Welsh Hairbits

This brace of one-act plays by Frank Vickery, linked by Welsh accents and wigs, represented a delightful directorial debut for Liz Curley. Both plays used the same basic set but each play had a separate cast, giving eight actors in total a chance to get to grips with comedy in a Welsh accent. A Night Out revolved around one simple plot, getting the parents out of the house so that the children could “play”.  Sharon Goodwin and Nick Caton as Mam and Dad were a great knockabout couple that seemed perfectly at ease with the quickfire banter across the stage and managed the Welsh accents very well indeed.  Diction and audibility were strong and Mam and Dad’s comic timing was excellent. Jodee Goodwin and Chris Rogerson as Doreen and Eric were less convincing Welsh natives but nevertheless provided a much calmer counterpoint to the more frantic adult games of “hunt the ticket” and “getting dressed” played by Mam and Dad. I wonder if Doreen could have been rather more eager to hurry her parents out of the house and whether snatching surreptitious gropes and kisses without being spotted by Mam and Dad would have added to the stakes.

Split Ends also featured two parents but this time the youngsters were a son and a new girlfriend. There was a much greater sense of physicality in this play, as well as more visual humour, partly because of the size differential between Nancy and Cyril. Applying the Heimlich manoeuvre to Cyril (Daniel Curley) after he swallowed Susan’s contact lens, became an acrobatic performance, while Cyril’s St Vitas dance when he realised he couldn’t find his wig was like watching someone with a full bladder jigging about outside a locked lavatory. Both “scenes” were hilarious. Paulette Harris as Nancy had a hugely expressive face and some great one-liners. No problems with the Welsh accent here. Louise Burtenshaw made an impressive debut as lisping Susan with a compulsive eating disorder and Toby Harris as the more passive Norman was a good foil for his fellow performers.

The set is worthy of mention since it featured a staircase to the upstairs and its deliberate clutter for the first play was very convincing. All the larger props were in keeping and the overall impression was of the front room of a two up two down. A lot of furniture was squeezed onto the small stage but it certainly added authenticity. Despite the necessary busy-ness of the set and the fact that four actors were performing, often simultaneously, the blocking was excellent with no problems with sightlines or upstaging. All credit to the director for this and of course to the self-awareness of the actors.

This was an enjoyable evening’s entertainment. Congratulations.

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