Alice Through The Looking Glass

Theatre Royal Bath’s Egg Studio Theatre, Sunday 12 December 2010

Review by Emma Shane

© December 2010

A long way from the special effects of a Poole pantomime, or the glitz and glamour of White Christmas in Manchester. This production of Lewis Carroll’s second Alice novel has a cast of six, meaning that with the exception of Alice, the actors all have to tackle multiple roles, including being an ensemble when required, this necessitates numerous costume changes. The production also has a band of two, and a variety of props, some of which clearly have to be very much ‘Poor Theatre’ representations of items.

The uninhabited stage at the opening of the show, includes a mirror on a stand positioned centre stage, the ‘looking glass’ in the story. Front stage left is a chess board, with a few pieces on it. The band take up their positions, in the auditorium, at the side to the right of stage right. The lights dim, the music starts. Two actresses, dressed in black skirts, one with a red top and white hat, and one with a white top and red hat take up positions sprawled on the floor of the stage by the chessboard. Their hair is tucked up tightly under their hats. Both wear black and white stripy tights, and black jazz shoes on their feet. These two ladies are Alice’s elder sisters, Isabella and Isadora, played by Sorcha Finch-Murray, and, Louise Plowright respectively. Presently Alice, played by Alexis Terry enters, she is noticeably a good deal shorter than the other two. She is dressed in a Royal Blue frock, which comes not quite to her knees, I actually thought it looked a little short for the period. She has no pinafore, and her cropped black hair (which could be her own, or a wig, hard to tell) is too short to effectively tie it back, nor does she wear any hair-band or slide on it. She is also wearing and black and white stripy petticoat, pale grey tights (which show the dirt) and grubby white jazz shoes (well they certainly became grubby during the course of the show).

Alice wants to play make believe games, but her elder sisters are busy playing chess, which they say she is too young to play, and they tease the little girl, who promptly has a hissy fit. I must say I felt that Alexis’s shouting, screaming and lying on the floor of the stage kicking was rather over the top. I don’t recall Alice as being quite such a contrary character in the books. The elder sisters exit, taking their chess board with them, meanwhile Alice, clambers up the steps to the mirror, stares at it. She turns to the audience to deliver some lines about how sometimes if you look carefully into the corners of mirrors you see things other than the exact mirror image, she also mentions that she has heard of people getting stuck in mirrors (or is that just her imagination) and then of course she climbs through the mirror. The mirror swings round in its glass to allow her to climb through. Presently a net curtain which has been stretched over half the stage is raised, so that we can now see the back half of the stage, where Alice is. The backdrop at the very back of the stage currently shows an image of empty theatre seats. Alice picks up a book, and reads aloud from it, but it makes little sense. She then takes it up to the mirror and reads the mirror version, it is the first verse of the classic poem The Jabberwocky, which she says still doesn’t make much sense. There is a chessboard still out on this back part of the stage. Alice picks up two of the pieces (the white king and the white queen), and walks off stage with them. She returns with two larger chess pieces, walks off stage again, and returns along with the actors Paul Mundell and Kate Copeland playing The White King and White Queen respectively. Both are wearing long white coats and appropriate head-gear. They are complaining that someone has “picked them up”. it takes them a little while to discover Alice, and despite her protestations “I’m a little girl”, they decide she is a tree and throw her out into the garden.

A quick bit of scene changing, we are now in a garden, Kate Copeland having now shed her coat, and changed her head-gear to that of a daisy flower, pushes on a green barrow. Which three other actors, John Biddle as Shrinking Violet, Sorcha Finch-Murray as Rose, and Paul Mundell as Tiger Lilly are positioned behind. These four actors are all dressed in green garments, sort of like combinations or union suits or long leotards or some such. Each has a headdress of the flower they are meant to be, and each carries in their hands a large prop leaf. All wear grey stripy tights and black jazz shoes. The other three flowers think Daisy is something of a weed because she is always popping up where she isn’t supposed to be. Daisy is annoyed by this and protests that she is not a weed she is a flower. The flowers also think Alice is a weed. The four flowers, or rather three flowers and Daisy sing a song about this. During the song the one person who stands out the most is Kate Copeland as Daisy. The sound of something springing and landing heavily is heard in the garden, the flowers become nervous and warn Alice “Don’t let her find you”. Her refers to The Red Queen, who is always running about, no not running jumping. Presently Kate wheels the barrow off stage and all four exit. Just as they do so, Louise Plowright makes a striking entrance, jumping onto the stage from the wings, or maybe stepping onto the stage and then jumping. She is wearing a long red coat, which has a black and white lining. On her head is a bright red wig, and on top of that a crown. Her own blond tresses are well tucked up under her wig, such that we can’t see it, yet does one detect just a hint of a glimmer of them? Like the others she too is wearing grey and black stripy tights and black jazz shows. Though her dress is long, and appears to have some kind of a bustle to it, when she jumps we can tell she is landing with knees well bent, and stays in that position for several moments while talking, or before jumping again. She is a commanding character. Somewhat similar in accent and manner to The Queen in The Poole Lighthouse’s 2005 production of Beauty And The Beast. The only difference being that The Red Queen is not an out and out wicked character. She may not be a particularly nice one, but she is not one of those monstrous woman (such as Chitty Chitty Bang Bang’s Baroness Bomeburst) that certain actresses seem to have a tendency to end up playing. In a way she’s more one of those Super-Bitch characters, which Louise happens to be very good at playing. This is the actress after all who originated the role of Tanya in Mamma Mia. Anyway it’s a great part for Louise, one that fully utilises her excellent stage presence, and the role seems to suit her, as she barks instructions to Alice to “Curtsy” and “open your mouth wider when you speak”. She combines this with instructions in running, and how to jump brooks. Alice very much wants to try being a pawn, and she agrees Alice can be one, and tells her all about the squares she will have to progress through, and what she will find there. Presently she has to run off. But at this the actress drops to the floor sideways towards one of the wings, falling with her legs up in the air. Alice remarks on her still being there, at which the Red Queen protests she is not, and that she ran very fast and disappeared, and with that she crawls backwards (on her back) into the wings, (exiting stage right). It is one of the very few moments in this show when the fourth wall is broken, and the only such moment that is really noticeable. Swiftly the other four actors enter, three of them (John Biddle, Kate Copeland, and, Sorcha Finch-Murray) are dressed almost alike in white shirts, and baggy black knickerbockers On their heads they wear hats that denote them to be pawns, two are white and one red, hair hidden under the hats. They carry black and white umbrellas. All are wearing black and grey stripy tights and black jazz shows. One other actor, I think it was Paul Mundell, was dressed similarly, but wearing a Red tailcoat, and I’m not sure if he was wearing a hat at all, or a different sort of hat, denoting him to be the train conductor. The four lift Alice up and carry her, then putting her down take their positions, they have now been joined by another player, as Louise Plowright has slunk subtly onto the stage in the middle of all this action. She has now shed her red coat and wig, and is dressed like the other three ensemble players as a pawn, wearing a red hat. They all sing and dance a song about travelling, and the dance routine is a typical stage musical representation of travelling by railway train, the ensemble twirling their black and white umbrellas to represent the wheels of the train. Amusingly in the middle of the song the conductor says “I’ve just realised you pawns are going the wrong way”, at which the dance routine has them all turn around and then continue the number. It is a good performance from the ensemble as a whole, and the only time in the show where Louise Plowright merges completely into the ensemble, such that if it were not for this being fringe theatre with the audience very close up, one might not have actually noticed her among them. I’ve only seen her contrive to merge so completely into an ensemble twice before. The first time I saw Mamma Mia she was somewhere in the Act 1 finale but I didn’t notice her (though that was probably because I was paying rather more attention to the cavorting of one of her Dynamos). The second time was the number The Future Is Bright in Bad Girls The Musical (But that was on the West Yorkshire Playhouse’s big stage). Today in Alice Through The Looking Glass it is much more down to Louise Plowright’s ability to fine tune her performance to give just the right amount of stage presence.

Once off the train, Alice is wandering through the wind, when she meets The White Queen, played jolly well by Kate Copeland. Her vale is all twisted up by the wind, so Alice, just like in the book helps her to fasten it properly. They discuss poetry, which results in The White Queen reciting The Jabbawocky. She then screams, because she’s about to prick her finger. Now Kate has to deliver rather a memorable and famous speech about living backwards, and having a memory that works both ways. This may be complete nonsense, but it is clearly some sort of product of Lewis Carroll’s mathematical background. Some mathematicians turned authors may be like that.

Wandering through the woods, and getting a little lost trying to find the next brook, Alice encounters Tweedle Dum and Tweedle Dee, played by Louise Plowright and John Biddle respectively. John Biddle seems to be about the same height as Louise, who’s 5ft10”. Dressed in orange wigs, black and white striped overalls, with ridiculously large white ties with red spots, and black tailcoats, they look sufficiently similar to be convincing. Both speak with accents that sound like English public school boys. Well actually Louise’s sounds a bit like the accent Joanna Lumley used in Absolutely Fabulous. Louise is usually positioned to stage right and John to stage left. The pair introduce themselves to Alice and the audience with the rhyme about them. However, they aren’t much help to Alice in trying to find the brook, as they keep contradicting each other by pointing in apposite directions. There is a brief interlude when the Red King passes by sleep walking, and the pair explain to Alice the bit about how she will disappear if the Red King wakes because she only exists in his dreams. Just when all this nonsense is beginning to get a little tedious, a diversion is provided by something being winched down noisily on a pulley near the front of the stage over on stage right. This is of course Tweedle Dum’s rattle, which Tweedle Dum then complains about Tweedle Dee having spoilt. It would be so easy for Tweedle Dum to ham this up and make it too over the top, but Louise displays masterful restraint in acting convincingly and not going too far. And its a very good thing she does so, because had she not done the character would have become pathetic (and characters which are pathetic do not suit Louise Plowright’s acting talents). We are fortunate that she plays the part with sensible restraint. Meanwhile John Biddle’s Tweedle Dee is trying to hide behind a large black umbrella with red spots. The “battle” which follows however, is a piece of nonsense, where the actors can get away with hamming it up, and they do. Both disappear into the wings, with Alice going back and forth carrying some strange items. They reappear attire for their “battle”. Both wear hats that look like colanders with whisks stuck into them. Both have a large yellow cushion with white tassels tied around their middles at the front. Both have red and white checked cloaks pinned to their shoulders, each cloak has a white label in the middle of it, one saying “Dum” and the other “Dee”. The “Battle” involves a small amount of mock fighting, of the wrestling variety. One presumes that the ‘Movement Consultant’ Aidan Treays would have been responsible for choreographing that, though one can’t be sure. The battle then degenerates into complete nonsense, with Tweedle Dum adding a bogey contest. Louise’s facial expression of horror conveys Tweedle Dee’s reaction to this perfectly, and then Tweedle Dum elects to counter it by introducing farting to the proceedings. A very silly battle indeed. Which finally comes to the end because they hear the sound of something, possibly a Jabberwocky, approaching. All three flee the stage, and there are some visual effects on a screen at the back, which are clearly meant to symbolise an approaching Jabberwocky. At which point the stage suddenly goes dark, the house lights come up, and it is the interval.

Act 2 opens with some black and white pretend waves (made or material or cardboard, it’s hard to tell), being rippled up and down. Presently a cut-out of a boat on a stick near the back of the stage is moved across the stage from stage left to stage right. Then in a middle of the stage a bigger cut out of a boat is moved the opposite way. Finally near the front of the stage a model of a boat, just large enough for a person to be inside, and we have Louise Plowright as The Red Queen disguised as a sheep inside it. The boat, later turns out to be on top of a frame on wheels, and Louise (standing in the middle of the frame) is pushing it along. The bow of the boat is pointing to stage right. Across the bow is draped some knitting, which will evidentially eventually become a black and white stripy scarf, I think in plain garter stitch. Although she never actually picked up the knitting, the presence of it could hardly help but remind me of a certain production of Das Reingold, when Fricka kept carrying her knitting around the ROH’s stage. Well given the sororial similarity, it isn’t perhaps too surprising, and anyway it’s one of very few occasions I can recall seeing knitting around on stage in a production. Louise opens the act singing very sweetly, when she chooses to use it that way she has quite silky voice, if using more received pronunciation than her natural accent, which she wraps around some nonsense song about being in a boat away from it all. It’s a nice song, though for the second verse Louise changes accent somewhat into her natural northern tones, perhaps to bring more power to the number, at any rate it becomes distinctively dark, not exactly harsh, but decidedly not received pronunciation. Did she mean to change accent? or did she slide out of accent inadvertently? I couldn’t be sure. Either way it did not harm the song. She’s too good a singer, skilled at getting a song across, for it to be harmed by anything like that. Anyway it is a treat to hear Louise singing so magnificently. Almost as magnificently as her memorable rendition of The Winner Takes It All. This song clearly suits her talents pretty well. In the middle of all of this Alice turns up, in the river, and manages to persuade the reluctant Red Queen to let her come into the boat. Alice realises it is The Red Queen disguised as a sheep, though the Red Queen keeps insisting to Alice that she is not a Queen. In fact she is a shop keeper. At this the cloth representing the river falls away, to reveal the boat being on a frame on wheels. Louise parks the boat in a corner, front stage right, and deftly flicks over the port side of the boat (that being the side facing the audience). In the book it was actually The White Queen who was the sheep knitting in the shop, but for this production who better than Louise Plowright, of all people, to play a singing shop keeper! How deliciously she asks Alice “Are you going to buy something?” Alice eventually agrees, since the shop keeper evidently won’t answer her request for directions unless she does. Three other members of the company now perform the roles of talking bone china mugs, near the back of the stage the Mugs are card-board with holes cut for the performer’s heads. The merchandise seem to be rather upset by Alice attempting to handle them. This gives Louise another acid line to deliver deliciously “You’re upsetting the merchandise”. The mugs start singing about it, and themselves. Though the song has nonsense lyrics, it has a lovely jazz-inspired tune, which Louise ever alert can’t help reacting to, even though for the first verse or so it is only the mugs who are actually singing. It is our intriguing Shop Keeper who nearly steels the scene moving rhythmically to the music. About halfway through the song, it is her turn. She strides purposefully to centre stage and sings. While she does so, she moves her arms in a manner which reminded me very much of characteristic moves Donna And The Dynamos in the finale reprise of Dancing Queen at the end of the musical Mamma Mia., well just a bit similar. The lyrics to this song may make no sense whatsoever, but musically the song is just absolutely perfect for Louise Plowright’s lovely voice, the kind of big loud jazz number she can give us a real tour de force with. Terrific, and rather a showstopper. Eventually, towards the end of the song the mugs all disappear, ducking down out of site, so Alice buys the only thing she can find to buy, an egg, and getting her answer from our rather amusing shop-keeper heads off.

I think it was after this that Alice was nearly captured by the Red Knight, played by John Biddle, who didn’t make much impact. She is rescued by the White Knight played by Paul Mundell. The two knights are rather impressive. Both actors wear or carry cardboard cut outs of horses. Each is equipped with a pole (like a merry-go-round) which can be removed to become their lances. Once the Red Knight retires, Alice and the White Knight continue together. There is something quite touching about Paul Mundell’s White Knight, with his upside down box, his helmet, and his tendency to fall off his horse while trying to jump a brook. Eventually Alice decides it is preferable to manage alone, rather than with the accident prone knight, and he rides off.

Then something mysterious starts happening to the egg, it seems to be taking, about wanting to be put down. So Alice places it on a long handled pan, this is withdrawn by a scene shifter, and soon another larger long handled pan appears, with a rather larger egg. That disappears, and presently someone wheels on the green barrow, which now has a large board fastened to it, depicting Humpty Dumpty sitting on a wall. A flap near the top of the board opens, and John Biddle pokes his head through it, complaining “You bought me and I wasn’t even for sale”. Shortly after beginning a discussion about poetry, he comes out from behind the board, opens a cupboard in the board and picks up a ukulele, yes he actually is both an actor and musician, and would probably fit in well with some of those actor-musician productions that seem to have come into fashion. Armed with his ukulele he recites or rather performed The Walrus and The Carpenter. Meanwhile the cupboard has transformed into a little puppet-theatre, and various puppets of the Walrus, the Carpenter, the oysters etc performed by the rest of The Company out of sight behind the board and underneath the barrow illustrate the poem. They did a reasonable job, bearing in mind that all of them are actors, and ones who judging by their resumes in the programme would not usually be trying their hands at this. John Biddle performed the poem pretty well. Although, unfortunately for him, no performance of this poem can quite match the one done as an audio show-reel by one of voice-over agency Lip Service’s artistes (a notable British puppeteer). However, for the purposes of this production of Alice Through The Looking Glass John Biddle’s performance, and that of the rest of the company was perfectly satisfactory. At the end of the recital Alice has a few, rather silly lines about how she doesn’t like any of the characters, and then with a swift bit of special effects, Humpty Dumpty appears to fall off his wall, or rather the door swings open again and a large amount of yellow material flies out, clearly mean to be the yoke of an egg. Presently The White King (played by Paul Mundell) wanders onto the scene, and seeing what has happened summons his men, but only four of them turn up. This finds the other four members of The Company now dressed as The Kings Men. Besides their standard grey and black striped tights and black jazz shoes, all wear black and white checked skirts reaching nearly to their knees, with white jackets buttoned over these, and on their heads black hats that look almost like bearskin hats. At first when they march on the four seem to be all equals. The White King enquires as to where the rest of his men are, and one of the girls, I think it was Kate Copeland who replied “Knight School”. Yet there was also around this time some lines that Louise Plowright muttered in what seemed, for her, a surprisingly hesitant manner. A short while later it was Louise who took charge and dominated the scene, as she handed out miniature frying pans to the other three, and led them in a very funny, rather well sung song about cooking eggs, which seemed to involve a catchphrase of “Omelette”. By now the stage warrioress seemed to be a kind of leader among the quartet of ‘Kings Men’, perhaps some kind of Sergeant, which had not been apparent earlier in the scene. On reflection, I wonder if perhaps there may have been something not quite up to standard with the beginning of this scene, perhaps a forgotten line or something? If it was a forgotten line it was well covered, but there just seems to have been something very slightly, ever so slightly odd about the beginning of that scene. Having finished their song, the King’s Men troop off stage. The White King explains that Humpty Dumpty “will be back up there in a day or two” and then adds “I just wish they wouldn’t try to cook him in between times.” The White King then appears to become slightly giddy, in need of a ham sandwich. Alice searches in her pockets (as commanded) and magically finds one, which The White King promptly eats, and then she finds a second and a third. I thought it a bit odd that the sandwiches were wrapped in cling film. Surely greaseproof paper would have been more suitable, given the time-period. After all cling film was not invented until the 1950s.

Alice, alone again, finally crosses the last brook, and finds herself in the eighth square. A sort of queen at last. She is understandably rather pleased with herself, and sings about this. In the middle of this that useful wire over to front stage right, drops down a crown made of some blue fabric, which Alice puts on. The only problem is that for sometime now she has been unable to remember her name. This scene takes up only the front half of the stage. Alice arrives at a building where a party for the new queen is being held, we and she can see this behind the mesh curtain separating the front and back halves of the stage. The Red Queen and The White Queen are both seated at a banqueting table. Barring Alice’s way is a doorman, played by Paul Mundell, a complete contrast to his White King. He says that first any new queen has to take an exam. He proceeds to ask her various questions, particularly on arithmetic, most of which are either such nonsense pieces or logic, or asked so fast it is hardly surprising she can’t answer any of them, and therefore can’t gain admittance. Eventually, however, Alice manages to distract the doorman, by pointing somewhere else and saying “Oh look some is trying to get in”, and when he leaves his post to investigate she gets in. The two queens welcome her quite cheerily, telling her she has missed the soup. She is however just in time to be introduced to a leg of mutton. The Door Keeper is now a waiter, who brings on a covered dish (with a hole in the bottom of the tray), and places this strategically on the table. John Biddle, out of sight under the table, wearing an appropriate headdress sticks head through the hole, so that his face looks like a talking leg of mutton on a plate. He tells his rather gruesome tale. Then Alice asks the queens if they would like a slice, but they inform her “It is bad manners to eat food you have just been introduced to”, while the horrified leg of mutton (which is all that is left of whatever he once was) is carried away. The waiter then brings on a pudding, sort of like a Christmas pudding. This is similarly a covered tray with a hole in it, and once again John Biddle with a suitable headdress. This time he sings a song about what a sad food item he is drenched in custard, which appears to move Alice and the two queens to tears. Well it moves the two queens. Alice is rather more concerned about the fact that if they keep introducing her to the food none of them will get anything to eat. Alice is then called upon to make a speech, during which the two queens position themselves either side of her to “support” her. They try to lift her higher, then quash her lower, when she complains about not needing to be supported. Just as she starts making her speech she remembers her name, and says it “Queen Alice”. The other two are surprised “she knows who she is” and accuse each other of having told her, which they haven’t. At this point Louise is bringing some of the deliciously wicked characterisations she used for her wicked sorceress and wicked queen in the Poole pantomimes. Everything gets very confused, with bits of set and people moving about, and paper being dropped from the ceiling into the auditorium, this turns out to be representing falling snow. Eventually we find the set is now the original opening one. Alice is lying on the floor of the stage, slightly towards stage left. Entering from stage right come her two sisters, Isabella and Isadora, looking for her. The find her lying unconscious out in the garden. They are concerned. It is Isadora (played by Louise Plowright), the warmer, more gentler, and perhaps more mature of the two who seems the most concerned. She blames herself and Isabella for teasing Alice. She kneels by the younger girl, and holds her in her arms until she comes round, telling Alice gently “What a fright you gave us”. She also tells Alice they will go into the house “and play any game you like”, a proposition which Isabelle seems rather less keen on. With that the play ends, and it only remains for all six of the cast to come on and take their bows.

I very much enjoyed the fact that the set and props were inventive rather than fantastical, the sort that stretch the actors to stretch the audience’s imaginations. Throughout the piece the two man band of Rob Hiley not only on piano but also on percussion, and Rob Phelan on double bass, provided good fringe-theatre accompaniment. Paul Dodgson’s music and lyrics, while generally not at all catchy, is nevertheless pleasant to hear. It is a perfectly enjoyable score. The omelette song stood out to some extent, while the only other two really memorable songs where the Red Queen’s numbers in the boat and then the merchandise and the Red Queen in the shop. The latter was a lovely jazz style piece that seemed to suit Louise Plowright’s singing talents rather well.

The cast of six make a tight ensemble, with five of them proving to be extremely versatile, as they have to play so many different parts, often with little time to change between parts. Alice, as portrayed by Alexis Terry seems more like Mary Lennox in Francis Hodgson Burnett’s The Secret Garden, or for that matter one of Noel Stretfeild’s heroines (such as Jane Winter, or, Nicky Robinson) than the way I remember Alice from Lewis Carroll’s books. I actually found her quite irritating in places, which is a bit awkward given that she is the title role. Meanwhile Sorch Finch-Murray is the least notable performer in the show. She is perhaps at her best as the Rose, but for the most part during the show she is largely overshadowed by Louise Plowright and Kate Copland, and perhaps that is just as well. Actor and musician John Biddle is accomplished in a number of roles, but comes into his own as Humpty Dumpty. Paul Mundell displays considerable versatility and adaptability, making the most of several roles: The White King, The White Knight, and the Door. He is also pretty charismatic as the Tiger Lilly. He is one of two Bristol Old Vic trained actors to deliver the goods in this production. Meanwhile Guildhall trained Kate Copeland, manages to be an engaging Daisy, and a rather likeable White Queen too. One can’t help warming to her. She seems to know exactly what she is doing and does it jolly well. During the penultimate scene she even manages to stand up well to Louise Plowright’s stage presence, such that the pair make a sort of double act, dominating the stage between them. Louise Plowright is always at her best when she has artistes of her own high calibre to play off. This production gives her Kate Copeland and Paul Mundell to spark off. While this does not serve her as well as getting say the likes of Tim Flavin, Julian Forsyth, Louise Gold, Leila Ben Harris, David Henry, or Laura Pitt Pulford, nevertheless they are entirely satisfactory, and her part is itself a good fit for her talents. The Red Queen comes across as rather a starring role, possibly even the star of the show, and it is a super role for her. She is particularly strikingly good with the Act 2 opening, the Red-Queen-Disguised-as-a-sheep in a ship-turned-shop. She also proves to be considerably more versatile than I realised, with several of the bit parts, notably as Alice’s sister Isadora, and then as one of the King’s Men. In both instances she again dominates a good deal of the scene, being a considerable part of carrying those scenes. I had never seen her in a fringe theatre situation before, and it is a joy to see that while she is very capable of leading a company in a big musical (such as heading the West End cast of Mamma Mia), her acting skills translate perfectly well into the smaller more intimate venue of fringe theatre. She is one of those performers who always seems to alert , and does not let a performance go stale (even on the big stages), here in a smaller venue it is easier to pick up the subtleties of her acting skills. In many ways fringe it turns out is a good match for her talents. Though she is very good in big musicals too.

Bath’s Egg Theatre has got itself a winner her, at least I think so, the audience seemed to be having a good time, and the cast certainly gave a good value performance. Really excellent fringe theatre, on a par with The Orange Tree (Greater London’s excellent pocket National Theatre), well with performers like some of the ones we had this afternoon around, very possibly.

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