Educating Rita

Educating Rita is a stage comedy by British playwright Willy Russell. It is a play for two actors set entirely in the office of an Open University tutor. Commissioned by the Royal Shakespeare Company, Educating Rita premièred at The Warehouse, London, in June 1980 starring Julie Walters and Mark Kingston.  It was the latest offering of Caerphilly Players and took place at a new venue for me: Y Banc, Caerphilly.   The space used to be Barclays bank, and it was very interesting to see what had been done to convert the building into a performance space but also fun to see the old parts of the bank, such as the vault, during my tour of the building given to me by the society.  Very cool; thank you.

The set was basic but effective and did everything it needed to do to enable the performers to convey the story.

The two performers in this performance were Sadie Moon as Rita and Matthew Fisher as Frank.  I’ve seen a lot of productions since becoming a NODA rep and I must say that Sadie and Matthew gave two of the most incredible performances I’ve seen during that time. 

Sadie’s portrayal of Rita, complete with scouse accent, was, in a word, incredible.  We saw the character of Rita grow throughout the production and the Rita in the final scene was a far cry from the Rita in the opening scene. Sadie’s accent never faltered.  I had to ask if she was in fact, from Liverpool.  She isn’t, but she could have been! 

Matthew gave us a brilliant interpretation of university professor, Frank.  Frank is an alcoholic and clearly struggling with aspects of his life.  Matthew played this part brilliantly.  There is a danger to overplay drunk scenes but this was never the case in this production.  A fantastic character, full of depth and emotion.

A play with such a small cast has the potential to lack pace.  However, this production was full of pace and the play flew by.

This really was a fantastic production and one that made me thankful that I am a NODA rep as I would have missed it had I not been in this role.  A brilliant production, thank you.

 

The views in this report are solely of the author.

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