Don't Rock the Boat by Robin Haydon. The Mill at Sonning, Reading RG4 until 06 September 2025, 4☆☆☆☆. Review: William Russell.

Photo Credit: Pamela Raith. 

Don't Rock the Boat by Robin Haydon. The Mill at Sonning, Reading RG4 until 6 September 2025,

4☆☆☆☆. Review: William Russell.

“Funny comedy with heart well acted.”"

There are times when reviewing plays at this delightful dinner theatre one feels one is biting the hand that feeds because we too get to eat. Sally Hughes, who directs this pretty well forgotten weekend from hell with something serious to say comedy by Robin Haydon, has assembled a good cast, a splendid set by Jackie Hutson  and given her summer audience something to laugh at even when possibly some of it is a little too close to home  for comfort. It may have dated slightly - 2025 is nothing like 1991 – but the audience had come to laugh and duly did. It is possible to read quite a lot into the fact that the protagonists are a bullying property developer out to get a hypocritical lawyer and local politician who chairs the planning committee to help him out of a jam, as well as into the way their respective wives get treated. The local authority corruption scandals are every day affairs still so in that sense it is topical enough and some men still have those attitudes to the women in their lives. But basically it is the holiday weekend from hell play on board the Bunty in which one marriage implodes and their children do their own plot played to the Eton Boating Song. Steven Pinder is  suitably awful as developer Arthur Bullhead, Harry Gostelow conjures up really nasty hypocritical lawyer John Coombes very well indeed while Rachel Fielding as his wife rises  to the moment when she puts him firmly in his place with a few unpalatable home truths in breathtaking style.Saddled with the role of Bullhead's wife, who remains put upon, Melanie Gutteridge carries on regardless doing as she is told – she really deserves her own moment of truth but unfortunately does not get it. Four couples and two children in a parked boat has enough meat in it for audiences to discuss the issues raised afterwards, but by and large comedy sets the tone of ahugely enjoyable riverside stay where there is, as the author says, a mutiny on the Bunty., The four stars are quite simply because of how happily the audience reacted to a well played production – I would have more reservations about stars for the play but chances are people will go home happily humming that wretched song having enjoyed some jolly good boating weather.

Cast

Francesca Barrett - Shirley Bullhead

Hanna Brown – Wendy Coombes

Harry Gostelow – John Coombes

Melanie Butteridge – Mary Bullhead

Steven Pinder – Arthur Bullhead

Creatives

Director – Sally Hughes

Set Designer – Jackie Hutson

Costume Designer – Natalie Titchener

Lighting and Sound Designer – Graham Wetmouth