A Sting in the Tail

We were greeted and seated in our usual seats, armed with a programme and made to feel very welcome by Roger Pizzey and the other FADS members. Having discovered that the play was written by Brian Clemens we were prepared for a ‘thrilling’ evening. This particular production was sadly the exception and it comes to me as no surprise to realise that it is very seldom performed.

However the set was very well designed and built allowing free access across the stage to the doors but I would like to have seen a little more movement during the actual dialogue in Scene one.  I felt the play was so poorly written that I am not sure how this could be achieved. I must compliment Dave Holden and Roy Stevens on their excellent performances with such vast amounts of dialogue to learn especially as so much of it was rather similar and therefore very easy to get one line confused with another.

In scenes two and three the excitement started to build and the brilliantly designed and built set really came into its own. The props were well chosen, the costumes and make-up looked right for the parts and the sound and lighting were inconspicuous giving that touch of realism. The new lighting equipment certainly came into its own enabling Jamie Wright to produce exactly the right atmosphere especially during the murder scenes and the depiction of the wonderful garden, seen through the patio doors. The choice of the pictures on the walls also added well to the set.

Vic Moss as Detective Inspector Berry gave an excellent performance as always.  He has the ability to get into the mould of his parts and always comes over as very convincing. The two ladies in their very different roles were also good, Elizabeth Toon as the alcohol swigging wife, swaying around the stage with a decidedly unsteady gait, and Lyndsey Kite as the secretary.

The two scenes in Act Two continued the trend of building the tension levels in this unusual play but in my opinion it still needed more to bring this thriller into a reasonable comparison with FADS' usual great productions. The sting in the tale didn’t quite work.

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