Review of Friday’s Plays
by Sarah Lockyer
Tonight, we welcomed three youth groups to the One Act Festival and a sold-out auditorium. We were delighted that Lady Lorimer and Port Erin Commissioners were present to witness their talents on display in three
very different plays.
Me, My Monsters and I by Grey Pratt
The Stage Door Academy
In this play, the monsters that emerge at night are not just under the bed but also in the head of Kid (Emily Furner): they represent all the bottled-up emotions that the nameless protagonist feels after the death of her sister. Kid learns that simply ignoring these personified negative emotions, including Anxiety (Hettie Furner), Pain (Poppy Pearson) and Loss (Evelyn Stubbs), is not effective, as they will continue to feed off each other. Rather, Kid has to process and work through the emotions in order to grow and come to terms with what has happened.
Grieg’s ominous music ‘In the Hall of the Mountain King’, rustling sounds and shadowy figures moving around set the tone effectively at the start. The light changed from sharp focus on the bed to reveal the whole bedroom, complete with brightly coloured bean bags, scattered toys and strewn clothes—and monsters in pink pyjamas! Kid was dressed in contrasting red, perhaps suggesting something more real and substantial.
Emily Furner certainly performed the central role with confidence, delivering lines with clarity and convincing emotion. When Kid eventually recounted the details of the car accident that led to her sister’s death, you could have heard a pin drop. It is not easy to play an abstract concept such as Judgement (Elodie Marshall), Failure (Tatum Erasmus) or Change (Lillian Roberts), but all of the emotions were acted most effectively, with different gestures and tones of voice in keeping with their roles. We really felt the effect Envy (Emmanuelle Deveaux), Pain and Depression (Taryn Harding) and each of their fellow monsters were having on Kid.
Direction ensured that the monsters closed in on Kid at times, surrounding her and making her feel trapped, while at other points in the play they approached Kid individually, to reason with or to taunt her, sitting next to her on the bed. There was also humorous interplay among the monsters, who shifted from arguing and challenging each other to joining forces as Kid came to terms with them. In the end, Kid literally embraced each of her emotions in turn, showing how much she had learned and grown, and leaving us hopeful for her future.
Stage Door are to be congratulated for an accomplished and memorable performance. As the youngest group, and one taking part in the One Act Festival for the first time, they should be very proud of what they achieved, and we look forward to seeing them perform again in the future.
Lockdown by Douglas Craven
Elite Theatre Arts
It was thirty years ago today that sixteen pupils and one teacher lost their lives in Dunblane, in the deadliest mass shooting in British history; this tragic anniversary gave an added poignancy to tonight’s performance of Lockdown. In this play, high school students wait in a dark classroom, not knowing if it is a drill or if there is a real emergency. When one girl rushes out of the room in hysterics and the teacher follows, the remaining students have to decide whether to stay put or venture out. The audience is challenged to think about what they would do in a terrifying situation that has become all too real and frequent in the modern world.
The opening music ‘I don’t like Mondays’, inspired by a teenage shooting spree at a school in San Diego, was a fitting introduction to the setting and story of the play. The lights on the stage barely came up, just enough for us to see a simple classroom setting, with teenagers in school uniforms cowering under desks, while their teacher tried to keep them – and himself – calm. Flashes of light from a lighter and a mobile phone reminded us they were waiting in darkness, making their situation all the more tense. The passing minutes and hours were punctuated by booming, repetitive announcements that revealed nothing about what was really going on beyond the door that loomed at the back of the stage, and a fire alarm causing shock and panic.
The acting was strong throughout. Once the teacher left, the characters shifted from their student personas to their truer selves, and the actors achieved this well, delivering their dialogue convincingly and using gesture and body language to suggest their relationships and personalities. The stage was used effectively, for example when the students took over the teacher’s chair and desk, and when they came forward to express their views with varying degrees of confidence appropriate to their clearly different characters. The tense but monotonous situation was given a dynamic quality by changes of pace and injections of humour. We were reminded that these were just ordinary teenagers trapped in an extraordinary situation.
The ending of the play was chilling: footsteps were heard, the corridor lit up, someone started banging on the door. Then blackout, and the audience was left to imagine what happened next and to echo a question in the play ‘When did people start hunting children?’ Congratulations to the group for a powerful performance of a demanding piece of theatre. Newcomers to the Festival, they made an excellent first impression, and we hope they return in the future.
In Juliet’s Garden by Juith Elliot McDonald
Stage One Drama School
Shakespeare’s heroines gather for a meeting, hoping the Bard himself will show up, as they want to update their plots. Their conversation challenges the hand that they have been dealt by Shakespeare in terms of their roles, while his agent -complete with clip board – gives them a different perspective. Juliet’s Nurse (Penny Lavery) reminds us how women over the centuries have reacted to their characters and the positive difference they have made. At the end of the play, the heroines realise that, just maybe, Shakespeare has actually provided a voice for the ‘strong, rational, complicated women’ they want to be, if they can find it and share it with their audiences.
The meeting place is a lovely garden in Verona: a floral trellis and garden furniture set the scene, with birdsong and fountain sounds adding to the ambience. Lighting gave the appropriate feel of a warm summer’s afternoon. Costumes ranged from sumptuous period dresses to modern suits, a reminder of all the different ways Shakespeare’s plays have and can be performed. Each outfit suited the particular character, from Ophelia’s (Bella Kirkwood) boho look to the Renaissance velvet gown of Desdemona (Maddie Wood). The effect was a colourful collage contrasting well with the business attire of Jacqueline (Morgan Braidwood) and Portia (Phoebe Cringle), which established the action firmly in the twenty-first century. As did the mobile phone going off at the start of the play—part of the script this time, not a member of the audience forgetting to put theirs on silent!
The characters were convincing and clearly differentiated, and the confident acting throughout demonstrated full and subtle understanding of Shakespeare’s original text as well as the thought-provoking ideas this play explores. The production benefited from lively presentation, including articulate dialogue, well-delivered Shakespearean speeches, effective movement and gesture, and even a delightful rendition of the ‘stabbed, smothered and drowned’ song!
The success of the play depends on contrasts: between Shakespearean and modern times, between all the different female characters, and ultimately between their sense of themselves at the start and at the end of the piece. Humour and lightness were balanced with poignancy, as the characters slipped seamlessly into delivering lines from their respective Shakespeare plays, and we were reminded of the fate facing all these young women—and all women finding their place and influence in a man’s world.
The audience responded with enthusiasm to the engaging, witty script, delivered with energy, understanding and a delightful lightness of touch by the accomplished cast. Although the Bard never did appear, I am sure he would have approved of such an assured performance by his feisty heroines, even if he wouldn’t have considered changing their stories.
Following the three plays, with all the young actors seated around on stage,
we were treated to an interesting analysis
by Sue Doherty, our GODA adjudicator.
Sue shed light on the plays, their writing and their interpretations
for the stage by the actors and directors
This was a fascinating learning experience for both the groups
and the audience. We look forward to tonight’s comments.
