IMPROBABLE FICTION To September 17.
Scarborough.
IMPROBABLE FICTION
by Alan Ayckbourn.
Stephen Joseph Theatre (The Round) in rep to 17 September 2005 then tour.
Mon-Sat 7.30pm Mat Sat 2.30pm.
Runs 2hr 30min One interval.
TICKETS: 01723 370541.
tickets@sjt.uk.com
www.sjt.uk.com
Review: Timothy Ramsden 25 June.
Comedy, thriller, musical nearly a whole season of stories in one comic celebration.
Named after round' pioneer Stephen Joseph, Scarborough's theatre-in-the-round is nowadays most closely linked to playwright/director Alan Ayckbourn who's celebrating its half-century with a corker of a story-pot full of the sort of kindly, cosy genre pieces that have stuffed his fine children's plays in recent years.
It's built round Arnold, secretary of a local writers' group, a well-disposed but incompetent male such as Ayckbourn's been penning since the seventies. Arnold loses count as he works out the tally of chairs in his living-room for a literary gathering. As local writers' egos swirl around him throughout the first act, he's lost, being a mere re-writer of instruction manuals into English people can understand.
Yet his fellows' projects are stillborn, inspirations all running out mid-opus. Then, during the bravura second act, three of the tales come to life. Arnold's neutral furniture helps the action swing between a Victorian sensation shocker, an inter-war Golden Age' detective story and a piece of modern sci-fi (with its author's built-in malapropisms). As changing telephones delineate period, Arnold makes bemused attempts to play his part in the trio of tales.
Ayckbourn keeps a fine balance between narrative lines, holding an illustrated children's story back for his conclusion (a promised musical never really emerges). Behind all this is the irony that Arnold's unimaginative nature, which make him the group's born bureaucrat, is the one stuck at the centre of the stories, which infuse his fellow-writers' personalities into an array of genre characters innocent and evil.
Also enmeshed in the fictions is the helpful Ilsa, who's only called in to help out with Arnold's invalid mum, and even mother herself, unseen upstairs. As events proceed, Arnold develops into a later Ayckbourn character, the mild-mannered hero, here coping with the anarchy of the imagination amid a riotous swirl of adventures.
Fittingly in this 50th year, the cast is full of Scarborough regulars, gamely quick-changing between narratives. John Branwell's a splendid anchor to it all, while Eileen Battye's cool command, Terence Booth's splenetic energy, Laura Doddington's good-natured enthusiasm are among the fine characterisations in this comic celebration of theatre's imaginative ingenuity.
Arnold: John Branwell.
Ilsa: Laura Doddington.
Brevis: Terence Booth.
Vivvi: Clare Swinburne.
Clem: Giles New.
Jess: Becky Hindley.
Grace: Eileen Battye.
Director: Alan Ayckbourn.
Designer: Roger Glossop.
Lighting: James Farncombe.
Music: Denis King.
Dance: Sheila Carter.
Costume: Pip Leckenby.
2005-07-04 00:46:38