The Diamond Necklace Radio Play
Information
- Date
- 5th December 2024
- Society
- Newick Amateur Dramatic Society
- Venue
- Newick Village Hall
- Type of Production
- Play
- Director
- David Read
- Producer
- Barbara Bone
- Written By
- Juliet Bagnall
Walking in with the cast already present and chatting on the stage, ready for the production of the radio play, with old fashioned BBC microphones on stands ready to record them, was a lovely touch. It created a hubbub of liveliness and anticipation in the air. The table for sound effects was ready with the two sound people ready and waiting, and all sound effect paraphernalia ready for them to use: glasses, an old fashioned telephone, a tray with some dry leaves on the floor for walking on and more: it was lovely to try to work out what everything was and what effects they would be used for. On top of that, the entire cast was stunningly dressed: the ladies in velvet and taffeta and silks, sparkling jewellery and furs; and the men were in black dinner suits with bow ties. It’s probably the best dressed ensemble cast ever created.
When Terry Bone came up to the front and announced “This is the BBC World Service” in an impeccable BBC accent, it instantly and beautifully transported the audience to the 1950s and the world of radio play. David Hayes and Linda Bradley played the lead roles with confidence and ease and were instantly likeable and easy to warm to. The play itself, in two ‘episodes’ is written very much in the 1950s style with a touch of melodrama: the baddies are very bad indeed but always get their comeuppance, and butter would not melt in the mouth of the goodies; this was a lovely entertaining choice. However, the focus was very much on it being a serious play, rather than what could have been more entertaining perhaps, would have been to portray it as a tongue in cheek ironic comedy. As a straight drama it could have done with more pace, as it was fairly slow and very dry, and changes of pace within different parts of it to keep it fresh and interesting.
Radio plays are highly entertaining and so much of that is the sound effects, that can be seen on the stage. Watching Bev Connor from the Sound Team walk in the tray of crunchy leaves was super, but it felt like the audience shouldn’t laugh too much, as the play was being played so straight. The audience really wanted to laugh in different places and it would have been so great if this had been encouraged. The cast could have mouthed or gestured things or looked at each other during the voice action which would have made it so much more entertaining. The cast all knew exactly when to sit down and stand up which didn’t distract from the action and this was well done. If the scripts had all been in sleek black folders, in keeping with how the cast looked, and placed on stands for them to read from, for example: on music stands, it would have freed their hands to be able to use them for expression. Some cast had lovely folders but some had quite dog-eared scripts which detracted from the lovely look of cast. The one look that Jenny Walton gave when they talked about her character being pulled under a door was super, and the audience clearly wanted more of that kind of thing.
Theatre going audiences are not used to sitting and just listening for almost two and a half hours sadly so it helps to give them something different to look at, at different times. The reason that many people want to see a radio play is to see the comic sound effects live on stage. The sound effects table was super, but it would have been better to hear them do all of the sounds, rather than have a significant portion of the sounds over the speaker system. The champagne cork popping noise could have been made from the table for example, even if it didn’t sound exactly like a cork popping, at that moment: towards the end of the play, that could have been a lovely touch and comedic to boot.
There were some lovely aspects to this production and everyone clearly put a lot of effort into it. The programme containing the actors’ favourite actors and which role they would like to play was a lovely touch and made it a very interesting read. Congratulations to all involved on the whole production.
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