Agatha Cristy and the Village Hall Murders

Swavesey RADSOC have taken to the road with their third touring production.  This time with a twice-postponed production of Derek Webb’s Agatha Crusty and the Village Hall Murders, directed by Chris Avery. I liked the play, it was very amusing.  

The first night performance of the tour was in the Bethel Baptist Chapel in Swavesey.  Any touring show presents a challenge to Director and cast but even more so when seating and acting areas are both on the flat and, as in this play, the cast were also seated for several scenes.  If you are not sitting in the front couple of rows it necessitates either ducking and diving to see who is speaking or cutting your losses and just listen.  Fortunately, the need to listen closely was a requirement.

The setting depicting a Church Hall was fine, with the doors either side for entrances/exits.  The set was lit well taking into account the facilities available, and the few sound effects needed were good.  The shock ending of Act 1, with the body falling out of the cupboard, made us all jump. Maybe holding the moment for a couple of seconds would have been better as it was so sudden some people didn’t get what had happened before the blackout.   I liked the way the Company Stage Manager became part of the action in the moving of props, chairs etc.

This particular play gave everyone the chance to create their own persona, as the villagers of Chortleby were an eclectic lot.
The titular tole of Agatha Crusty gave Rachel Isham the chance to give us an excellent portrayal of a very perspicacious woman, a first-rate performance.  
D.I. Twigg was very nicely played indeed by John Pickering, a typical country DI who thought he was astute, but lacked more than a little awareness, especially when it came to people’s names! The play on words with the names was extremely well handled.
Rob Zanconato created a good character as Harry Knott, very laid back amidst all the action and Ashleigh Wilson gave a fine performance as Alice Fogg, which I much enjoyed.  
A nice performance also came from Katy Hughes as Eleanor Wagstaff, the stalwart of the Village Hall committee. Eleanor tends to ride rough-shod over everyone, whilst showing her regard for  Toby, the vicar.  Phil Bailey as the said vicar looked every inch a man of the cloth.  However I would personally have liked to have seen more warmth between Eleanor and Toby.
I particularly liked Adrienne Sharman’s dual portrayals of Olivia and Oliver, both delivered with absolute confidence and conviction, but strangely I liked Oliver better!  

Andy Howard in a small but essential part as the village PC, gave a good account of himself and, although Helen Grattidge as Isabella Battersby had a minor role, again it was essential to the plot. Di Chapman was Maisie, the recently widowed village hall cleaner, who pottered about in a deceptively unobtrusive manner. A little more angst when she was found out would have been good.  An amusing performance came from Hannah Whiffin as the life-model/Snow White stand-in Mandy, and she certainly made the most of her simulated death by poisoned apple at the panto rehearsal. 

Overall a nice production, a couple of technical blips and a few prompts on the night I was there slowed the action slightly.  I would like there to have been more variation in the pace of delivery by some of the characters but overall I very much enjoyed it as did the full house audience. Congratulations to all involved.

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