See How They Run Theatre Review

See How They Run Theatre Review

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Posted 2016-02-07 by Douglas Sutherland-Brucefollow
If you go to a play and the Bishop has lost his trousers, the Village Virgin is drunk, someone's drunk, a passing stranger has been mistaken for the Governor of New South Wales and everyone is hiding from everyone else through slamming doors it's probably an English farce.

Garrick Theatre's latest offering is See How They Run by renowned farceur Philip King. Almost certainly his best-known play, King wrote a number of plays all while acting until nearly his death in 1979.

See How They Run (from Three Little Mice) was written in 1944 during the Second World war as an antidote to the doom and gloom of the times. The opening night in 1945 was even interrupted by three doodlebugs landing nearby, although in true theatrical fashion, the show went on.



The play is very much of it's time, the dialogue and plot lines firmly set in wartime. The vicar's wife is castigated for wearing trousers in public and waving at soldiers, alcohol is in short supply, there are German Prisoners of War and everyone sounds like Noel Coward.

Garrick's production, directed by the highly experienced Lynn Devenish is true to the original, although a note about the time and setting of the play in the programme would have been useful for younger audience members (one young lass in front of me asked her boyfriend in a loud whisper 'For God's sake, why can't she wear trousers?')

In farce, timing is everything, and every character should be played entirely straight. Mugging and playing for laughs or pauses in the pace destroys the gossamer fragile creation that is English farce.

Devenish has a cast of mixed experience although they worked hard together. The vicar's wife was played by the delectable Jennifer Bowman; the Village Prude, Miss Skillen, by Marsha Holt; Timothy Present made a lovely Corporal Winton John Lobb a suitably po-faced Bishop of Lax.
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See How They Run%% runs until the 13th February at the Garrick Theatre, 13 Meadow Street, Guildford. Tickets cost $20 ($17 concession) and can be obtained by ringing 9378 1990 or emailing [email protected].



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211755 - 2023-06-16 06:39:26

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