DRIVING MISS DAISY. To 10 April.

Oldham

DRIVING MISS DAISY
by Alfred Uhry

Coliseum Theatre To 10 April 2004
Tue-Thu; Sat 7.30pm Fri 8pm
Runs 1hr 55min One interval

TICKETS: 0161 624 2829
Review: Timothy Ramsden 3 April

Accomplished revival of a gentle play.Several minutes into the Coliseum's production of Alfred Uhry's romantic, soft-focused comedy about a Jewish senior citizeness and the Black chauffeur (not that much her junior) employed in the interests of road safety by her lawyer son, that I realised - not how good Robin Herford's production is, but that the high quality's no surprise. Oldham may be off the nationally-beaten track, but under artistic director Kevin Shaw it's having a golden age of popular programming, direction, acting and notably design.

Herford steers this side of the sentiment waiting to mire the journey through the quarter-century starting in 1948, gently pointing up that all the trio of characters are outsiders in mid-century Atlanta, Hoke being Black, the Werthans Jews. A synagogue is burned; Boolie declines a meeting with Martin Luther-King (whom he admires) because attendance could close off significant local business contacts.

Damian Myerscough's performance comes closest to comedy, with plentiful reactions tolerant surprise at his mother, increasingly appreciative towards Hoke. Boolie is somewhat apart; the play's centre is the relationship between Daisy's stubborn independence and Hoke's easy good-nature. With younger characters it would be a love story. With characters who end up as nonagarian and septuagarian it's a matter of the rough-ride to eventual friendship and companionship.

Larrington Walker keeps the easygoing manner of a man with a clear conscience. He's alert to the character's inner moral authority and integrity. It's there in the hand he offers for Boolie to shake when he's first employed, and his quiet negotiation of a bigger-than-offered pay-rise without causing offence.

Judy Wilson, seated in her elegant wicker-chair, chin jutted assertively out, or later stepping gingerly in advancing age, shows a Daisy you sense has always protected herself behind that Miss', a nature that takes a quarter-century to form a friendship through defences ultimately less to do with prejudice than personal independence.

Michael Holt uses small trucks for the various locations including a swivelling car-seat that allows different angles in the motoring scenes in front of a part-glimpsed small-town American street mottled with suggestions of jaguar-skin that doubtless defines vehicular luxury for Miss Daisy.

Boolie Werthan: Damian Myerscough
Hoke Coleburn: Larrington Walker
Daisy Werthan: Judy Wilson

Director: Robin Herford
Designer: Michael Holt
Lighting: Phil Davies
Sound: Anna Holly

2004-04-08 12:52:28