Relatively Speaking

For their spring production, Clavering Players had chosen "Relatively Speaking", a gentle and amusing comedy written by Alan Ayckbourn.  This was his first major success as a playwright, having its world premiere in Scarborough in 1965.  The original title Meet My Father perhaps gave a better indication of what the play is all about, whereas Relatively Speaking is a clever play on words.

No matter; Clavering Players delighted its Saturday evening audience with a witty and well-acted performance, under the guidance of Gordon Cummings as their Director.  With only four characters in the play, everyone had to be on top form with their quick-fire exchanges of dialogue and they all did a grand job in keeping their timing and entrances and exits brisk and upbeat.

The setting for the play is the bed-sitting room of Ginny's London flat, where her current boyfriend Greg is staying.  The action then transfers to the garden patio of Sheila and Philip's home, The Willows, in rural Buckinghamshire.  The two locations were nicely presented and well stage managed by Ken Kemp and Keith Nuttall, with good lighting and sound support from Lesley Talbot.  I particularly liked the enlarged photographic backdrop of the garden view, which was well-scaled in relation to the patio furniture and lent an authentic feel to the action.  The costume plot, too, well-devised by Jennifer Cummings, added visually to the enjoyment of the performance.

The play is basically a comedy of misunderstandings and mistaken identity.  In the opening scene, Ginny, a young woman with a slightly chequered romantic past, delightfully portrayed here by Phoebe Hayes, is planning to visit her parents for the day by train, but is resisting her boyfriend's willingness to tag along.  This is with good reason, and although the audience is unaware at that point in the play, she is actually planning to visit her older, married, lover Philip, having several times attempted to break off their relationship and now wants to end it, once and for all.  Rob Clarke was equally convincing as Ginny's naive and besotted boyfriend Greg, who doesn't apparently read anything into the fact of finding a pair of men's slippers under the bed, or the drawer full of expensive boxes of chocolates, or bunches of flowers filling Ginny's apartment, all of which are explained away by Ginny with improbable excuses!  Greg proposes to her, but is still rebuffed, so decides to follow her, with potentially disastrous results.

In the next scene, we meet Philip and Sheila, who are "enjoying" breakfast on the patio and planning their day.  It's very obvious from their relationship with each other that their marriage is under some strain.  Netti Hayes gave us an enjoyable performance as the slightly bemused, but caring wife, who's put down somewhat by her overbearing husband, well-portrayed here by Peter Simmons.  Philip's plans for a clandestine meeting with Ginny, his former employee and lover, are thwarted when Sheila announces she's not going to church, throwing Philip into an impassioned rage about a lost garden hoe!  Greg then turns up unannounced, ahead of Ginny, and wrongly assumes that Sheila and Philip are Ginny's parents.  When Greg asks for permission to marry, Philip mistakenly believes Greg is his wife's lover and wants to marry her! Once Ginny arrives, she has to convince Philip to play the role of her father - all very confusing and hilarious, and so typical of an Alan Ayckbourn comedy.

Thank you, Clavering Players, for a very enjoyable and entertaining evening.

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