Our Day Out

My first visit to Nunthorpe Players was a bit of a trip down nostalgia lane having been in Willy Russel’s Our Day Out almost 25 years ago and what a fantastic choice it was for this talented group, a great mixture of adults and Juniors.

Director Sara Ramrekha and her whole production team really seemed as one with her vision transforming the lovely St Mary’s Church Hall into this adventure for the cast.

This is not an easy play to stage with multiple stop offs and scene changes combining with almost 50% of the play set on board a coach. Assisted by a fab (largely family team) Peter Clegg did wonders with the set, a large tiered bus taking over stage right and protruding into the audience bringing the action closer to the audience and allowing everyone in the bus scenes to be on view, thankfully to the audience and not to the teachers! The bus on permanent display allowed the curtained off stage to be transformed into numerous stop-offs, (Zoo, beach and Conwy Castle to name a few) without long pauses in the action and each of them was packed with colour, excellent scenery and lovely attention to detail in all the small props. Even the very brief stop off at Cafe’s were brilliant visually really emphasising the hard work and care that was put into this production.

Now fancy sets, really cool visual effects like a 70’s fairground slide show and excellent costumes are all very well but they also need the drama and performance to match. Luckily Nunthorpe had twenty-two members who all excelled in their individual roles and collectively as a group. Before I go into detail, I must mention how well every member of cast handled the accents in the show, from the bold Wesh tones to the really effective Liverpudlian Juniors, every cast member really nailed these without letting them slip in the show.

Whilst four of the adults playing the teachers are heavily involved, the rest of the adult cast brought each of their smaller roles to life with great personality and characterisation. Garry Sowerby doubled up wonderfully as a comical and cheery Lollipop Man switching in a flash to serious Headteacher. Benjamin Whitehead was hysterical, also doubling up as the hen-pecked Cafe owner and Zookeeper. His switch from calm to chaos was great to watch, as in both roles the children rob his establishments. He worked brilliantly with Bex Robertson in the cafe as their cunning plan to maximise profit on their sweets comes unstuck as the cafe is cleaned out with a penny to show!

Rightfully choosing to keep their cafe locked were the excellent Katie Legg and Annabelle Dailey as Pamela and Paula. Both these two young actors really nailed the Welsh accent and brought great comedy to the roles with the hiding behind the shop counter a lovely touch. Out of the Cameo roles, Barry McIvor as the coach driver Ronnie really stood out for me. A colourful performance showing multiple sides to this character as he slowly warmed to the kids and fought their corner at every opportunity.

The four main teachers were superbly cast and each of them really captured the characteristics of each member of staff. Meghan Hanrahan was lovely as Susan, often quiet in the background yet with a strong control of her words and actions. It was great to see the comedy come alive in her as she masterfully undid the boy’s pathetic attempts of flirting and undermining her. A really strong performance and matched excellently alongside her love interest and fellow teacher Colin, played brilliantly in his debut stage performance by Stefan Byrne. He was wonderfully shy and nervous throughout, his exasperation and embarrassment at being the heartthrob to Linda and Karen really shone through. It was nice to see him break out of the weak characteristic with a great outburst at Mr Briggs in Act Two.

The main theme behind the teachers is a great debate between cruelty or compassion in handling the tear away kids and Alex Duncan as Mrs Kay and Paul Maull as Mr Briggs really captured this throughout the play. Alex had a lovely soft and composed nature about her, really emphasised by the Hippy style costume and flower power hip flask, the nurture to her character really shining through. Her battles and disagreements with Mr Briggs were excellent with the speed and control of dialogue perfect. Paul Maull really captured the almost arrogant and self-righteous side of Mr Briggs, a teacher so stuck in his ways and unable to be convinced otherwise. He was stern in his voice, tense in his body language and a real menace to the kids. The only break in his character comes from a very emotional scene with schoolgirl Carol, and even this and the momentarily relaxation would only last for a short period. 

Now it has to be said that the Juniors in this production absolutely stole the show. As a group they were wild and raucous, the bus singalongs lively, the off script reactions fantastic and every single one of them created their own individual characters at ease, all of them totally believable. 

Although not huge parts, Ellie Edwards (Gayle), Jess Dixon (Maureen), Lottie Bertram (Gladys) and Daisy Wall (Veronica) were excellent the whole show. From their lovely naps on the coach to their excitement at the Zoo their energy never dropped, and I especially loved Daisy’s numerous little interactions with Mr Briggs showing him the complete lack of respect he deserved.

In Billy Metcalfe as Kev and Frankie Stewart as Jimmy we had two lads playing the picked on and hyperactive youngest members of the road trip. Their beaming smiles were almost as huge as their performances and I could not keep smiling at how much fun they were having and how well they bounced off all the other members of the cast, students, and teachers.

With a lot of groups struggling to find male actors, Nunthorpe are blessed with 5 excellent young lads all in quite leading roles and not one of them looked out of place, all excelling. Isaac Short was really good as Andrews, a really confident showing of the quite disturbed, misunderstood and isolated youth. Even when he seemed to be opening up to Briggs, he was instantly shot down and almost humiliated and he handled this with great quality, the comedy to his role coming to life with his smoking sketches. 

Mitch McSween as Riley and Pacey Morning as Digger however won the comedy awards on the night. From their first entrance trying to blag their way onto the trip, to the bullying and securing of the ever-popular back row of the bus their characters were 100 miles an hour the whole show. Mitch in particular showed a real talent for comic timing and line delivery and he and Pacey bounced off each other with ease dominating many of the scenes. It was great to see a different and more vulnerable side to Mitch’s character and this transformation when brought back down to earth by Susan showed the making of a very talented young actor.

Covering almost every stereo-typical school character on the coach we also had our IT girls, the popular kids who everyone wants to hang out with, and Niamh Cook was absolutely perfect for her role, Linda. The rebel child, ignoring the uniform policy, showing amazing attitude when arguing with Briggs and the total show off to her mates as she teased and flirted with her teacher, Colin. Her connection with her bestie Karen, played perfectly by Olivia Kennedy was so much fun to watch. Olivia’s lines were delivered with a real punch, and both girls filled the stage with sass and attitude.

Now in Chloe-Ann Hamill as Carol we had a character who was the complete epitome of what this play was about. Excellently handling the cockiness and cheek of her character she showed us true depth to character in her vulnerability really capturing the depths of depravity all these kids had come from. Her emotional scene on the cliff top had me stunned in silence such was the delivery of her lines and the emotion she built up in both her character and the scene. A truly incredible performance from a star to watch now and in the future.

I think it is fair to say that not only had Director Sara spent a huge amount of time on ensuring the story evolved and moved along at pace but also, she got everyone to understand the meaning behind the story. Whilst this is a very funny play, many of the jokes are hiding fragility, most of the bad behaviour a cry for help and the fact one little trip out gave all of these kids so many memories clearly won the battle between Mrs Kay and Mr Briggs. Kindness certainly wins over cruelty when gaining any sort of breakthrough with these troubled kids.

I love visiting new groups because you never know what to expect, well I must admit to being completely blown away. Not only was the production excellent in every detail but this has to be one of the friendliest societies I have visited over the years. I felt like I had been coming here for years such was the welcome we received, and it certainly won’t be my last. Thank you to all involved and I hope to see you all again very soon.

 

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