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Dangerous Corner by J. B. Priestley
DANGEROUS Corner was not only JB Priestley’s first play, but also flagged up his famous “time plays” in which he explores the might-have-been, allowing his protagonists a chance to take the alternative fork in the road – or in this case avoid the obstacle of the title.
Set on one night after dinner at the home of a publishing company director, the cast is his two co-directors, two wives and a devoted company secretary, and a deus ex machina in the shape of a female novelist with an unquenchable curiosity.
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Table Manners by Alan Ayckbourn
CHURCHILL Productions, the company that has brought 21 shows to Dorset audiences in the past 11 years, chose Alan Ayckbourn’s Table Manners, part of his Norman Conquests trilogy and an assured banker, to the Tivoli Theatre in Wimborne last week.
Judged by a full house on Saturday afternoon, you can’t go wrong with Ayckbourn, whose prolific output seems to convince audiences that his plays are funny and lightly entertaining, when in fact they are very clever and very lacking in heart. He’s a keen observer of dysfunction, and a very able architect of multi-purpose settings.
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A Doll’s House by Henrick Ibsen
THERE is nothing easy about Henrick Ibsens’s most frequently performed play A Doll’s House.
Written in 1879, pre dating Freud by more than a decade (and Eric Berne’s 60s pop psychology cult book Games People Play by 85 years) the play was a sensation from the first performance. Not only did it turn the idea of the “well formed play” on its head, but it flew against the accepted conventions of romantic love and the sanctity of marriage.
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Honour by Joanna Murray-Smith
AUSTRALIAN playwright Joanna Murray-Smith’s play Honour, written in 1995 when she was a mature student on a Columbia University writing programme, was performed at the National Theatre London six years ago, where it delighted the critics.
It’s not the sort of play you expect to see on a Saturday afternoon in the Tivoli Theatre in Wimborne, performed by an amateur company.
But when that company is Churchill Productions, which in its ten years’ existence has established a reputation for versatility and exceptional acting, this difficult and painful play is in safe hands.
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Blithe Spirit by Noel Coward
(Director Pete Talman) Noel Coward’s comic masterpiece evokes the spirit of the time—the spirit of the 1930’s, the spirit of marital relationships, the spirit of the Other World. Charles and his second wife Ruth are haunted by the ghost of his first wife, Elvira. Medium Madame Arcati tries to help things out by contacting the ghost…
Blithe Spirit, Tivoli Theatre, Wimborne.
Noel Coward’s original production of Blithe Spirit opened in 1941 and audiences today are still enjoying it. Coward described his play as ‘a superficial comedy about a ghost’. This, one of his wittiest comedies, makes light of death.
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Two by Jim Cartwright
TWO by Jim Cartwright is a collection of monologues and duologues from different characters in a typical local pub. Just two actors, John Billington and Jan Wyld, play all fourteen characters between them. The scenes range from funny to chillingly sinister, ending with an intensely moving scene between the pub landlord and landlady. They have a difficult relationship and snipe at each other throughout the play, however we find out the reason in the last scene which for me was so moving that I almost got my handkerchief out, however all ended well.
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Hobson’s Choice by Harold Brighouse
(Director Tony Boncza) A comedy based around the battle of wills between Hobson, a hard-headed cobbler, and his daughter Maggie, who defies him by marrying his most downtrodden worker.
Hobson’s Choice, Churchill Productions, Tivoli Theatre, Wimborne
THIS company has long had a reputation for quality productions, and it therefore comes as no surprise that once again they have come up trumps and enhanced that reputation even further with a production—directed by Tony Boncza—that is well-nigh perfect in every way.
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Lady in the Van by Alan Bennett
(Director Pete Talman) with Jan Wyld as Miss Shepherd, John Billington-Beardsley as Alan Bennett and Stuart Glossop as Alan Bennett 2.
Alan Bennett’s superb comedy is based on a true event that was to take up almost two decades of his life, after he allowed the cantankerous, smelly Miss Shepherd and the battered van in which she lived to move into his Camden garden on a temporary basis. She remained there until her death some fifteen years later.
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Deadly Nightcap by Francis Durbridge
(Director Damien Thomas) Murder and Mystery abound in this ingenious play from the master of the genre, which has more than its fair share of blind alleys.
WITH the combination of a top-notch thriller by an acknowledged master of the genre, Francis Durbridge, fine direction by professional actor/director Damien Thomas and a first-rate cast, this production could hardly fail to score – and score it most certainly did.
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Daisy Pulls it Off by Denise Deegan
(Director Pete Talman) The attempts of a super achiever Daisy Meridith (Margo Stephens) to submerge her elementary school background and find acceptance in the snobbery confines of Grangewood School for Young Ladies.
Daisy Pulls it Off, Churchill Productions, Tivoli Theatre, Wimborne
IF you didn’t see this absolutely spiffing production then you really need to write ‘I must go to the theatre more often’ 100 times – with no ink blots please. It’s all a glorious spoof of the Angela Brazil/Elinor Brent-Dyer type schoolgirl novels, and is set around a play put on by the fourth form at Grangewood School For Girls, circa 1930, which is in turn about elementary school pupil Daisy Merideth, the first ever scholarship girl at Grangewood. Her honesty and true grit help her overcome adversity and go on to become the most popular girl in the school – via jolly exciting things like a cliff rescue and some hidden treasure.
