THEATRE REVIEW: Harriet, Harry, And The Pirates - Parr Fold Park, Walkden.

Presented as part of this year's Greater Manchester Fringe Theatre Festival, local up-coming comedy theatre company, 'Death By Pie' gave us their latest tale, written by company founding member, Nathan Smith. 'Harriet, Harry And The Pirates' lampoons the swashbuckling genre, and is a family show, intended primarily for preteen children.

In all fairness, the show would have been much more successful inside a theatre. This afternoon's presentation on the bandstand of Walkden's Parr Fold Park was less so. The company, despite apologising for the lack of amplification, really needed some for this venue. The shell-shaped dome of the bandstand acted as a vocal resonator and if the actor was at the right spot on the bandstand, their voice carried superbly. However, it seemed the closer they came to the edge of their 'stage' the less audible they were. This meant that voices kept going in and out, and even with the greatest of vocal projectors (Nathan Smith - whose sonorous tones seem to know no limits), this was still quite obvious.

A second thing which didn't really help was the location of the venue itself. There were sadly far too many other distractions this afternoon. A very squeaky set of exercise machines close by, barking dogs, and low flying light aircraft, to name but a few, made concentrating on the play a little difficult.

Yes, the play would have worked much better in a conventional theatre. These distractions would then have been non-exisistent, and we would have been able to hear and understand the story. For an outdoor show, where the target audience is preteen children, the story was too long, and did not inspire enough. Despite being interspersed with original songs, they were not upbeat enough or had enough movement in them to really engage their audience fully, and using accoustic instruments without amplification meant they were also too quiet. It took until the act 1 finale song before the children really started to engage. 

The jokes, the gags, the props, in fact the whole play itself, was actually very funny, well written and enjoyable.... for me! I am in my fifties, and left my childhood behind many decades' ago! For contemporary children, the play was perhaps a little too staid and conventional, and most certainly it had too many non-contemporaneous references which would not have been understood by their parents let alone the children themselves. I might mention just two: The Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer cinematic opening to the show, and the Blankety Blank mickey-take, 'Plankety Plank'. As clever and as funny as these things were, they would simply have gone over the children's heads.

The silly puns and Milliganesque humour - "take the wheel" eg - would have garnered huge laughs if the children had heard the lines and seen the following actions. Sadly most of them were completely missed.

The cast of 6 (playing many roles between them), all gave their all to the play. Their energy and commitment to this endeavour was most laudable. Their characters and characterisations all good, their interaction with the children, superb; but the show dragged (at 2 hours including interval), and was very short on physicality and action. The sword fight woke the children up, and the "Really / Willy" joke made them laugh. But it was difficult to keep track of the story, and I don't think any of the youngsters in this afternoon's audience would have been able to do so completely either. 

A worthy endeavour, well acted and presented. Just not ideal as an outdoor show unfortunately. 

Reviewer - Matthew Dougall

on - 4.9.21