A Bunch of Amateurs

This is a fun show by Ian Hislop and Nick Newman, about a washed up American actor hoping to revive his career by coming to England to play King Lear at Stratford upon Avon, the home of Shakespeare, except he is unaware of the existence of more than one Stratford and finds himself instead at Stratford St John, a sleepy village in Suffolk with a ‘Bunch of Amateurs,’ helping them to save their Barn Theatre from closure.

What was clever about this production, directed by Sue Chaplin was the staging under the management of Cathy Nicholls. The Harrold Centre has a relatively small stage, so instead of a series of set changes involving flats etc, the whole show was performed with fixed flats either side depicting the wooden walls of the barn theatre, complete with a hatch halfway up the wall stage right. With this as the background and ingenious use of the two separate set of steps leading off the front of the stage, a couple of chairs, some stools and a trestle table to depict amongst others, a committee room, a breakfast bar, a dining table, a massage table/bed and a Bed & Breakfast.  To depict a different setting the cast would play the scene to either stage right or left, descend the steps, walk across the front of the audience and go up the other set back onto the other side of the stage and end up a matter of feet from where they started. Meanwhile the trestle table and other furniture had been rearranged as required. Simple, clever and very effective; it left you in no doubt as to what the set now represented. At one point the cast entered from upstage right, signifying they were leaving the Bed and Breakfast, walked to the front, down the steps and up the other steps stage left, to define they were back in the Barn. Ingenious thinking by Sue Chaplin.

Lighting by Dave Revell and Chris Chaplin complemented the set well and sound by Ian Person was crystal.

A great array of costumes, depicting each of the characters personalities very well were sourced by Fran Ross and Sue Chaplin.

Simon Wells played the role of Jefferson Steel very cleverly and with great confidence. Firstly, his American accent was quite subtle, as was the way he put across Jefferson’s gradual attitude change from entitled and angry to humble and personable, and part of the team. And as it says in the programme, he had a huge amount of lines, which he had obviously put an awful lot of work into as he never missed a beat. Simon Wells took us on a subtle journey from disliking Jefferson to rooting for him – clever acting - Jefferson Steele himself would have been proud!

The very experienced Simon Alaluf, who I think has been in every Adhoc production I’ve ever seen, played the pompous Solicitor, Nigel Drewbury, whose nose is very much put out of joint by the arrival of Jefferson Steel and who then takes the very role he coveted. He played him as quite sly, but with quite a lot of flustered humour, especially when he is uncovered as the source of the scandalous newspaper article. Loved the umbrella versus plastic knife fight!

Rachel Morrey as Jefferson’s daughter Jessica Steel added some glamour to the plot as she gradually wrapped her father round her little finger to get the part she wanted in the show.

Clare Page was an excellent Mary Plunkett, the star struck landlady with the hots for Jefferson, if only she could remember what films he’d been in. Highly amusing.

Fran Ross was Lauren Bell, the wife of the sponsor, passionate about arts and somewhat smarter than her husband, who withdraws the Beer sponsorship after the newspaper scandal breaks. Her saucy masseuse scene with Jefferson was incredibly funny and will remain etched on the mind for a while yet.

Jude Stacy was the determined director and driving force behind the Stratford Players, who continually had one over on Jefferson. Her scene where she announces that she has covered all Jefferson’s riders was absolutely hilarious, especially when Denis arrives on the mobility scooter as the means of transport to his accommodation.

Matt Rowson playing Denis Dobbins gave a master class on how to play an intellectually challenged character for maximum laughs. His slightly slowed speech and his facial expressions just make you constantly smile, especially when boring Jefferson to death describing his handyman tools and jobs.

Adhoc is a very experience, tightknit group who know each other inside out and as a result gave us a very slick, fast paced production on their tiny stage with a very well thought out production, which was totally absorbing and thoroughly enjoyable. So well done to Sue Chaplin, her cast and crew for a great show. You are very much a society that punch above your weight and great example of a village hall society with an excellent Bunch of Amateurs.

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