Be My Baby. To 26 June 2004.
Salisbury
BE MY BABY
by Amanda Whittington
Salisbury Playhouse To 26 June 2004
Mon-Wed 7.30pm ThuSat 8.00 pm Mat 17,19,24,26 June 2.30pm
Runs 1hr 55min: One Interval
TICKETS: 01722 320333 www.salisburyplayhouse.com
Review Mark Courtice: 10 June 2004
Sixties set story of fallen girls.
Whittington's play is set in a home for girls who have fallen - for unsuitable men, making themselves pregnant and beyond the pale in strait-laced 60s society. Their babies are due for adoption at birth, and in the meantime they are working in the laundry and scrubbing the floors with time in the afternoon for Bible study.
Each has a different story, and a different fantasy of escape, often expressed by a Dusty Springfield track. Each, of course, has the same story of betrayal, loss and fear.
Raz Shaw's production is a rather slow and solemn affair. It's surprising, really, in a play with a cast of teenage women and a script with some good pregnancy jokes that there is not more life. Be My Baby is well written, with some sustained scenes of real emotion, but with its tight construction, humour and energy must be allowed to make their contrast.
Individual scenes work well, the pace driven by the actors and the tone confidently handled; especially by Kelly Bright as Queenie and Rebecca Callard as Mary, who has both soul and welcome flashes of fire. The older characters are less well written, but Maggie Ollerenshaw makes Matron more than just a cruel harridan.
The use of pregnant inmates to move the (rather too many) settings and props slows everything down to their pace, so what sees like a clever conceit makes the show drag.
The redolent songs of sixties girl groups root the play firmly in the past. They also serve in this production to further slow things down as characters too often wait quietly for them to finish.
They raise, too, the question of how relevant to today's young women in the audience this play really is. This would not matter if it were not still very difficult to be a single mother, so there are issues still to explore.
Jaimie Todds set, constructed of sheets and indications of institutional architecture, does the job. Like the lighting by David Holmes all is tight and grim, with only occasional flashes of rock and roll to lighten the mood.
Mary: Rebecca Callard
Mrs Adams: Liz Crowther
Queeenie: Kellie Bright
Dolores: Hannah Watkins
Norma: Hannah Storey
Matron: Maggie Ollerenshaw
Director: Raz Shaw
Designer: Jaimie Todd
Lighting: David Holmes
Musical Direction: Helen Porter
Choreography: Linda Muirhead
2004-06-14 00:30:53