reviewed by Polycrit
It is regrettable that the enjoyment of the casts and production teams, which must be considered an important factor in judging the success of a Convergence summer production, should be tainted with the fear of having no audience to appreciate the performance as the School disperses with the advent of the summer holiday. Coupled with this was the anxiety of putting up for the first time on the Girls' School stage, a full box set.
As events turned out, however, the sudden substitution of enthusiasm for this tension on the First Night gave the plays a contagious exuberance which soon involved the sizeable audience. The first of the plays, however, The Bald Prima Donna denied the audience the chance to respond with all the vigour that the cast was generating. It was not frequently funny enough for laughter, nor grave enough to stimulate them. The involved discussions of trivia and long flights of apparent nonsense were unnerving, particularly to an audience which was on the whole very young.
Stephen Shaw was pleasantly relaxed as the old man, a guise in which he had already proved himself. Brian Melichan was better than we had ever seen him before, as Mr. Martin, and Penny Wellburn and Valerie Parker gave enjoyable performances, even if they lacked a little confidence. One will remember Alice Hines's arch-sweetness as the Maid; but Jacek Strauch's grossly hammed Fire Chief was out of place even if it did put life into the play. Caroline Saunders's cast worked well, but the play was an unequal match for them.
Nigel Sheineald's production of The Real Inspector Hound was able to capitalise on the audience's pent-up energy, and with the first laughs, the performance caught fire. It is a play which operates on many different levels, with its central theme being the relationship of appearance and reality, as the two theatre critics become involved in the play they are watching. With a cast of such sensitivity, the role of the director need only be one of co-ordinating ideas, but Nigel Sheinwald's main triumph was in the near-perfect casting. In particular, it was a master-stroke to see Stephen Games as Birdboot, the Northern (as he played it) Cassanova theatre critic. His vitalism, timing and excellent portayal. coupled with such impressive make-up ensured that this will be remembered as his finest role. With new-found maturity and sensitivity, he was the anchor for the cast which The Bald Prima Donna had lacked. His excellent display was well balanced by Clive Anderson's 'bubbly' interpretation of Moon in which he once more showed modern comedy to be very much his forte. Katie Finch's delightful Miss Drudge was faultless and ranks with Irene Fawkes's roles in the past as the most enjoyed performance since Convergence was founded.
Peter Webb's performance as Major Magnus made one regret that he should have left his debut so late, and Geoffrey Perkins was successful in achieving just the right degree of melodrama. Ann Goff was a stunningly beautiful and entertaining Lady Muldoon, demonstrating her maturity as an actress as she glided across the stage, making fine use of so limiting a set.
Charles Aylmer was in the best sense of the word ridiculous, and Jill Evans made most endearing Felicity, and let us mention Michael Portillo's ninety-minute ordeal as a most convincing corpse!
POLICRIT
from Gaytonian 1970