Shafted!

“Shafted” is a powerful and dramatic drama by John Godber, with pathos and humour in equal measure. It covers 30 years in the lives of the miner Harry and his wife Dot Starting with the miners’ strike of 1984 and aftermath and devastation it had on all the lives of the miners and their families after the closer of the pits. In true Godber style we are taken forwards, backwards, again and again over the 30 years.  With skilful back-projection of powerful scenes, songs from 1984 to 2014 we knew exactly which year of their lives the action was taking, and understanding and on many occasions feeling what they were going through.

Not only did Richard Wilshaw and Polly Lovegrove direct this truly excellent production, but also portrayed roles of Harry and Dot, who not doubt truly loved each other but was always bickering, and picking-up on each other’s faults, and with Harry’s out of work put more strain on their marriage.

 Richard’s grasp of how the character Harry felt was tangible, not only mentally, but physically as well. He showed Harry’s fury of losing his job, a job that he had known all the life. Also showing  the frustration of Harry of not being able to find suitable work, which lead to bouts of depression and losing self-esteem, following  outburst of anger of they way they had been treated which happened to so many of the men after the closure. Richard also brought out Harry’s typical Yorkshire wit with some very funny one liner and tying to see the funny side of live. A brilliant performance from Richard.

Polly Lovegrove’s performance of Harry’s wife, Dot was superb. Dot was always worried about how they were going to manage to put food on the table, where was the next meal coming from.  She had two jobs to help, but was always looking out for ways to move forward, convincing Harry to try something new, Trying various jobs from window cleaning to opening an B & B in Bridlington, if it didn’t work out,” let’s try something else” Out of this marriage Dot was the one who kept things going which we see as the play progressed.

These two strong and experience actors Richard Wilshaw and Polly Lovegrove were truly believable, giving first class performances with copious amounts of scripts to deliver, with characterisation that never faulted.

Thank you for the invite to a brilliant piece of work from Richard Whitlow and  Polly Lovegrove as directors and actors. And also, all the technical team

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