Cash on Delivery

50% or more of successful direction comes with choosing the right play and casting it well. Debutant Director, Leigh Conley, managed to cast perfectly this enormously funny and well-written play and therefore be half way to a big success before rehearsals had even begun.    

Well planned, tightly rehearsed and brightly paced this production set out to entertain and it certainly did. Sound enhancement aided greatly in the big auditorium although secondary speakers in the dead spot could have helped the audience hear all the nuances and therefore make the jokes even clearer.  Some of the jokes didn’t receive the volume of laughter they deserved as people were keenly listening to catch every twist and turn of the plot. It must be remembered that sound enhancement cannot add to depth of tone, clarity of diction and voice production if they are not there in the first place.  Naturalised conversation is all very commendable but can exclude the audience if not carefully handled. Remember the audience doesn’t know what an actor is going to say until he/she says it whereas the cast has heard it many times before in rehearsal.

The set was quite impressive with every entrance/exit as required and visible to the audience. A well worked staircase gave access to the first floor. The front door opened on to a strange arrangement. One couldn’t be certain as to how the house looked from the outside, but the falling off the roof worked well. The window seat was effective but why was the sofa so close to the fireplace and why was the fireplace behind the sofa? There was so much room on stage left but everyone struggled to get around the sofa. Were other angles tried? The way the room was organised the fireplace should have been on the fourth wall opposite the sofa giving more room on stage right of the sofa. There was a strange moment when actors exited into the Dining Room but re-appeared from the Kitchen. Even in a farce this was slightly illogical.

All the technicals for the physical jokes had been well planned and rehearsed.  The felling by the door of Uncle George was extremely well handled gaining groans as well as laughs from the audience. The dropping of the stretcher also worked well getting appropriate contrasting responses from the audience. Physical jokes need space to work effectively and for the audience to see what is happening. The moment everyone is waiting for – the arrival of the washing-machine – was beautifully handled. This can get out of hand and upstage the action. ADC controlled this really well getting the best response from the audience.

Casting was excellent throughout with everyone constructing and maintaining their characters in a very realistic manner. It seems odd to say of a farce, but everyone appeared normal and quite believable. This ensured the audience was quickly involved in the story and was sympathetic of the situations in which the characters got involved. It is not good to single out one actor but the company was fortunate to have Simon Hurst at the heart of proceedings.  His reliability and control ensured all worked well. His amazing ability to appear to pause just before the next character was introduced as someone else was simple genius encouraging audience laughter without milking things and slowing the pace. Around him everyone as mentioned above created strong characters and developed their own comedy to make for a complete evening of laughter. All the pieces of the jigsaw fitted together with ease and each was so significant that the whole would not work with a someone not pulling their weight.

It has never been easy to recreated the excitement of the previous performance and audiences full of relations, friends and society members are never encouraging to relaxed, sparkling performances, but the cast didn’t fall into the trap of overworking the gags and a good pace was maintained. Michael Cooney’s play is a wonderful piece, but requires good pace and seamless presentation to succeed. ADC achieved this very well with a company who worked well together and for each other. It is good to see ADC presenting well written material with an eye to detail enhanced by good technical support.  

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