Two Out of Three Ain't Bad.

The Oxfordshire Drama Network Festival held every year at this time in the wonderful Unicorn Theatre in Abingdon is always worth a visit.
This year we went on the Wednesday night to see three short plays presented by local groups and adjudicated by Arthur Aldrich who has been involved with theatre for over 60 years.
The first play was ‘Funny Ha Ha’ from Whole Hog Productions, a play written by Becky Cann one of the two performers in the piece, and Matthew Clift, the Director. The story is of two clowns both disenchanted with their lives and eager to end it. They find themselves on either end of a noosed rope and we are treated to their inner thoughts and tribulations. One has Cancer; one has just been fired from the Circus. You get the picture. Not too many laughs.
Now the adjudicator loved this production and I wouldn’t be surprised if it isn’t chosen to return for a re-run on Saturday night as one of the adjudicator’s choices for the Gala Evening.
I found Mr Aldrich a very fine man and indeed we discovered we had gone to the same school many years ago in Coventry, there’s a thing. However I found Funny Ha Ha a drag and half way through the play I was hoping they would activate the nooses on the rope and be done with it.
The play opens with Clown 1, played by Darren Little, holding the stage alone for around five minutes before he says anything. I for one was convinced he’d forgotten his lines but unfortunately not, he rants and raves in short bursts about the fact he has Cancer and is going to do away with himself.
He is eventually joined on stage by Becky Cann in the guise of Clown 2, and together they go through a series of routines some classic clown capers and some not.
She is also intending to end it all. What is it about clowns?
Funny Ha Ha is well acted by the two performers who as far as I could see and hear were word perfect. Impressive with such big parts.
Not at all my sort of play but it was well done and I guess it’s me.
The second coming was ‘Perfect Partners’ by Alan Richardson, entered by BreakaLeg Productions.
This was much more my type of thing. Set in the 1970’s Perfect Partners is a dating agency, on the skids alas, where for a fee you are matched up with the perfect partner.
Unfortunately, the proprietors of the business have their own marital problems that spill over to affect the business in a series of situations including an unwanted interview with a scandal sheet reporter played well by Richard Damerell. Apart from a little uncertainty on his entrance he did give the air of the sleazy journalist seeking a story in this case of Perfect Partners not coming up with the goods as their named suggests in a series of complaints from unhappy customers.
Viv Bennet played the main character of Edwina Lovelock in an excellent portrayal of the company boss trying to keep her business afloat in the face of so many failures including that of her marriage.
Her erstwhile husband Jonathan was played convincingly by Mike Davies as the erring hubby who had left the ambitious Edwina for the arms of a new lady.
Nice bit from Edwina when her voice changes as she answers the telephone, oh so common in real life of course.
Julie Kedward played the final character in the piece, that of Susan Carter
who had come along on behalf of a friend to see what the agency had to offer and of course realising what a shambles the place is and being warned off by David the reporter soon leaves.
Sadly a very small part for Julie Kedward. I have seen her in several plays and know how capable she is as an actress, still perhaps next time.
Directed by Deidre Jones, Perfect Partners was an enjoyable romp with a good 70’s set, I particularly liked the trim phone (they used to attract bats you know).
The final offering of the evening was ‘The Worst Day of My Life’ again by Alan Richardson and put on the Compton Players.
This play was set in a hospital ward, admirably furnished with a real hospital bed and trimmings. Full marks to Props and Equipment guru Ian Hickling.
Charlie Brown played is by Nick Roberts. He has convinced the nurse and us that he was a successful businessman, also his wife visitor, Joanne, who doubles as his secretary. Unfortunately for Charlie visiting times are askew and the second visitor is also his wife, Evelyn, his first wife of some 21 years. She soon finds out about Joanne and as you can imagine is not a happy bunny.
Joanne played by Brenda Prior looked the part well but her performance was let down by the number of prompts she had to receive-shame.
Evelyn on the other hand seemed much more confident but I did feel she should have been a tad more angry in discovering the shenanigans of her spouse the feckless Charlie.
Then we find that Charlie isn’t the high flying fashion designer his first wife thinks he is but in fact a vacuum cleaner salesman (nothing wrong with that mind), and his frequent absence abroad is in fact when he is shacked up with Joanne.
Then we are treated to the visitation of Melissa the third wife played by Mandy Clark, who sounded, looked and obviously loved every minute of the part and rightly so. Melissa was a self confessed ‘floosie’ and wasn’t bothered in the least that Charlie had two other wives.
The final scene where the young nurse Samantha, again well played by Naomi Read, lets slip that she and Charlie are going to be married. You can imagine the climax of the play. His wives hold down poor Charlie whilst the vengeful Samantha approaches him with a syringe the size of a small pneumatic drill. Good production, directed by Charlie East.

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