****
Double Double,
Wheathampstead Dramatic Society
February 2015
You
have to hand it to the Wheathampstead Players. I have no idea what it is you
have to hand to them, stamina pills might not be far off the mark, but hand it
to them you do. They have serious form in two-handers. The commendable Educating Rita recently gave us a pair
of actors doing their own version of a Mo Farrar theatrical marathon and in Double Double Jonathan Field and Irene
Morris threw their own particular hats into this difficult staging ring. I take
my own hat off to them, and if I had two then both would be doffed. Not because
I thought the production of this entertaining play from Eric Elice and Roger
Rees was perfect, far from it in a script lacking an all consuming style, but
because the two actors were pleasingly skilful and eminently watchable. And
that ain’t easy when, read the cast programme, they are completely on their
own. You hear about a variety of offstage characters but none are destined to
appear. No light relief from a comic maid or a sinister lawyer here. Field and
Morris is all you are going to get for your eight quid.
Before
I get bogged down in what passes for a review let’s give you a smidgeon of the
plot. It helps you know. Well heeled Phillipa James needs a man to pose as her
dead husband so she can inherit a lucrative trust on what would have been the
fiftieth birthday of the late and not so lamented spouse. She finds one, a dead
ringer for her old man, in a wandering hobo with the look of a Russian peasant
and the thick sound of haggis and whisky. Cue a bit of Pygmalion trickery and
bob’s your uncle. Yes, I know, it stretched my credibility as well. Not that it
matters. Underpin with the complexity of Anthony Shaeffer’s Sleuth or the sexual ambiguity of Pinter
and Double Double would pay rich
dividends. But the Elice and Rees play never threatens those theatrical
heights, sexual play is neither gripping nor ambiguous and delicious plot
twists are limited to the surprising, and pleasing, end. It was all a husband
and wife insurance scam after all. And if that spoils it for any lazy folks who
have yet to see it I apologise, but three night runs of an old chestnut allow
such an indulgence . It was clever in its denouement, but not enough on its own
to prop up a piece rich in theatrical possibilities but pretty ordinary in
exposition.
In
the final analysis it all comes down to the respective merits of the
protagonists. After all, they didn’t write the script they merely played with
the words. And here Jonathan Field as the cultured hobo Duncan McFee and Irene
Morris as the pseudo rich Phillipa James did sterling jobs. Mr Field never put
a foot wrong in a first class portrayal of a man seemingly out of his depth and
out of his league and Miss Morris, diction as clear as always, created a woman
whose motives and emotions were never truly revealed. Both actors had great fun
in reprises of rehearsed shenanigans, upper class husband home from the office,
and if I level a semblance of criticism at director Julie Field it is in regard
to the underplaying of sexual chemistry and not persuading the admirable Miss
Morris to occasionally drop her guard. I reckon I wanted a touch more
vulnerability from a woman who was, as eventually revealed, playing a pretty
dangerous game.
But
not for the first time that is me being picky folks. You don’t get meaningless
pats on the head on these blogs. In depth incisive theatrical points just flow.
Or some other such rubbish. And, amongst all this rubbish, can I say that for
whatever the play’s faults it was a pretty good evening. I spent all of the
interval working out a variety of impossible scenarios. And my companions did
the same. And we went home chatting about it and, not for the first time,
saying that in Irene Morris and Jonathan Field the Wheathampstead Players have
two bloody good actors. Word perfect, good pace, nicely choreographed. Two
actors, double double, and oodles of stamina pills. They were both in the bar
afterwards. I am not surprised. Roy Hall
