Pearson and Rebecca Smith were the hapless newly-weds who unwittingly get mucky books and blue films sent through the post [very retro], dressed respectively in a staid suit and a shorty negligée.

Visitors to their love-nest over the bank include his snobbish mother [a lovely character performance from Linda Raymond, even if several boroughs removed from Chelsea], his pompous boss [Keith Goody], Superintendent Paul [Ryan Stevens – is it me, or are policemen getting younger all the time ?] and two oddly assorted good-time girls [Lisa Matthews brandishing a rubber cudgel, and Ela Raymond, wielding a feather duster].

But the comedy gongs must go to Old Mr Haskell as the bank inspector with the Union Flag flying beneath his jim-jams, and Young Mr Haskell as the chief cashier – aka the Phantom Pornographer - who struggles to limit the damage the tide of Scandinavian filth might cause to the National Union Bank in this unnamed respectable Thames Valley town. Simon and Sam caught the style, both physical and vocal, to perfection, sliding sleepily down the wall, or losing the use of both feet. Sam, whose truly hilarious performance included not one but two suicidal leaps through the hatch, could happily have understudied Crawford at the Strand.

The cast thoroughly deserved the gales of laughter that greeted the better jokes, and the whoops and cheers on their tardy curtain-call.

OTHELLO'S GUILT

OTHELLO'S GUILT

at the Rose Playhouse, Bankside

22.092016

for Remote Goat

We walk into a desert, strewn with the essentials of survival. Boxes, a camping stove. A lone prisoner, in orange overalls, lies chained under a polythene shroud.

It's Othello, whose inner turmoil – the torments of hell, maybe - make up this compelling monologue.

Marco Gambino makes a welcome return to the Rose, after performing the Italian version of this piece – La Colpa di Otello – at the ancient amphitheatre in Segesta this summer.

The words are Shakespeare's, repeated and re-purposed by director Roberto Cavosi.

Key words and phrases recur: “What dost thou think, Iago?” - handkerchief, confession, slave - “Leave me, Iago!”, “I am bound to thee forever.” Like Jekyll and Hyde, the two men seem locked in a self-destructive struggle, Othello's jealousy fuelled by his nemesis Iago. Occasionally another voice is heard: Emilia, Desdemona.

Gambino's Moor is a tortured soul – farewell the tranquil mind; he utters his thoughts in a rich Shakespearean tone with a touch of his native Sicily. There are snatches of dramatic music – Alfredo Santoloci the composer. And Othello's solitary life is punctuated with small rituals – making coffee, taking a piss, failing to light a roll-up, clumsily shaving. Sand runs through his fingers as Desdemona protests her innocence. He contemplates the green-eyed monster through a glass darkly. And finally crawls back under the polythene to lie with arms outstretched.

A powerful, poetical study of one man's conscience, making for an intensely moving hour in the company of a captive racked by guilt, grief and remorse.

CHASE ME UP FARNDALE AVENUE, S'IL VOUS PLAIT

CHASE ME UP FARNDALE AVENUE, S'IL VOUS PLAIT

Trinity Methodist Music and Drama
21.09.16


Those intrepid Townswomen get their teeth into saucy French farce in their latest dramatic offering.
The hotel set boasts a Dansette and five doors, none of them working quite as it should. No French window, but a French maid called Fifi, and a cast of characters with ominously similar names.
The Farndale Ladies – and their one male member – have countless costume changes and false entrances, as they double and treble as wives, mistresses, friends, secretaries and the plumber's wife.
The confusion is complete, the plot as tangled as Minnie's knitting. So no surprise that it all got too much by the end, life imitating art; even the attentive prompt – Terrie Latimer – struggled to rescue the floundering actors.
Some priceless performances, notably Sue Bartle as Minnie [“Are we acting again?”] Robinson, physically superb as Roger, gamely struggling with the script, a last-minute substitution from wardrobe. Jenny Edler was scatty Felicity, Alison O'Malley the formidable Phoebe Reece, and Helen Wilson her sister Sylvia, cast as both Frank and Mary Carrott. Emma Byatt, an assured farceuse, also played a married couple, as well as a mistress. They all seemed adept at handling male parts, but their SM, Gordon [David Ehren], was pressed into service as a wonderfully wooden Barrett.
Much to enjoy in Tony Brett's production, from the invisible partition to the Cancan kickline finale. The surreal door sequence went very well, but the “this is my husband” routine could have been a little slicker. Many of the classic amdram pitfalls were featured: the garbled prompt, the nightmare drinks table, the wig and the moustache. And there was a memorable rendition of the Marseillaise, with spoons and washboard obbligato.
I hope that Brexit will not mean an end to their cross-channel ventures; I was sorry to have missed previous attempts, including the intriguing “Cave, girls, it's Fraulein Humperdinck”.

production photograph by Val Scott, who was also responsible for the amusingly authentic programme