REVIEW: Funny Money - The Lowry Theatre, Salford.

When I saw that Ray Cooney’s classic farce Funny Money was being put on at The Lowry, I jumped at the chance to see it.  Cooney is probably best known for Run For Your Wife, but Funny Money had a two year run in London’s West End and was made into a film in 2006 starring Chevy Chase.

The plot revolves around Henry Perkins (Eric Atkinson), a middle aged accountant who inadvertently picked up a suitcase on his journey home that contains £735,000.  The play opens with Perkins’ wife Jean (Mary Appleton) tidying the house and wondering where her husband is – and when he eventually arrived he is clearly drunk and is dancing around the living room clutching the briefcase.

Jean Perkins was more concerned by the arrangements for her husband’s birthday dinner where she is expecting friends Vic Johnson (David Milne) and Betty Johnson (Elly Hayton) to arrive at any moment.  Henry promptly tells Jean to pack her bags as they are leaving for Barcelona immediately on one-way tickets.

This production of Funny Money was put together by the Barton Theatre Company, a local amateur company based in Eccles.  The set was very simple but a very detailed living room at the Perkins’ house – my only criticism was that after spending such a large amount of time on the detail of the set the actors still had to pretend to open the front door.  This seemed a very simple addition that would have had a big impact.

Sadly for the Barton Theatre Company, the set was just about the only thing I can have any praise for in this production.  Funny Money is a farce in the theatrical sense of the word but this production was a farce in every other sense of the word.  This became evident very early in the play when Atkinson arrived into a scene several minutes earlier than he was supposed to – something that was not very well disguised by any of the actors – but this was simply the beginning.

Actors missed cues all the way through the play – sometimes being several minutes late and others arriving into scenes they were not even in.  They also forgot their lines, which can be excused on opening night, but this was consistent throughout the play.  It was very clear as the first act came to a close that things were not going well – to the point where David Milne addressed the audience to confess this fact, something that none of us needed to be told.

Returning for the second half, it was very clear that some people had not returned after the interval – probably a third of the audience were missing.  Sadly for those that stayed, the second half was not much better than the first.

There were yet more missed cues and forgotten lines, something which the cast were becoming more and more aware of as time went on.  Actors were leaving scenes through a variety of exits and entering back through different areas – the audience was also able to see actors walking around the back of the scenery shortly after their exit.  This drew more laughter from those remaining than anything in the play.

It’s very hard to find positives to say about this production of Funny Money but I do hope that the opening night issues do get resolved in time for the later performances.  The play deserves so much more, as do those paying to be entertained.

Reviewer – John Fish

on  – 9/9/18