FLARE PATH. Tour

Tour

FLARE PATH
by Terence Rattigan

Middle Ground Theatre Company

Runs 2hr 30min One interval
Review Hazel Brown 2 February at Poole Arts Centre

World War II drama that fails to igniteWhilst one accepts that Rattigan's play is set in the 40's and reflects its time, why has the director, Michael Lunney, chosen to remain so faithful to an outdated style of direction? The actors stand and declare their lines woodenly across the large set with the curtain descending to mark the passage of time. The production does not ignite or excite – there is little sense of impending danger or fear.

Set in a hotel lobby near a World War II airfield, the wives and girlfriends of the aircrew wait and fret while their men take off along the eponymous flare path to bomb Germany. The plot revolves around wartime marriages. Patricia Graham, a successful and glamorous actress, married in haste to the captain of a Wellington, a younger man, whilst on the rebound from a broken love affair with a matinee idol. Doris, a former barmaid, married a Polish count whose wife and children were killed by the Germans. Finally a down to earth cockney, bombed out of her London home, arrives for one night with her husband, a rear gunner, Serjeant Miller.

Matinee idol, Peter Kyle, arrives at the hotel to take Patricia back to America with him. However, the aircrews, summoned by 'Gloria', an avuncular Squadron Leader, have to set off on an unexpected and dangerous sortie. The scene is set for the drama – will they return? Will Patricia leave her young husband? Will Mrs Dusty Miller catch her bus back to St Albans? Will the hotel owner, Mrs Oakes, discover the discarded breakfast eggs?

Rattigan shows the tenderness of the couples' relationships and the camaraderie of the aircrew with insight and personal experience. Pinpointing the dependence of these men on the women in their lives, he draws this tightly bound group closer together to fend off outside threats. These are universal themes that should have been brought to the fore in the direction, rather than lost in period verisimilitude.

Countess Skriczevinsky: Jackie Lye
Peter Kyle: Nigel Carrington
Mrs Oakes: Christine Drummond
Sergeant Miller: Miles Chambers
Count Skriczevinsky: Rupert Baker
Flight-Lieutenant Graham: Daniel Brown
Patricia Graham: Ali Gorton
Mrs Miller: Tania Mathias
Squadron-Leader Swanson: Colin Baker

Director: Michael Lunney
Designer: Ali Gordon
Lighting Designer: Stephen Holroyd
Composer: Mark Taylor

2002-02-05 01:36:28