A black comedy play written and directed by talented playwright Martin Roche explores a group of retired thespians living out their days in a retirement home. Not to be confused with a care home. Independent living is the key to remaining at The Beeches or you’ll be gone by tomorrow.
PADOS [Prestwich Amateur Dramatic and Operatic Society that is!] is lucky to have this beautiful, emotional and clever play as part of its season which fitted perfectly with the intimate, bijou setting of its theatre space. Martin Roche knows the play well – as it’s from his own pen, heart and mind and craftily extracted clearly drawn characters with depth and back stories. I am sure most of his characters would be thinly guised representations of his extensive, back catalogue of on and off stage characters he knows personally or homogenous mixtures of. The play is intimate and emotional and I filled up at least three times, such was the power of some of the characters' stories. PADOS House fit the bill for a perfect viewpoint of the home’s sitting room / residents' lounge where the action took place. A beautiful set by Ian Howarth's and Cliff Burton’s experienced hands gave depth and a good use of doors and a perfectly placed window to watch the residents’ inevitable exits from. It was used beautifully throughout and became a metaphor of the world outside representing what lies behind us and what lies ahead.
The Beeches is run by the bossy, selfish, egotistical and money grabbing Julie (Chloe Whittington), who trod insensitively over everyone in her path; especially poor, pathetic husband, Tony (Keith McEvoy) but got her comeuppance in the end when she is found out and is usurped with Tony taking the helm as a much better home manager who has more care experience and a better relationship with the residents in his little finger than Julie had in her entire body. Enter Kelly, new care assistant and new to everything, straight off the dole queue and quite the individual in appearance and feisty attitude and not what the residents expect. The residents bet wagers on how long she’ll last; expedited by the cynical Colin’s nasty threat that she’d be gone within a week. They all lose of course because Kelly joins the happy band of ex-theatrical professionals and realises that there is quite a lot of life in there and strikes up warm and unlikely friendships with the gentlemen who live there and builds deep and genuine connections with them. Tara Mycock has a striking presence although being physically petite, she delivered spunky interactions which were spirited, pacey and well thought out. She gave a convincing portrayal of a newbie, outsider who become central to the resident’s daily lives and grew and changed in attitude and character. I wasn’t as convinced in the final scene of the transformation to rising theatre star but overall, she was perfect for this central character whom the plot revolves around.
The residents: Tom, played with finesse, style and so much controlled and well timed pathos by Paul Firth stole the show for me. He was excellent, his light touch and acerbic camp quips were perfection whilst his tender, soft and measured tragic moments revealed a man very much in touch with his own reality. His hilarious eulogy after Alan’s passing was top drawer despite the darker setting. He very much reminded me of a hybrid Alan Rickman meets Paul O’Grady (but not Lilly Savage). His foil was the poor and tortured Alan (Jon Comyn-Platt) whose painful demise into dementia, incontinence and all things degrading was beautifully acted. I sobbed at his frustrated phone call asking directory enquiries for the telephone number of his family but he couldn’t remember their names. He had a haunted, hollow face which reminded me so much of the cruel journey dementia takes its victims on as it takes away their memory and soul. Don (Peter Haslam) gave his usual warm, confident and competent portrayal of the only straight resident. A widow with an almost estranged daughter and money hungry son-in-law who never came to visit. I felt he got dressed up every single day waiting for them. He was so genuine and real and I had a lump in my throat when he told Kelly he wished he’d had a daughter like her. Such realness. The baddie of the piece is cynical, bitter and twisted Colin, who has theatrical history with everyone but sits on the periphery of the group with an air of superiority being borderline malicious, and yet he is in fact the most vulnerable and fragile member who has the most to gain from genuine connection. Stephen Moss had the hard and sharp elements of the character spot on. His demise in the final scene felt a little overly drawn out. But, that might be a comment on the final scene which felt unnecessary. I would have liked to have been kept hanging with what happened after the funeral and left to draw my own conclusions. Mark Rosenthal’s natural and skilful comic timing and physicality was exploited to its full potential as he played the stone deaf handyman Gordon. He is funny to watch and a very experienced performer who knew exactly how to extract the humour. His scene at the post funeral buffet where he licked the glass before giving it to the will-digging daughter was hysterical. Don’s daughter, played by Andrea Berger, was just the right measure of nasty to make us dislike her on sight and the audience felt not sympathy for her or her equally nasty piece of work husband, played by Rob Butler. The cast were all great fits for their parts and had been excellently directed.
The strength of this play for me was its sharp, pacey narrative, its massive use and interweaving of theatrical talk, play prose, quotes, tips of the hat to theatre and the use of music to demarcate individual stories. Roche’s play has this in abundance and must have been a joy to perform for the small and well chosen cast who understood the piece and were each given moments or monologues to really expose their story and soul to the audience. I thought it was beautiful. I laughed and cried (a little) and that’s what good theatre is supposed to do isn’t it? Talk to your soul.
A really lovely play from Martin Roche, performed very well by the talented and accomplished troupe of players at PADOS. I believe there are still a few tickets available and it runs until Saturday. A great night out but a hankie is advisable.
Reviewer - Kathryn Gorton
on - 20.6.23
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