My "rest" from theatre seems to have amounted to a month at most - I must learn to take a total sabbatical from such things in future, perhaps.
Nice however to see some other people's shows instead, beginning with Global Warming: The Musical - now there's a title to conjure with. From what the director and others involved in the production were telling me, I was expecting quite cheesy fare, with everything thrown in to do with today's tacky society. What actually turned out was quite a touching and amusing musical satire of a girl band trying to sing their way to the top in a "Save the Planet" song contest (at the "CO2"!) by singing the decidedly unenvironmental song "Let's Heat It Up!" The girls themselves are engaging although a little underconfident in their opening number, and the whole thing has a nice touch of The Goodies-style satire to appeal to family audiences - even if the occasional coarse word slips in.
Nice however to see some other people's shows instead, beginning with Global Warming: The Musical - now there's a title to conjure with. From what the director and others involved in the production were telling me, I was expecting quite cheesy fare, with everything thrown in to do with today's tacky society. What actually turned out was quite a touching and amusing musical satire of a girl band trying to sing their way to the top in a "Save the Planet" song contest (at the "CO2"!) by singing the decidedly unenvironmental song "Let's Heat It Up!" The girls themselves are engaging although a little underconfident in their opening number, and the whole thing has a nice touch of The Goodies-style satire to appeal to family audiences - even if the occasional coarse word slips in.
Whilst the girls are taking care of the music, the adults have some great guest appearances, from the likes of Kevin Topple as a cocky TV director, Scott Sophos as a Karaoke landlord, Val Taylor as the deaf landlady who confuses The Glo Chicks with "The Glue Sticks", and a showstopping number from Adrian Bolton as the "Conscience Cowboy" with his song, "Daddy or Chips".
Happily also, the show and the numbers never overstay their welcome, and Tony Franchi's brand new play makes for a nice, economical evening's entertainment, which, yes, does have something meaningful to say about the environment.Joseph Andrews on the other hand, for me, rather dragged. Probably, I think, because the interval was chosen a little too late into the
proceedings, when I would've liked to have seen the story through to the finish. Though comparable in length to Global Warming: The Musical, Henry Fielding's old warhorse of bawdy humour has been knocking about for centuries, and the Dedham Players decided to spruce it up with some tavern songs, amusing props, and a male narrator (Don Poar) instead of a female one as originally written. Newcomer Daniel Ellis brings the necessary physique and bashfulness to the title role, but his is a part lost amid a whole flurry of colourful characters.Les Chisnall holds it together in meticulous straight-faced fashion as Parson Adams (whom I didn't realise until later was an older character than the way Les played him), and once again, there are some good cameos from Rachel Culley ("Lady Booby"), Sue Nicholson (her maid "Slipslop"), Paul Reed (too briefly seen at the beginning and belatedly reintroduced in Act II), Brian Butcher and Alan Stock as Laurel & Hardy-style police officers, and a cameo to savour by Annie Simcox as a flirty maid. Nice also to see Will Parrick in a small, comparatively gentler role of a robber, after his skinhead turn in Treatment(qv).
Reasonably fun on the whole, but by half time I felt it was the sort of Dedham play that I'd seen before.
Anyway, I'm off now to help out with Colchester Theatre Group's own summer extravaganza, We Love You Arthur - about that monumentally charismatic figure of romantic magnetism of the 1980s, Arthur Scargill(!?)
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