The Agatha Christie Challenge – Mrs McGinty’s Dead (1952)

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STOP PRESS: The Agatha Christie Challenge is now available as a book in two revised volumes – details at the end of this blog post!

In which Superintendent Spence is not satisfied that James Bentley is guilty of the murder of charwoman Mrs McGinty, and asks that owner of magnificent moustaches, Hercule Poirot, to delve into the case to see if he can discover the real culprit. Poirot accepts the challenge, and, enduring a stay at a grotty B&B all in the pursuit of justice, unearths the real murderer and saves Bentley from the gallows.  As usual, if you haven’t read the book yet, don’t worry, I promise not to reveal whodunit!

The book is dedicated “To Peter Saunders, in gratitude for his kindness to authors”. Peter Saunders was the theatre impresario who produced The Mousetrap, amongst other successes. Mrs McGinty’s Dead was first published in the US in thirteen instalments in the Chicago Tribune Sunday editions from October to December 1951, under the title Blood Will Tell. The full book was first published in the US by Dodd, Mead and Company in February 1952 and in the UK by Collins Crime Club, on 3rd March 1952, almost exactly a year after the publication of They Came from Baghdad.

This was one of the last books by Christie that I read first time around, primarily because I had seen the Miss Marple/Margaret Rutherford film Murder Most Foul, which is (allegedly) an adaptation of Mrs McGinty’s Dead, and thought that, as I now knew whodunit, there wasn’t a lot of point reading it. How wrong I was! Whilst it is a tremendously fun film, Murder Most Foul bears as much similarity to Mrs McGinty’s Dead as does the Book of Common Prayer. So, if you find yourself in the same situation, don’t lose any sleep over it!

Whether it’s because it is so unlike that film, I’m not sure, but I always have difficulty recalling the plot, characters and identity of the murder whenever I read this book. As a result, personally, it’s an entertaining read, as it’s as though I’m coming to it new. However, I do also find this book rather ploddy at times, particularly in those early, expositional chapters. It did take me some time to complete it. There are also a quite a large number of characters, and therefore possible suspects, and it’s one of those books where you have to stop and think exactly who we’re reading about in this chapter and what association they have to the rest of the book.

Nevertheless, it’s entertainingly written, with plenty of humorous episodes, enjoyable characterisations and a few tongue-in-cheek references to the ardours of writing detective fiction. Yes, Mrs Oliver is back, Christie’s thinly veiled self-creation, obsessed with apples, struggling with storylines, exasperated that she made her detective a Finn, a vegetarian and too old – exactly the same problems that Christie had created for herself with Poirot. There are some very funny moments in the scenes between Mrs Oliver and Robin Upward, the very theatrical playwright who is adapting one of her books for the stage; his vision of her characters and plot is so very different from hers, and one can indeed imagine that this could be a real source of anguish for any author whose works are highly adaptable.

There’s an intriguing conversation between Mrs Oliver and Robin when he gets the idea that she should write a book where her detective Sven Hjerson is murdered. “No fear,” she replies, “what about the money? Any money to be made out of murders I want now”. But of course, by this time, Christie had already written and squirrelled away Curtain and Sleeping Murder, the books which end the careers of Poirot and Miss Marple, to be published after her death. And from my memory, what Robin suggests should happen to Sven happens to one of her detectives… we’ll just leave that idea hanging there.

Mrs McGinty’s Dead is our first meet-up with Poirot for four years – we last encountered him in Taken at the Flood. Given Mrs Oliver’s petulance about Sven Hjerson, I guess we can conclude that Christie had temporarily had enough of our Belgian hero and wanted to write some different characters – hence the interim books Crooked House and They Came to Baghdad featured neither Poirot nor Marple. She re-establishes the character in the opening paragraphs of the book, fondling his moustaches, creating an art form out of eating, drinking revoltingly luminescent sweet liqueurs, missing his old pal Hastings – even though his vanity only permits him to consider him as a stooge – and not regretting giving up the cultivation of vegetable marrows, a hobby which he gamely embarked on in The Mysterious Affair at Styles but it never caught on.

We also meet Superintendent Spence again, having also become acquainted with him in Taken at the Flood. He’s a bit more of a rounded character in this book; considered, intelligent, honourable and tenacious. Christie allows Poirot to point out the major difference between her two detectives, when Poirot gets frustrated at not making quicker progress: “I get nowhere – nowhere […] There is nothing – no little gleam. I can well understand the despair of Superintendent Spence. But it should be different for me. Superintendent Spence, he is a very good and painstaking police officer, but me, I am Hercule Poirot. For me, there should be illumination!”

At times the book feels almost like a travelogue, with our hero Poirot moving from residence to residence, interrogating the occupants, trying to get to the bottom of what happened. As a result, there are a multitude of characters, most of whom play a minor role, but the consequence of that is we get a surfeit of suspects. This tends to confuse and frustrate rather than make it more exciting or difficult to crack. But the book redeems itself with its comic scenes (Poirot trying to make himself at home in the Summerhayes household is very funny) and the portrayal of Robin and all his theatrical chums is cheeky and entertaining.

As usual, there are a few references to check out, starting with the locations. The main activity of the book takes place in Broadhinny, and the neighbouring towns and villages of Kilchester, Cullenquay, Parminster, Cullavon, and Drymouth all play a part. Of course, these are all fictional; Parminster might be based on Warminster – one tends to think of Christie-land as being the West Country – although perhaps Kilchester is based on Colchester. The book starts with Poirot emerging from the Vieille Grand’mère restaurant into Soho; there are many Vieille Grand’mère’s all around the world but I can’t identify one in Soho.

The title Mrs McGinty’s Dead refers to a children’s playground game. “Question and answer all down the line,” says Spence. “Mrs McGinty’s Dead! How did she die? Down on one knee just like I! – and then the next question […] Holding her hand out just like I”. I have to say I don’t recall that game from my childhood. Do any of my gentle readers? When Mrs Oliver and Poirot meet, they recall their shared experience regarding a Mr Shaitana. He was the victim in that excellent book Cards on the Table.

“Beautiful Evelyn Hope is dead”, quotes Poirot in conversation with Spence. Evelyn Hope, as far as this story is concerned, was Eva Kane’s assumed name once she’d fled after being suspected in the Craig case. But the quote is from Robert Browning’s poem, Evelyn Hope. This is not the first time that Christie has named a character after someone in a poem; Enoch Arden, who is frequently referred to in Taken at the Flood, is the name of a poem by Browning’s contemporary, Tennyson.

“If we hanged Edith Thompson, we certainly ought to have hanged Janice Courtland”, avers Superintendent Spence. But who was Edith Thompson? She, together with her lover Frederick Bywaters, was found guilty of the murder of her husband in 1922 – even today, the guilty verdict against her seems very harsh, based on a series of love letters but no hard evidence. “Do you know, cher ami, what is a secret de Polichinelle?” asks Poirot of Spence. He answers his own question. It “is a secret that everyone can know.” It comes from a 1903 play of the same name by French dramatist Pierre Wolff.

Regular readers will know that I like to consider any significant sums of money in Christie’s books and work out what their value would be today, just to get a feel of the range of sums that we’re looking at. The cash amounts mentioned in this book aren’t particularly expensive, but they’re interesting, nonetheless. Bentley is accused of having stolen £30 from Mrs McGinty. That’s about £600 today – quite a lot to steal from an older lady. All Mrs McGinty had in the bank was £200, to be bequeathed to her niece – that’s the equivalent of about £4000 today. Bentley’s board and lodgings cost him £3 a week – that’s £60 a week today, which is very good value for what he got. Mrs McGinty used to charge 1s 10d per hour for her cleaning services – about £1.80 today, way below the minimum wage. One other interesting fact; stamps to send a letter cost one penny. That’s just 10p today. Someone in the Royal Mail is obviously raking it in at the moment, I’ll say no more than that!

Now it’s time for my usual at-a-glance summary, for Mrs McGinty’s Dead:

Publication Details: 1952. My copy is a Fontana paperback, seventh impression, dated August 1974, with a price of 35p on the back cover. The cover illustration by Tom Adams shows a massive fly hovering over a tea table, in an old-fashioned parlour. And is that a shoe attached to a foot attached to a leg at the bottom of the picture?

How many pages until the first death: The first death takes place before the book starts, and is referred to on the third page. However, there’s quite a long wait before the second death – 126 pages in all.

Funny lines out of context: sadly, none spring to mind.

Memorable characters:

Quite a lot to enjoy here. There’s the hopeless but likeable Maureen Summerhayes with her wayward children, awful cooking skills and “comfortable” guest house that’s more like an assault course. There’s the gutsy Maude Williams, willing to risk her own safety in a bid to help trap the guilty party, in the best tradition of Christie gutsy young women. There’s the haughty Mrs Carpenter, who can’t believe that her word doesn’t carry more weight in law than a mere servant’s. But most fun of all is the flouncy Robin Upward with his coterie of actors, ostentatiously referring to his mother as Madre, fussing and preening wherever he goes.

Christie the Poison expert:

Again, no real references to death by poisoning in this book. All the murders are much more violent and brutal.

Class/social issues of the time:

The early 1950s were known for being a time of dismal austerity. “The war has complicated things,” laments Superintendent Spence, although he is thinking specifically of the opportunity for the unscrupulous to change wartime records, identity cards, and so on, for their own dubious gains. The only hopeful new aspect to everyday life was the National Health service – but even there, people were cynical. In the words of Mrs Sweetiman, “nowadays even if you’ve got a chilblain you run to the doctor with it so as to get your money’s worth out of the National Health. Too much of this health business we’ve got. Never did you any good thinking how bad you feel.” Come to think of it, who gets chilblains nowadays? I don’t think I’ve ever heard of anyone having them.

Most of the class/social references in the book are spiteful little comments about foreigners, the homeless and – thinking primarily about Robin Upward – the use of the word “pansy” to describe a man who’s not particularly into women. Mrs Sweetiman refers to “nasty tramps” in their area who might have broken into Mrs McGinty’s house. Deirdre Henderson is of the same mind, referring in a later conversation with Mrs Oliver that there are “horrid tramps” in the area.

Elsewhere, as has happened in the past, Poirot is considered to be a “funny little foreigner” (again by Deirdre Henderson); Mrs Sweetiman’s assistant Edna needs to inform the police of a development but feels she can’t approach Poirot – “not a foreigner, I couldn’t.” Poirot contacts Mrs Wetherby ostensibly to suggest a replacement for their cook, Frieda, and she is relieved that Maude is “no, not foreign – English, thank goodness.”

You might expect the class system to be at its most pompous in an English village, where the lowly born serve the high and mighty. Mrs McGinty had few admirers, even though many relied on her work to keep their houses clean. Even though she had worked for her, and she was now dead, Mrs Carpenter still can’t bring herself to think of Mrs McGinty as more than just “some old charwoman”. But then again, neither Mrs Carpenter nor her husband are Nice People.

Classic denouement:  Yes! And the first since Towards Zero, eight years earlier. It’s one of those occasions where Poirot gathers everyone into a room, he lays a trap to make it seem like one person is responsible for the killings when all along it is someone else in the room, who at first tries to brave it out but then snaps. The best kind of end to a Christie book.

Happy ending? In a sense yes, although it’s very low-key and under-emphasised. There is a supposition that a relationship might blossom at the end of the book, but it’s not the one you might have expected and even then it’s only in the suspicious minds of the detectives. All a bit dark and gloomy, to be honest.

Did the story ring true? Nothing is so bizarre that you read it and think, oh Mrs Christie how could you possibly think we’d believe that –  and given the fact that so many of the world’s problems today come from the unscrupulous and biased news media, for me it rings very true that the crime and solution came from a newspaper cutting.

Overall satisfaction rating: A little chewy occasionally, but with a very exciting second half and a banger of a denouement. 8/10.

Thanks for reading my blog of Mrs McGinty’s Dead and if you’ve read it too, I’d love to know what you think. Please just add a comment in the space below. Next up in the Agatha Christie Challenge is They do it with Mirrors, and the chance to reacquaint ourselves with Miss Marple. This is another book I find it hard to remember, so it will be a journey of discovery re-reading the book. As usual, I’ll blog my thoughts about it in a few weeks’ time. In the meantime, please read it too then we can compare notes! Happy sleuthing!

If you enjoy my Agatha Christie Challenge, did you know it is now available as a book? In two revised volumes, it contains all my observations about Christie’s books and short stories, and also includes all her plays! The perfect birthday or Christmas gift, you can buy it from Amazon – the links are here and here!

Review – John Bishop: Warm Up, Royal and Derngate, Northampton, 3rd March 2020

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It’s not often that a Work in Progress show fills the massive Derngate auditorium, but then again, it’s not often that the great John Bishop comes to town. Actually, to my knowledge, it’s at least the second time he’s come to town. The first time we saw him, he was so late, he offered to buy the entire audience a drink. Even though that was in the smaller Royal theatre, it still must have cost him a bob or two. Forewarned is forearmed this time.

But first, a support act. Remembering that Mr Bishop didn’t have a support act when we last saw him, I was surprised that there was one this time. But indeed there was, in the jovial form of Barry Dodds, a Geordie from Gateshead (I thought Geordies could only come from north of the Tyne? Controversial!) full of appropriate apologies for not being John Bishop, but with a ton of fun material of his own. He has a great story about how he fooled a flatmate who liked to dabble with wacky baccy (and worse) – and it’s a good trick: put a bar of Palmolive soap in the microwave and watch it expand. It plays with the most balanced of brains, but when you’ve been on the illegal substances it can fair blow your mind.

I also really enjoyed his account of why he and his wife split up, and his rather gruesome but extremely funny story of what trainee doctors can get up to in the mortuary. Mr Dodds is a naturally funny guy with great timing and a comfortable confidence, and his short set was, truly, all too short. We’d love to see him do a longer set sometime.

After the interval, Mr Bishop wandered on, cup of Yorkshire Tea in hand, apologising for the fact that as this show was indeed work in progress, some of it might be a bit shit. And, really odd for a WIP show, it’s not going to be leading on to a big arena show later in the year – he had intended to do that, but then the plans got altered and the arena show has been postponed. But the WIP shows had already gone on sale, so Mr B felt obliged to give us some WIP comedy, even without a big show in the offing. You couldn’t make it up.

He is the absolute master of relaxed, slow storytelling, every routine always having a killer punch at the end. He is so engaging, and confiding, that you feel like you are the only person he’s sharing these brilliant observations with, maybe over a convivial pint somewhere. He talks about things that we can all recognise, such as the compromises in relationships or how your attitudes change as you get older. One of his assertions, absolutely correct, is that men never change from the age when they meet each other. Whereas women develop and grow their friendships over the years, men always remain essentially kids; if they met when they were at school, then they’re still schoolkids when meet decades later.

Another absolutely spot-on observation is how a middle-aged man suddenly gets transported into a world of sexual and/or romantic fantasy if a woman talks to him nicely. You can just be on a flight and offered a drink by an air hostess and a world of possibilities opens up to you. I also loved his material about being the only Scouser on the ski slopes, his experiences of acting a sex scene (or not) with Sheridan Smith, and a brilliant sequence speculating about sex between the over 70s. He had us all in cascades of laughter.

He says he has one joke; and it’s the same joke he told last time he was here – but, to be fair, it is awfully funny. It’s the one about the accidental penectomy and the replacement surgery. If you know it, you know it. If you don’t, well I’m not going to tell you. During the course of the evening, he chatted with a couple of audience members who had earlier piped up for whatever reason; and, as with his last appearance here, he ended the show with a brief Q&A session. I mention that because the last question he was asked included a callback to an earlier piece of material, and Mr B’s answer included a callback to something another audience member had said – and it was a masterstroke. No wonder he called the show to halt at that point – it could never get better.

A great night of comedy and an absolute privilege to see a master of the art at work. His tour continues throughout the rest of the year, but many venues are already sold out. This comes as no surprise at all. Just brilliant.

Five alive, let comedy thrive!

Review – Dance to the Music, The Cresset, Peterborough, 2nd March 2020

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This was my first ever visit to the Cresset in Peterborough, even though it’s barely an hour’s drive away from where we live. On the plus side: there’s plenty of free parking, a useful bar/restaurant area, and friendly staff. On the minus side: it feels a bit like a sports centre and when you enter the Sovereign Hall for the show, it’s like someone’s quickly erected a makeshift stage at one end of an aircraft hangar. We were in row E and the seats are not particularly comfortable, there’s no rake until you get to row AA and the place doesn’t have much of an atmosphere. As a result, any show you see there is going to have to work really hard to get its entertainment value across. Fortunately, the cast of Dance to the Music do indeed work really hard!

Perhaps I should come clean here, gentle reader, and explain (if you didn’t already know from my blog about Soo Yoga) that Strictly Come Dancing’s Kristina Rihanoff, who has masterminded (mistressminded?) this show also happens to be my yoga instructor, which made us want even more to come and see it. Added to which, a couple of weeks before the tour started, two of the dancers, plus host Jake Quickenden, joined us for a yoga session. So I almost feel part of the company!

Back to the show. It’s an informative, entertaining and spectacular journey through a century of dance, from the Charlestons of the 1920s to the shapes people throw on the dance floor today. Choreographed and devised by Kristina Rihanoff, it consists of a series of retrospectives celebrating various famous dance styles decade by decade, with a great choice of contemporary music and lavish costumes. Some of the music is pre-recorded, but much is also performed by the aforementioned host and singer Jake Quickenden; he of the jungle, X-Factor and Dancing on Ice – and he’s never going to let us forget it. Jake has a charming, likeable, relaxed style that quickly wins the audience over and he narrates the show with great humour and abundant cheekiness. He also gives us some great musical performances.

A fantastic highlight was Jake’s singing I Heard it through the Grapevine to a seductive rumba (I think it was a rumba – I’m not an expert!) by Kristina with lead dancer Jo Baiao. There’s also a terrific sequence to the music of the Andrews Sisters, with the whole cast throwing themselves into a jive/lindy hop routine. And I really enjoyed the disco section, and much appreciated the fact that they featured one of my favourite 70s tunes, Play that Funky Music by Wild Cherry. I’m not sure how often Peterborough swings to that particular soundtrack.

Of course, there’s always that moment that everyone dreads, the audience participation section. Kristina reminds us of her Strictly Paso Doble triumph with John Sergeant, where her celebrity partner dragged the poor woman across the floor like a burglar with his swag. Jake scours the crowd for a chap willing to give it a go on stage with Kristina. Fortunately for us all, as this was the last night, he picked on a willing guy in the front row to whirl the cape onstage – and it was none other than Ben Cohen, Kristina’s dance- and life-partner! Whilst all the other guys in the audience breathed a sigh of relief, Ben promenaded a few classic Paso poses, much to everyone’s amusement.

In addition to Kristina and Jo, we were also treated to the dance artistry of Aaron Brown, Angelina Anastasia, James Davies-Williams and guest stars Marcella Solimeo and Dylon Daniels. I must say I thought Marcella was especially enjoyable to watch, with great dancing mixed with a huge personality. There were also two local bonuses: local youth theatre Kindred gave us a great dance routine, including a very funny let’s make Jake look too old for this sequence; and then we also had the pleasure of Kristina’s young Bespoke Ballroom company, showcasing their talents. Both teams of young performers did themselves proud.

This was – allegedly – the last time Kristina will dance her way around a stage; and was definitely the last night of this particular tour. Not sure if I believe it; once a performer, always a performer. Time will tell. If this did turn out to be the very last Dance to the Music, then I’m sorry you missed a treat.

Five alive, let dance thrive!

Review – Rough for Theatre II and Endgame, The Old Vic, 29th February 2020

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A double-bill of Beckett plays is always going to be a challenge, but hopefully a good one. The current Old Vic production directed by Richard Jones comes with a terrific pedigree, starring Daniel Radcliffe and Alan Cumming in one reasonably familiar play and another rarely performed piece. Does it measure up to those high expectations? Read on, gentle reader…

I admit, I’d never heard of Rough for Theatre, neither piece I or piece II – they were written in the late 1950s, in French, naturellement. Fragment deux, that opens this production, is a 25-minute snippet where two bureaucrats examine the life, worth, anxieties and achievements of a man, C, frozen in a window frame, ready to leap (presumably to his death). During the process we learn a little about this man, but we understand much more about the characters of the two office men. A (Daniel Radcliffe), clearly superior, with a natural, relaxed authority, simple clarity of thought and speech versus B (Alan Cumming), flustered, neurotic, insecure, longing to bask in the glory of being in the company of A.

Messrs Radcliffe and Cumming bring this two-hander to life as a sparklingly unsettling comedy, savage in its contempt for the fate of the man about to jump, but also revealing the strange professional relationship between the two observers. Much funnier than it had any right to be, this little play has the ability to make you laugh, cringe, and appreciate how much we clutch at straws to make life bearable. A terrific opener.

After the interval we returned for Beckett’s Endgame, or Fin-de-Partie in its original French, that stalemate end to a chess game where no one can make a meaningful move, and there’s certainly no chance of winning. Me to play, Hamm may gleefully announce, but then what? There he sits, blind, imperious, inconsequentially veering from the bland to the bullying, and all for nothing. He whistles for his servant, Clov, who attends in a flash, but is sarcastic, resentful and unhelpful, attempting to return some of the cruelty that had been handed out to him. Preserved but useless, Hamm’s parents, Nagg and Nell, inhabit their dustbins in a corner of the stage, reminiscing about the good old days, with just an old dog biscuit to eat. You can take the chess analogy as far as you like; depending on your fondness for the game it might illuminate or obscure whatever meaning you feel Beckett has written into it.

I’d never seen Endgame on stage before, but had only read it; and what feels like organised stasis on the page comes to vivid life in a way you couldn’t dream of in this stunning production. From the moment Daniel Radcliffe enters the stage and decides to open the curtains, it’s an amazing and spellbinding performance. He remembers he needs his ladder, hits himself for forgetting, then when he finally gets the ladder into place he climbs up it in a most extraordinary manner and, having opened the curtains, comes down in another, ridiculous and hilarious way; forgets the ladder, hits himself again, and so it goes on. It has the audience in hysterics. Throughout the play, Mr Radcliffe adopts a most uncomfortable, but riveting to watch, gait; bouncing, hobbling, sliding over every available surface. But much more than this, he invests Clov with a fascinating characterisation; sullen, bitter, frustrated, but alarmingly obedient and essentially impotent.

Alan Cumming’s Hamm is a truly ghastly creation, sitting on his throne (a masterful piece of design work by Stewart Laing), his withered, dangly legs reflecting his loss of power. Marvellously smug, viciously cruel, he blathers on confidingly with observations of past life, confronting Clov with petty vindictiveness; in fact, it’s a superb portrayal of a grotesque man clinging on to the wreckage of life. His patronising treatment of his parents in the bin is riddled with sneering and malice, whilst they wait, innocently and pointlessly, for something to happen. The performances of Karl Johnson as Nagg and Jane Horrocks as Nell are a pure delight, as they blink their way out of the darkness in which they are kept, fondly holding onto distant memories of escapades on the tandem in the Ardennes, or rowing on Lake Como. It’s incredibly moving how they continue to look after each other even though their lives have now come to naught.

One cavil – from Mrs Chrisparkle – Nell and Nagg’s dustbins could have done with being placed just a few inches higher on stage; someone’s big hair a few rows in front of her obscured her view of Ms Horrocks’ face throughout the play – which is a substantial and unfortunate element to miss in this production. However, with razor-sharp direction and pinpoint accurate performances, this double-bill converts two difficult-to-appreciate texts into two rivetingly funny and tragic pieces of theatrical magic. Two hours 15 minutes (minus the interval) of hanging on the edge of your seat for the next deliciously delivered line or piece of memorable comic business. We absolutely loved it.

Five alive, let theatre thrive!

Review – A weekend at the Leicester Comedy Festival, 22nd – 23rd February 2020

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This is now the fourth year that a bunch of us have ventured into the Heart of Rural England (or so the county welcome signs say) for an overnighter at the Leicester Comedy Festival. For this jaunt, Mrs Chrisparkle and I were joined by Lord and Lady Prosecco, Professor and Mrs Plum, the Squire of Sidcup and the Wise Woman of Wembley, Lord Liverpool and the Countess of Cockfosters, Prinz Mark von Köln, and Lady Headington. It was like herding The Aristocats. With an ambitious programme of seeing seven shows on Saturday and four on Sunday, which we almost achieved, I hadn’t quite realised how many of the shows I’d arranged were Work in Progress. One the one hand, that does give you a fascinating insight into the creative process. On the other hand, it does mean that some shows (or at least elements of some shows) can be a bit meh. Let’s dive straight into Round One.

Andy Barr: Collected Jokes, Poems and Thoughts 2010-2020 – Upstairs at the Firebug

This was something of a curiosity. Emphatically not, as it happens, a Work in Progress show; quite the opposite in fact – Andy Barr’s Greatest Hits of the past decade. It is the nature of a festival like this that you take a punt on someone you don’t know – and sometimes it’s gold, and sometimes it’s myrrh. Mr Barr was new to us, and I spent the best part of the fifty minutes trying to get into his mind to gauge his persona – and in the end, he had erected so many distancing devices inside his show that I just couldn’t get there. In a nutshell, he does a deadpan delivery so well that you can’t distinguish the act (and the content) from his just having a really bad Saturday.

He nicely deconstructed the stereotypical Festival-type act by setting up a timer on his laptop which counted down 35 minutes of good stuff to be followed by 10 minutes of serious sad stuff (that would, allegedly, make him eligible for an award) and then finishing with 5 minutes of last chance guffaws. It’s a neat idea, and makes a great point about the artificiality of a stand-up act. The trouble is… it is meant to be funny though, and I just didn’t get it. To be fair, I liked his Greek mythology trilogy of poems, and I completely understood that his act was that he pretended to be totally unprepared whereas it was (probably) prepared to the nth degree. And there were a few elements that warranted a few gentle chuckles. But I didn’t understand the drinking, and I didn’t understand his serious sad bit. And there were no last-minute guffaws. Altogether very odd. In the end I couldn’t decide if it was me on bad form or him, so let’s call it an honourable draw.

Ali Brice: The Autumn/Winter Collection – Upstairs at the Firebug

 

Although it doesn’t mention it, this was a Work in Progress show, as Ali Brice pointed out to us early in his set. Here was another fifty minutes that didn’t do what I expected it to do – not that I really knew what to expect. The clues were all there in the pre-show blurb – giving himself an endorsement quote from a totally fictitious reviewer (nice touch) and saying it’s produced by another couple of people who are also, clearly, him. The genre was described as Alternative, Mime, but if you were expecting the next Trygve Wakenshaw, you’d have been disappointed.

I wasn’t, but I was still disappointed. During a later-in-the-day post-mortem, we all agreed that his continuous conversation with a chap in the second row, who, we worked out from their exchanges, is also a comic, was or is a flatmate, and obviously has some dubious sexual practices involving cardboard, made the rest of us feel excluded. It didn’t help that you suspected that this other chap was probably funnier than Mr Brice – perhaps the two could have swapped places. It also didn’t help when he did try to involve other members of the audience in his material (often a springboard to some comedy gems); it felt rather aggressive and confrontational. He asked me a question at one point and I obviously gave him an answer he wasn’t expecting (I wasn’t being tricky, honest) and he just cut the conversation dead because it wasn’t funny. Well, I have to agree with him there.

There were some nice ideas somewhere in the background, for sure, and he came up with the occasional flash of a brilliant turn of phrase. But it all felt rather… vacant. Not so much trying out some new material you’ve been practising in your bedroom, more that moment when you have to tell the teacher that your dog ate your homework. The one comic idea that he had carried through to any kind of conclusion, where he takes a photo of someone’s eyes with his phone then holds the phone up to his face to pretend to be them, was ruined by some clumsy phone handling and a rather crass punchline (or punch-image as it happens.) I’m afraid this one wasn’t for me.

Stuart Goldsmith: The Accident (Work in Progress) – Grays@LCB Depot – Lightbox

And now, as they used to say, for something completely different. If you know Stuart Goldsmith’s work and style, it will come as no surprise that this show, despite being billed as work in progress, was incredibly slick and Mr Goldsmith’s approach was confident, pacey, articulate, intelligent, and thoroughly well-planned and executed. The Accident in question (see title) was a time on holiday abroad when he was a kid and the family were involved in a car accident that left most of them with quite a few injuries. Mr G uses this as a thread that runs through the whole show although a lot of the material that he spun didn’t have an obvious connection to it.

The show is filled with his observations about life as a parent of two, now living in Bristol (favourite line of the day was probably I left the city I love for the woman I like) and his daily confrontations with trendy middle-class angst that he does so well. When it comes to constructing a detailed build-up to an intricate story, he is a master craftsman, and is always a pleasure to watch. If you’re a fan of Mr G, once he’s honed the show to perfection, you’re going to love it to pieces. Foolishly we arrived only about five minutes before the show started and had to stand at the back. Be warned; he’s popular.

Robin Morgan: Work in Progress – Manhattan 34 – Downstairs bar

We’d seen Robin Morgan once before at a Screaming Blue Murder a couple of years ago, and we liked his fresh, preppy style. So I thought it would be worth a punt coming to see his Work in Progress – how, indeed, is he progressing? Extremely well, as it turns out. Terrifically confident but not in a brash way – quite reverse in fact, he comes across as having an endearing innocence which allows him to get away with quite a lot of cheekiness. He’s great with the audience too, viz. the conversation he had with Lady Headington about tampons and the extended chats with Professor Plum about his vasectomy.

He’s incredibly proud about his appearance on BBC 1 (Wales, ahem) and is developing some great material about his mother’s affair (whether or not she had one), sex education, and the repercussions of having a vasectomy (to be honest, Prof. Plum proved to be of little help with some of his questions). He had a clever knack of turning the fact that this was a WIP show into something of a game, mutually agreeing with the audience what was good and what wasn’t. And he got the lot of us to recite the Lord’s Prayer, which freaked him out and which is some feat for a Saturday afternoon. We all thought he was terrific, and unanimously (I think) was considered the best show we saw all weekend.

Heaven Knows I’m Friz Frizzle Now – Grays@LCB Depot – Lightbox

Did anyone book this show thinking it would be about the Smiths? asked Friz Frizzle in his introductory moments to our first post-dinner show (Chutney Ivy, by the way, excellent). Answer came there none, because if you’re in the know you’ll already understand that Mr Frizzle is the best song ruiner in the business. We saw him as part of Late Night Jokes on Us a couple of years back and he was probably the most entertaining act we saw at Leicester that year. So we all agreed that an hour spent in the company of Mr F would be a wise move.

Sitting there innocently at his keyboard like a cross between a Church organist and Dangermouse’s pal Penfold, Friz takes a classic song from all our yesterdays, plonks it into a totally unrelated scenario, and punfully plays on the words with hopefully devastatingly funny effect. However; there is an unmistakable problem with Mr F’s act. If you don’t know the original song that he’s lampooning, the joke just flies way over your head and you’re left staring resentfully at those who do. That was the fate that befell Lady Prosecco, who sat there glumly for an hour. The rest of us, however, were laughing our socks off, as inappropriate lyric followed inappropriate lyric whilst still fitting perfectly into their respective songs.

I won’t offer up any examples of his mischievous mind because so much of the fun comes from unexpected surprises. Another unexpected aspect came when he opened up about his own mental health. Laughing about ruined lyrics feels terribly trivial in comparison with mental health problems, and, whilst it’s great that he felt able to share some of his experiences, and by so doing enables others to do the same, I can’t say that it sat comfortably in the environment of nonsensical musical comedy. Whether he needs to find a way of dovetailing that content in more subtly, or maybe creating a brand-new show that looks at mental health, and maybe combining the content with more specific mental health-based lyrics, I don’t know. And it certainly didn’t spoil the show; it just, somehow, felt a little out of place. Nevertheless, we all (nearly all) loved it and will continue to follow his career with great interest.

Mark & Haydn: Work in progress – Just the Tonic at BrewDog

I’ll be honest, gentle reader; there were about five acts on at roughly the right time for the 9.30pm slot in our programme, all of which looked good and would, I am sure, have been suitable entertainment for us all. The reason I chose Mark and Haydn was because Haydn is the spitting image of Lord Liverpool and the Countess of Cockfosters’ son, The Honourable Davey, and I thought it would be a hoot to see him in action.

And, to be fair, I wasn’t wrong. With a WIP sketch show some of it will fall on stony ground, but some will land on good soil, spread forth and multiply; and I’d say a good three-quarters of this show had top quality material or at least tweakably top quality material. Generally strong points to the act were 1) the fact that the two guys are physically (and probably mentally) very different and they spark off each other superbly to create an exciting stage energy. Also, 2) I was very impressed by how much preparation had gone into some of the sketches, and that really paid dividends.

Among my favourite moments were Haydn spouting off some ultra-dramatic tosh whilst we see a projection of what Mark is tapping on his phone (funnier than it sounds); a high profile PowerPoint presentation that goes wrong (call me a child but I loved the revelation of Haydn’s internet password); and the pair of TV pundits pointing out some ridiculous observations on a football game. All of these took meticulous preparation and I applaud the guys for going to the effort – it really paid off. Good fun – and certainly One(s) to Watch!

Ben Briggs: ZEIT-HEIST – The Cookie

We’re into the Sunday events now and our first show absolutely divided us. I’d not seen Ben Briggs before but had heard quite a lot about him, being a local (Northampton) lad done good. Technically there were a few problems for him; for one thing, the poor sod’s suffering from a hernia so had to limp up to the stage – not a good look and indeed he must have been feeling rubbish. Worse for us though was that The Cookie’s stage lighting had a nervous breakdown and started flashing lurid colours all over the place, with the result that for most of the show Mr B had a green face with a red outline. He looked like the Incredible Hulk with radiation sickness.

There’s no question that Mr B is a naturally funny man, who doesn’t shy away from tricky subjects like racism, and he has some routines with killer lines that he absolutely nails. He uses a brilliant retort in a sequence where an American confronts a Brit saying that without them, we’d all be speaking German. He’s also got a grotesque (but hilarious) routine about Egyptian tummy on a holiday where he hardly left the loo. He seemed alarmed that a lot of us in the audience were – shall we say – from the older generation. Honestly, no need to be alarmed; we’ve still got a sense of humour, promise.

This was a show that had some well-tried and rehearsed material and also some new stuff being road-tested. On the whole I thought it all flowed together pretty well. I have a sense that he’s the kind of comic who appeals to guys more than women; that certainly seemed to be the reaction from our party of twelve. I probably emitted more and louder guffaws at this show than I did at any other, so that’s got to be saying something! But he’s definitely not everyone’s cup of tea.

Kevin Precious: Teachers and Schools Work in Progress – Kayal Upstairs

Having loved his Unholier than Thou show last year, it was a no-brainer to catch Mr Precious again with his new WIP show, Teachers and Schools. He’s a naturally funny guy with a gift of exposing the little things in life that we all recognise and find ridiculous. For his new show, he’s tackling the stupidities of life at school – primarily from the teacher’s point of view. It’s fair to say that this WIP is at a fairly early stage, but nevertheless there were still plenty of school-life recollections that rang ominous bells.

I particularly tuned into the ghastly thought of what lurks behind the staffroom door – I’m sure we all remember kids being bellowed at by a grumpy teacher for daring to put a foot or a nose past that all-hallowed hinge. On my last day at school a teacher actually invited me into the staffroom to tell me I’d got a place at university – and I still found myself unable to breach that scary portal. Mr P explores this and several other weird hang-ups that we all have of those “happiest days of our lives”, with intelligence, wit and the insight of knowing the secrets of the staffroom. Once he’s sorted the wheat from the chaff, and delved deeper into some of his ideas, I’m sure this will be another excellent show.

Matt Green: Nice Scarf – Kayal Upstairs

For our last show of the weekend, we caught up with Matt Green and his Nice Scarf show – so called, because he comes on stage wearing a nice scarf. And why not? We’ve seen Mr Green a few times now, at a couple of Screaming Blue Murders and an Edinburgh Spank!, and he’s always slick, smart but self-deprecating, which is a good mix. He involved the audience quite a bit – specifically Mrs C and me and the Squire of Sidcup – and it was all very jovial and good-natured. Blessed with a cherubic appearance – of which he makes many a reference – this belies the toughness of some of his material, which makes it even more telling. It was largely well-tried and tested routines, but with a few new ideas; and it was all very funny and enjoyable – a perfect way to end the weekend!

So, what did we learn from our Leicester weekend experience?

  • If they’re well-behaved, a group of twelve people is perfectly manageable provided you allow them to do their own thing occasionally.
  • The move from paper tickets to e-tickets worked better than I expected. Just tell the ticket checker: “I’m part of the group of 12” and they let you in.
  • You can get too much comedy. The fizz flopped out of us when it came to attending the last show of both days – hence we saw 9 out of a planned 11 shows.
  • If you’re in the vicinity, Chutney Ivy is perfect for a superb Indian pre-theatre dinner; it’s a set meal so you don’t waste half your eating time choosing from the menu.
  • Only one of the venues we visited was accessibility-friendly. You’d have to plan very carefully if you had mobility issues.
  • For me, personally, don’t sit at the end of the rows in The Cookie because you have to sit skewed to watch the comedian, so that you irritate your vertebrae and as a result you trigger muscle pain for several days. Waaaaah!

We had a great time! Back again next year!

Review – Curtains, Royal and Derngate, Northampton, 25th February 2020

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Unlike most Brits, Mrs Chrisparkle and I had the pleasure (we’ll come back to that word) of seeing Curtains before its current UK tour, when we caught it at the Al Hirschfield Theater in New York in 2008 – I know, so cosmopolitan. I remember it reasonably fondly; Mrs C less so, and she took some convincing to see this first major British production. I recall I was perplexed at the time that the Broadway production didn’t transfer to the West End. With the benefit of hindsight, I think I understand why.

Curtains comes with a massive pedigree: primarily its composer and lyricist, Kander and Ebb, whose back-catalogue shines with highlights such as Cabaret and Chicago, as well as The Scottsboro Boys, Kiss of the Spider Woman, and the movie Funny Lady. Fred Ebb died whilst writing Curtains, as did book writer Peter Stone, so Rupert Holmes (he of The Pina Colada Song, Him, and The Mystery of Edwin Drooooood) stepped in to complete the task. Nevertheless, all of us can have our off days, and, musically, you can’t deny that Curtains is a severe disappointment. No memorable songs, no songs that have taken a life of their own outside the show, no great tunes. We all know people who say, that whilst they like “the theatre”, they can’t stand musicals. To my mind, musicals are an incredibly versatile art form, capable of creating sheer magic on a stage, exploring characters, revealing truths, deconstructing dilemmas in their own unique way. However, Curtains is the kind of musical that people who hate musicals think all musicals are like. If this was the first musical I’d ever seen, I’d dismiss the genre as kinda woeful.

The trouble with Curtains is (and I’m talking about the bare bones of the show here, not this production) that it’s trying to be a number of things but fails at them all. It wants to be taken as a serious musical in its own right, but the songs simply aren’t up to it – in fact this is far and away the worst score by Kander and Ebb that I have come across. It wants to be a comedy whodunit, but it completely lacks suspense. In its attempt to parody/pastiche landmark musicals like Oklahoma! or Finian’s Rainbow, it concentrates on their trademark scenes, such as big hoedown stomps or dream ballet sequences, but, taken out of the context of their original shows, they just slow down the natural development of this show. It also makes the show feel immensely dated. Whereas in Cabaret and Chicago the music and the style instantly gives you a time-setting without having to spell it out, you forget that Curtains is meant to be set in 1950s Boston, primarily because there’s no obvious reason for it. Musicals and murder are timeless, so why isn’t this?

Chrisparkle’s first law of musical theatre is that each song should progress either the plot or our understanding of the characters, or at least the general setting of the show. There’s nothing more frustrating than a stop-start musical where the story takes a break each time an ensemble assembles to sing something. Unfortunately, so many of the numbers in Curtains consist of the audience passively viewing the performance (or rehearsal) from another show (in this case the fictional Robbin’ Hood) which have no meaning or significance for us the audience. Take, for example, the lengthy Thataway that closes the first Act; it’s all bluster and no content, a very repetitive tune that never soars even when you think it might. It’s just an excuse for some swirling skirts and cowboy high-kickin’ (which, to be fair, the cast perform extremely well). But there’s no drama to it, no character development, nothing with which to lead you into the interval with a greater understanding of what’s going on.

Talking of intervals, it didn’t help that, technically, the performance was a bit of a disaster. The interval climax big effect, where murder victim #2 is found suspended noose-first from the curtains, simply didn’t happen. The characters told us all to “look up there” (or words to that effect) but there was nothing happening “up there”. Then, after Jason Manford’s Cioffi yelled “blackout!” to signify the end of the Act, the curtain fell, only to part rise again to reveal what looked like a degree of backstage consternation at the fact that the effect hadn’t worked. First night in a new theatre, yes, sometimes things go wrong. It happens.

Surely there were some good things? Yes indeed. Let’s start at the top with Mr Manford. I’ve not seen him in a musical before, and I thought he was excellent. The characterisation of musical-loving Detective Cioffi, hankering romantically after the ingénue Niki Harris, fanboying the writers and the director, worked extremely well. The Broadway production we saw starred David Hyde Pierce in the same role and he camped it up rotten. Jason Manford’s performance, however, was much more nuanced, more considered and more believable. And of course he has excellent comic timing, which he used to great effect.

Rebecca Lock also gives a fine, beefy performance as the no-nonsense, hard-nosed producer Carmen Bernstein, chucking out savage one-liners whilst belting out her numbers; think Ethel Merman meets Joan Rivers. It’s just a shame that her one-liners weren’t a little funnier and less predictable, but that’s not her fault. Carley Stenson looks and sounds great as Georgia Hendricks, parachuted in to play the lead role when the actress who was going to play Madame Marian suffers a terminal first-night curtain call. Ore Oduba was good, if a little clinical, as Aaron Fox, the composer, and his voice was a little under-amplified in the singing department.

There’s great support from the rest of the cast, especially Emma Caffrey as the show-off Bambi, and understudy Robin Kent who débuted the busy and important role of Bobby Pepper and did a terrific job. Capping it all, there’s a prize performance from Samuel Holmes as the flouncy director Christopher Belling, bitching his way around the stage, side-stepping blame and trouble like a slalom expert. I last saw Mr Holmes as Lord Farquaad in Shrek, where he stole the show; he really does this kind of spoilt brat incredibly well.

The other person who drags this show up by its bootstrings and does his best to redeem it, is choreographer Alistair David. An alumnus of so many brilliant lavish shows in Sheffield and Chichester, his dance routines for Curtains throughout are exciting, cheeky, and simply enjoyable. And it’s a testament to the great boys and girls of the dance team that they’re more than up to the task and make those otherwise bland set numbers watchable.

Mrs C started to nod off during Ms Stenson’s performance of Thinking of Him – nothing against Ms Stenson at all, just the fact that the plot had stopped in order for her to sing an irrelevant song, and it’s a cue to the audience to take their mind off the story and let their minds wander. I tried to pull her back to consciousness a few times during the first Act but she’d already lost interest, and was only vaguely sentient at odd moments. She experienced more of the Second Act and even laughed at Mr Holmes’ retort to Bambi: “the only thing you could arouse is suspicion” (winner of Best Line in Show). I stayed awake, but, have to admit, felt pretty bored for much of the time.

Alas, the most glittering of casts would have difficulty jump-starting this old banger of a show. After this week, the tour valiantly continues to Blackpool, Glasgow, Leicester, High Wycombe, Wolverhampton and Southampton. Go for the performances and the dancing; look away for the rest.

3-starsThree-sy does it!

Review – John Archer, Against the Odds, Underground at the Derngate, 21st February 2020

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As a prelude to what we hoped would be a weekend of riotous laughter at the Leicester Comedy Festival (more of which soon), Mrs Chrisparkle and I were joined by our friends the Squire of Sidcup and the Wise Woman of Wembley for dinner, drinks and an evening in the company of comedy magician John Archer. Mr Archer was recently on Britain’s Got Talent (apparently – we’re never in to see it.) However, clearly a lot of the good burghers of Northampton had watched his appearance because when we arrived twenty minutes before the show was due to start (normally plenty of time to get a good seat) we had to make do with the back row. Not a great position from which to observe close-up magic.

However, that’s not really Mr A’s style – you didn’t need to be in the front few rows to watch any sneaky dexterity. Most of his magical feats were mind-based; predicting the numbers that people would choose to create a fantasy lottery ticket, for example, or which card from a selection, all bearing different words on them that an audience member would pick unseen. There was yet another very clever trick where he had £80 in an envelope, with four other worthless envelopes, and he manage to convince audience members to pick all the other envelopes except the one with the dosh.

But he’s not just a fantastic magician. He has a lovely, gentle comedy style – self-deprecating, whacking out short silly songs on a ukulele; playing slightly on the fact that he won’t see 55 again but there’s definitely life in this old dog yet. An intriguing and impressive act; there’s no way that you’ll work out how he performs those feats of magical intellect – and to preserve the mystery I’d really rather not know anyway. No gimmicks, no pyrotechnics; just good old-fashioned entertainment. Nothing more to add! John Archer is touring his Against the Odds show in various venues around the country between now and May. Very enjoyable!

4-starsFour he’s a jolly good fellow!

Review – Alone in Berlin, Royal and Derngate, Northampton, 13th February 2020

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Here’s yet another play, that’s an adaptation of a book and a film, that neither Mrs Chrisparkle nor I had heard of, read or seen. The original book, Jeder stirbt für sich allein, (Every Man Dies Alone) was published in 1947, written by Hans Fallada, based on the true Resistance story of Otto and Elise Hampel. Surprisingly, it wasn’t translated into English until 2009. That’s a long time for such a significant work to remain virtually unknown to the English-Speaking public. Alistair Beaton has translated and adapted the original book, and the result is this play, Alone in Berlin, which received its world premiere in Northampton, before embarking on a short tour.

It’s a simple story. Otto and Anna Quangel live a humdrum but respectable life in Berlin. He, a carpenter, quietly goes along with the powerful Nazi regime in order to put food on the table; she, quietly but privately, opposes the regime. They have to break the news to their son Markus’s fiancée Trudi that he has been killed in action. Her coping strategy is to join a Resistance movement at work. This inspires Anna to want to do something practical to oppose the Nazis, but what? Her keenness for action brings Otto out of his rut, and he decides to start writing postcards with anti-Nazi messages and leave them in blocks of flats all around the city.

This simple act of resistance carries on for some time. Local Gestapo officer Escherich must trace the perpetrator, and in turn he is under pressure for results from his boss, the SS Officer Prall. It’s inevitable that Otto and Anna will be found, and punished – but how did the Gestapo track them down, what will be the punishment, and what of the human collateral that suffers as a result? I’m not going to tell you that – or else there’s no point you’re going to see it.

Let’s concentrate on the good stuff. Firstly, at the blunt end, it reveals the unease of day-to-day living, with the enforced Heil Hitler greeting, and the threat of being reported if you don’t use it. There’s the casual hatred of Jews, and the fact that their lives and property are easy meat for abuse. If you want to just break into a Jewish person’s apartment and steal their goods, no one’s going to blame you for it. Whilst at the sharp end, it shows the brutality and mental instability of the Nazi officers who enforce the regime, with a shockingly unpleasant torture scene, masterminded by an SS Officer gleefully snapping fingers off his victim and giggling whilst he does it. These are people whose Mr Hyde aspect has been given full permission to run riot. We used to say, it couldn’t happen again, but don’t you be too sure.

Also, and, thankfully, more subtly, it reveals what happens when an essentially good person remains good whilst evil thrives all around him, and what happens when another essentially good person chooses to go along with the evil – which one fares better under those same circumstances? Otto, admittedly laboriously and ineffectually at first, starts composing his postcards because it’s the only thing an insignificant man can do. Inspector Escherich, however, a police officer of longstanding experience and presumably reasonably high repute, makes the decision to toe the Nazi line and satisfy his new masters’ cruelty. During his investigation he weaselly offers two suspects the chance of suicide as a means of his “solving the case” whilst not directly involving himself in the dirty details. Comparing the personal journeys of Otto and Escherich, essentially the brave versus the coward, was, for me, the most interesting aspect of the evening.

However, it does take a long time and a lot of effort to get there. Sadly, this fascinating story is told in an over-stylised and slow manner. The decision to narrate/interrupt the story by an angel statue that comes to life and sings, Cabaret-style, repetitive (very repetitive) lyrics that reflect the downfall of the age, is a curious one to say the least. By the time the war was in full swing, the decadence of the Weimar years was a thing of the past anyway, so this feels anachronistic. Should the angel statue represent a nostalgia for a better time? She waits on the sidelines and observes all the action so perhaps she is meant to suggest that what happens to Otto and Anna is fate. Maybe? Not sure. What she unfortunately does achieve is to minimise what should be growing tension. Tension grows out of a sense of real threat, but her presence is ethereal, invisible, mystic even, which, I would suggest, works against what the play sets out to achieve. Whenever the statue interrupts the flow of the play, down comes the suspense. Worse, it actually feels pretentious – and it doesn’t even have the benefit of being tuneful. I’m afraid I didn’t like that element to the production one bit.

To be fair, it wasn’t technically a great performance either. In a very unfortunate error early on, Charlotte Emmerson, as Anna, broke the news to Abiola Ogunbiyi’s Trudi, that Otto had died. Pause to take that in… isn’t Otto (Denis Conway) sitting next to her? Oh, she meant Markus…. and that left three actors with nowhere to go apart from carry on regardless, but the atmosphere had gone. As a result, I was never certain whether Ms Emmerson’s occasional dithering over the lines was a deliberate characterisation point about Anna, or whether she was simply under-rehearsed. There were similar incidents of ragged prop-handling, with Trudi searching for ages to find the photo in her bag, Escherich having difficulty getting the gun out of his coat pocket, and the statue fumbling with a postcard on the floor. Added to which, as the curtain fell at the end of Act One, a stagehand walked on stage left before the curtain had fully dropped. Have to say, I wasn’t that impressed.

That aside, there are some very good performances to admire. Jay Taylor’s tetchy, and gradually increasingly unhinged SS Officer Prall, is a superb portrayal of growing evil. He’s like a sadistic, spoilt child, who’s grown too big for his boots and in a decent society would have been taken down a peg or two – but in wartime Nazi Germany, with status and power, he’s uncontrolled, off the radar, wicked. Horrific, but excellent. Denis Conway is also very good as Otto, particularly in the last quarter of the play when he starts to face the consequences of his actions. Those were genuine tears welling up his eyes. Abiola Ogunbiyi gives a clear and precise performance as Trudi, the only other character who develops during the play – from radical to housewife. And I really enjoyed the performance of Joseph Marcell as Escherich, increasingly faced with his own cowardice, trying to wheedle his way out of trouble – totally convincing.

It’s a great story of quiet heroism, but sometimes it struggles to get its voice heard over the stylised production and lack of tension. I was expecting more, sadly. Thank heavens for some good performances. Alone in Berlin plays at the Royal until 29th February, then continues to York and Oxford.

P. S. Mrs C didn’t like the harsh bright lights at the beginning and end of the show that blind the audience from the back of the stage. What was the point of them? She asked. Not a clue, I’m afraid. Is it fair on the audience to blind them like that? Ermm, no, I don’t think so.

3-stars Three-sy does it!

Review – From the New World, Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, Royal and Derngate, Northampton, 9th February 2020

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Mrs Chrisparkle and I, together with Lord and Lady Prosecco, were fervently looking forward to last Sunday’s concert with the RPO, because it had such a fantastic programme of musical delights. Clearly half the town had the same idea, as I’ve rarely seen the Derngate auditorium so packed for a classical concert.

Whilst the pieces were old favourites, there were some new faces to meet. Our conductor was Kerem Hasan, new to us, and almost new to the entire world as he’s only 28 years old, Lord bless us all. He’s a warm, engaging and encouraging presence on the podium, deep into his music, generous to his musicians, and enthusiastic about giving us the best musical show he can. Another new face to us was the Leader of the Orchestra, Sulki Yu, although she has been with the RPO for a few years now. Despite her name, she’s bright and expressive and clearly sets a good example to her troops.

The first piece on the programme was the stunning Vltava sequence from Smetana’s Ma Vlast. This always reminds Mrs C and I of our first visit to Prague back in 1997, where it was a favourite of our host, a young Czech guy who clearly valued his homeland just as much as Smetana did. Those surging strings cascade through you like a hot massage, and you feel appropriately reinvigorated as a result. It would be great to hear the RPO perform the whole suite some time, but this was a beautiful and stirring start to our concert.

After the usual shenanigans of wheeling the Steinway into place, and the violins all going into a little huddle at the back of the stage (I’d love to know what they gossip about whilst they’re waiting), it was time for yet another new face – our soloist for this concert, Romanian pianist Daniel Ciobanu. Another 28-year-old; things have reached a pretty pass when you’re older than the combined age of both the conductor and the soloist. He’s a smart and trendy chap; fully in control of his surroundings and supremely confident in his technical ability. Along with the orchestra, of course, he played for us Rachmaninov’s Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini, and it was simply fantastic. A faultless performance, full of passion and expression, revelling in all the delicate, fun bits, and majestically triumphing through the majestically triumphant bits. All from memory, of course; and you’re simply wowed by his incredible talent.

After an interval Chardonnay, we returned for the main event of the evening, a performance of Dvorák’s 9th Symphony, From the New World. Written by the travelling Czech in New York in 1893, and inspired by a combination of Native American folk music, the freedoms of a young country, and the legacy of Longfellow’s Hiawatha, it is in fact as far away from a Yorkshire Hovis advert as you can get. But the fact that it adapts itself to so many different moods and motives, and remains a favourite throughout the ages, shows its true excellence. From that hope-filled dawn of the first movement, through the luxurious softness of the second, and the spiky defiance of the third, to the powerful resolution of the fourth, this was a performance of immaculate strength and fluidity. It took your mind off all our current problems and made you feel glad to be alive. Absolutely superb from start to finish – we all loved it.

That was the last of the 2019/2020 concerts – and it was great to end it with a bang! Hopefully we will hear news of the next season of concerts very soon.

Five alive, let music thrive!

Review – The Whip, Royal Shakespeare Company at the Swan Theatre, Stratford-upon-Avon, 11th February 2020

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Odd title, The Whip. The first thing it brought to my mind was that implement with which you punish horses, or people, into painful submission. The second thing was a walnut-topped chocolatey confection, which sadly was very wide of the mark. The prime relevance of the title refers to its main character, Alexander Boyd, Chief Whip of the Whig Party in 1833, when this play is set. And of course, a political Whip is named after that aforementioned instrument of torture, as they whip the other MPs into the subservient position of what the party leaders want.

BoydA quick pre-show flick through the programme shamed me into recognising my own ignorance when it comes to the history of slavery – and, as far this play is concerned, how Parliament – eventually – brought about its abolition in Britain. I had no idea, for example, that there was a 26-year gap between passing the Abolition of the Slave Trade Act and the Slavery Abolition Act. Nor that after abolition, the Government introduced a period of “apprenticeship” for the former slaves – where in fact they carried on precisely the same work, on virtually the same conditions; today we call them interns (just joking, or am I?) The only real difference is that the Slave Owners had been recompensed handsomely for loss of stock. These apprenticeships continued for a further five years. And I certainly didn’t know that the sums paid to the Slave Owners amounted to 40% of the national budget, and the necessary borrowing to account for this didn’t get paid off until – wait for it – 2015.

MaybourneIt’s clear that Juliet Gilkes Romero’s new play is not only an exposé of those miserable years but also reflects parallels to Britain today. It’s emphatically not an allegory of Brexit; if it’s meant to be, it does a poor job. But there are elements that go to show that nothing is new in the world of British politics. A major project, with popular support, takes many years to be implemented. As a result of the final negotiations, a few prominent MPs and other businessmen become extraordinarily rich, whilst the country’s coffers are plundered. It takes ages for the country to regain its feet financially, the whole process creates a starting point for further political upheavals. On second thoughts, perhaps it is an allegory of Brexit.

Boyd on the Front BenchWe meet Boyd, who has befriended and adopted a younger runaway slave, Edmund, and groomed him to greatness with the possibility of a Parliamentary career. Boyd’s a good man, a principled man, with his heart in the right place; but also a practical man, who knows you have to walk before you can run. We see him in the House of Commons, surrounded by a noisy rabble and a Speaker whose pronouncements are delivered exactly like John Bercow, and he stands out as thoroughly respectable. He engages a feisty young woman, Horatia, as his cook/maid, not only because she stands up for herself, but also because her daughter was killed in a cotton-mill accident, and he feels like she is the kind of person who should be given a second chance. Also involved is the eloquent and respected ex-slave Mercy Pryce, who addresses the crowds at Speakers’ Corner, and who works with Boyd to influence thought and opinion. Whilst Mercy strives towards justice for slaves and Horatia demands votes for women, just how much will Society sit back and let all that change simply happen? And will Edmund achieve the greatness that Boyd expects of him?

FuriesGiven that this is a fascinating time of history, with some remarkable people working hard to put right an inestimable wrong, which still has consequences for the world today, I was disappointed at how pedestrian and dull the first Act, in particular, turns out to be. It’s very wordy and turgid; it moves slowly and with a strange sense of worthiness. It lacks dramatic tension and that special magic. Maybe this is because the play has been constructed as a kind of Greek Tragedy; with four characters designated as The Furies, the classical deities of vengeance. There’s a scene later in the play when Boyd goes to the Commons and is beset by the Furies who bump into him and accost him and prevent him from achieving his goals. And, frankly, it looks ridiculous. Particularly as, for the most part, the Furies act as scene shifters and general gophers. It’s the Furies who, Chorus-like,  wind up the story by addressing the audience directly with details of how the national debt from paying the Slave Owners wasn’t in the clear until 2015. But unlike a Greek Tragedy, we don’t have some cataclysmic ending or a deus ex machina to draw a line under the whole proceedings. The mix of contemporary political drama and stylised Greek tragedy didn’t sit well and I’m afraid I couldn’t take the Furies seriously.

HoratiaPerhaps the main problem with the play – which is a brave problem and therefore to be admired – is that it is simply too ambitious, trying to tie up too many ideas, and trying to make too many associations, so that it stretches itself without resolving anything. Whilst it spends a long time establishing the characterisations of the protagonists, the story doesn’t progress much, and everything feels ponderous and cumbersome – like that really irritating table that descends and ascends throughout the whole evening as a centrepiece for many of the scenes. Never has a simple piece of furniture-shifting monopolised your sightline so much as to get in the way of telling a story.

Mercy and HoratiaFortunately, there are some very good performances that just about pull you through the long three hours of this show. The double-act, if you could call them that, of Debbie Korley as Mercy Pryce and Katherine Pearce as Horatia Poskitt, provide most of the energy of the play. Ms Pearce impresses with her spiky retorts and generally bullish behaviour so that the stage brightens up when she comes on. Ms Korley’s measured and dignified performance completely challenges your preconceptions about how an ex-slave would behave.

Hyde VilliersRichard Clothier’s Boyd is also full of dignity – until he’s brought low by duplicitous colleagues – and he gives a great portrayal of a flawed, but good man in the most trying of circumstances. He also has an extraordinarily rich voice that demands your attention. John Cummins’ Cornelius Hyde Villiers is a nasty piece of work, in politics for all the wrong, self-seeking reasons, but creates a very believable person out of what otherwise could be merely a pantomime baddie. David Birrell plays Lord Maybourne, the Home Secretary, as very comfortably pompous and manipulating, a man who is naturally your (indeed, anyone’s) superior. And Tom McCall’s Bradshaw Cooper is a very credible portrayal of a difficult, tetchy, driven politician, the type we’d all like to punch on the nose.

EdmundWe didn’t understand why Nicholas Gerard-Martin’s Purnell was portrayed as such a terrified, jittery idiot; and what I suspect was meant to be a largely comic scene, where he is primed for his Select Committee appearance, felt to me a bit embarrassing. And Corey Montague-Sholay’s Edmund was so refined, so reserved, so delicate and private, that I feel we never really got to know him.

Bradshaw CooperI’ll be honest with you – Mrs Chrisparkle slept through at least half of the first Act and a quarter of the Second Act, which does indeed prove one thing; in waking hours, the second Act is twice as entertaining as the first. However, being bored in the theatre is the ultimate drama crime, and I can’t help but think that a play with this riveting source material and timeless relevance should have delivered a hugely greater impact. However, I always say I prefer a brave failure to a lazy success, and, given the quality of some of the performances, I have to add an extra star to what I feel this show otherwise deserves. The Whip continues in repertory at the Swan Theatre until 21st March.

Production photos by Steve Tanner

3-starsThree-sy does it!