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Stars explained: * A production of no real merit
with failings in all areas. ** A production showing evidence of not
enough time or effort, or even talent, and which never breathes any real
life into the piece – or a show lumbered with a terrible script. *** A
good enjoyable show which might have some small flaws but has largely
achieved what it set out to do.**** An excellent show which shows a
great deal of work and stage craft with no noticeable or major
flaws.***** A four star show which has found that extra bit of magic
which lifts theatre to another plane. |
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A delightful step back in time Pride and Prejudice Dudley Little Theatre Netherton Arts Centre
REBECCA CLEE directs a beautifully
enunciated account of Helen Jerome's adaptation of the Jane Austen
novel. Elegance is all as Society practises its gossip
and its snobbery, with Jean Potter's Lady Catherine – she who is
accustomed to deference – perhaps the super-snob in the face of some
stout competition elsewhere. She deploys her hands in a display of
studied superiority: “What? No governess? I never heard of such a
thing!” Like her, Andrew Rock illuminates the fringes of
the action, but in a very different way. He is the bowing and scraping,
hat-doffing curate, Mr Collins. He does not threaten to emulate Uriah
Heep, but unctuousness is all as he comes obsequiously a-courting at the
home of Mr and Mrs Bennett – she being the notorious marriage-maker with
a clutch of marriageable daughters. Lyndsey Parker is Mrs Bennett, a martyr to her
nerves; beautifully spoken but nevertheless leaving no doubt in her
delivery that she is doing her best to clamber into society and has not
been born into it. Chris Fawson, as Mr Bennett, delivers a nice line in
drollery as he does his best to cope with his wife's persistent push
towards the social betterment of her family.
As the daughters, Karen Whittingham (Jane), Emma
Dyke (Elizabeth) and Gina Lovell, as the perky Lydia, somehow cope with
their mother's insistent ambitions for them. Her belief is that any
husband is better than no husband and she displays it persistently. Dave
Hutchins (the brooding Mr Darcy) and James Silvers (the immeasurably
more outgoing Mr Bingley) offer strong performances as they come within
her grasp. Chris Brock is the unpretentious Mr Wickham and
there are pleasing contributions from Jackie Bevan (Lady Lucas) and
Alison O'Driscoll (Charlotte). Indeed, there is not a weak link in a
cast that is 20-strong. The production is engrossing and beautifully
costumed, though it does beg a quizzical eyebrow in that the action goes
on for about three months without very much change in the garb of these
splendidly delineated characters. There were a few first-night uncertainties but
these detract only minimally from what is a pleasing step back into the
early 19th Century. To 12.03.11.
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