Roast beef reviewed

Two hundred and thirty odd years ago, Oliver Goldsmith, seen here worrying about his receeding hairline, wrote She Stoops to Conquer and we went to see it at the Royal Exchange on Thursday night. It was advertised as a "rare roast beef of a comedy". It was okay.

Mmm. Yes, only okay. The acting was patchy - I found that the character Kate didn't so much stoop as hobble or hop about to conquer (as though her shoes were pinching her) and she had definitely been to the non-verbal expresssion school of acting as she pulled exaggerated faces at every opportunity. Others, especially Mrs Hardcastle, were far more up to the task however and there was much to laugh out loud at, particularly in the second half. Overall, we felt that it was a pretty unimaginative production and, of those we have seen this year (I've seen four, Chris three), it was one of the least successful of exploiting the "theatre in the round" staging. If it hadn't been such a funny play, it would have been pretty dire. The only interesting idea that they introduced was to suggest the ride round and round the house - that Mrs Hardcastle and her neice are taken on by Tony Lumpkin - by playing the sound of a coach and horses on speaker in sequence around the walls of the theatre. Unfortunately, it started right behind us and I almost fell off my chair in shock.

When you see plays in the same theatre on a regular basis, you start to get a feel for where the theatre management is going and what they are trying to achieve. I'm beginning to think they are not too sure themselves. The next play is Mirandolina, an Italian farce starring Matthew Kelly. I don't know whether this is a good thing or not, but it will be interesting to see if he plays a part or just plays himself. For Jonny's review of this one, follow the link to the House of Gin.