Me & My Girl

Steve Turnbull threw himself energetically into the main character of Bill, the cheeky Lambeth lad who discovers he is the heir to the estate of Hareford.

Although Steve had the confidence of cheeky Snibson, I didn’t instantly warm to his charm and charisma and a lot of the jokes fell flat which was a real shame.

Most of the musical focuses on the aristocratic family trying to teach Bill to behave according to his new position, which created some hilarious moments and some that weren’t as funny. I didn’t understand why there were ping-pong balls flying out of cushions – I would have like to have seen the characters work harder to create the funny moments with great acting and facial expressions rather than allowing the props to take over.

The love of Bill’s life, Sally, played by Charlotte Platt can only watch in dismay as the outrageous Lady Jaqueline, eloquently portrayed by Bethany Froud, tries to woo him.

Charlotte had some memorable moments, particularly in her solo ‘Once You Lose Your Heart’ which was very moving, as well as the title song ‘Me and My Girl’ which sounded lovely.

Peter Johnson as Parchester stole was well cast and did a fine job of ‘The Family Solicitor’ number. Sir John Tremayne was played by Graham Wilks who gave a confident portrayal with comic timing that was spot on.

As always, Jennifer Hall brought a professional approach to the production with a great portrayal of the Duchess of Dene. With her wonderful facial expressions, superb singing and acting ability she was always the perfect choice for this part. It was lovely to see her character evolve throughout the production as she grows to like Bill making the end scene much more poignant.

The choreography was well paced and spaced and the company men must be congratulated for their multi role contributions. It was clear they had worked extremely hard to make the company scenes really work.

I thoroughly enjoyed Cecil Walkers performance as Sir Jasper Tring whilst Darren Thornhill gave a memorable performance as Gerald who was suitably annoying.

The costumes, as always looked fabulous with good attention to detail with wigs and accessories.

The lighting worked well in some scenes however was noticeably poor in others with silhouettes from the actors being cast which really shouldn’t happen at this scale of production. 

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