The Sorcerer

Many thanks to St Leonard’s Gilbert & Sullivan Society for inviting me to see their production of The Sourcer at St Leonard’s Church on Saturday 25th May 2024.  The plot revolves around a young man named Alexis, who is obsessed with the idea of love transcending social distinctions. To promote his beliefs, he invites the proprietor of J. W. Wells & Co., Family Sorcerers, to brew a love potion. As a result, everyone in the village falls in love with the first person they see, leading to comically mismatched couples. In the end, Wells must sacrifice his life to break the spell.

As with ever with a St Leonard production, I left this performance in awe of the diversity and achievements of the cast. I think, most notably for me was the gender split, which was almost 50:50, something most societies struggle to recruit. To have this split vocally within the music creates a pure wall of sound, which, with the acoustics of the church, reverberated throughout the space, quite often making the hairs on my arms raise. The other notable mention within this diversity theme was the accessible adjustments made to the set. The society built a fully accessible set which enabled all cast members to be at ease within the space. There was inclusivity  through the direction and staging, in which the players could remain seated if they needed to, with business and motivation provided by them to ensure everyone remained active within the scenes.

As ever with a G&S, the piece opened with an epic overture, which was a delight for the ear. This was enriched with some nice simple staging which introduced some of the wealth and social status themes of the production. The production team included Lucy Bunce as director, assisted by Stan Pickles with Margot Wright as musical director. The work was modernised through costume and design. With a G&S show, I often struggle to keep up with the plot and have relied on the blurb within the programme to assist with this, when I realised there was not such an aid within the programme, I did get a little nervous. Fortunately the story telling through direction was so crisply readable that this blurb would have been superfluctuous, which is a testament to the creative. There were moments of nice choreography included to further animate the animation through moments of song. There were some simple uses of artisanry to depict the notion of sorcery, such as freeze framing and use of LED lighting on the ceiling. The arrangement of music blew my mind, with clever use of blend and dynamics across the parts to create dimension. The song ‘I rejoice that it's decided’ literally provided me with an eargasm, melting my soul and forcing me to close my eyes to ensure each element of aural delight was heard.

Now to the cast, as noted before, the community feel of the production was inspiring. This is partly due to how the cast members fused collectively, which provided a warmth to an onlooker from the audience. There was not an outlier to this team feel, which in turn, provided positive vibes, resulting in an energised and humbling performance from all. The quality of sound which boomed through all cast numbers was always rich and powerful. All cast members were clear on their intent and rationale for being in the scene, which ensured investment from the audience.

Sir Marmaduke Pointdextre was played by Philip Walsh, who gave a good performance within the role, providing rich vocals and strong gravitas to drive the themes and narrative forwards. He played across from Caroline Stewart who equally provided a strong performance within the role.

Alexis was played by Benedict Cartwright who played the role gently. I was blown away by his effortless vocal ability and fantastic work through the text. He played the role charismatically, adding repeated eyebrow gymnastics to add a slight comedic tone to the performance. As a slight development, I would encourage Benedict to think more about honesty to thought process within reactions to provide further detail to his characterisation, but this is not a criticism of his delivery, more something to think about. Across from Benedict was Amy Hardy who played Aline. As always with Amy, this was played with great strength and skill. Amy’s vocal talent never ceased to mesmerise me, to which this performance did not falter. She provided very articulate and honest reactions and I love the cheeky moments of satire she instils into her performances to further attain the audience’s investment.

Dr Daly was played by Chris Dodd who gave a rich & controlled performance. His vocals were en pointe, effortlessly flowing through the arpeggios. He demonstrated strong acting ability, providing great insight into the character. Becky  Kay played across from him as Constance, who is always a delight to see perform. Her voice is heaven sent, and she had plenty of opportunity within this role to showcase this to its fullest.

John Wellington Wells was played by Carl Donohue who was a joy to watch in the role. He had great command of the stage, providing animation and high energy to his characterisation. The articulation within Patter was outstanding and I loved his continuity of accent throughout the entire performance.

Smaller performances were played by Hilary Wilby as Mrs Partlet and Oliver Edwards as Hercules, who performed well and complemented the principles well within their narrative.

I have saved the best until last (by best I mean my subjective favourite performance of the show). Mike Bridges played the role of Notary, who was utterly hilarious throughout the show. He had charisma and charm to spare. He genuinely acted as though all of his Christmases had come at once, when Constance’s affection turned to him, which had me literally ROFL. 

Thanks again to St Lenoard’s G&S force this wonderful opportunity to watch and review their performance. I wish the society and their community all the best with their future productions.

 

© NODA CIO. All rights reserved.