Sleeping Partner

by Kenneth Horne

April 7, 8, 9  1960

Directed by

Ralph Dawes
and  
Ray Hopper

Production Crew

Review of the time

Thespis

" Cast was an advantage"

Julian Peabody, a business man on holiday with his daughters and their respective fiancés, was quite skillfully played by Brian Moulton.  It was unfortunate, however, that he so consistently pitched his voice in the upper register: it tended to be very irritating.  Daughter Jill, and her sister's fiancé, Stephen Clench, are the two who bump their heads together and start to dream the same dream.  They were played most successfully by Clodagh O'Farrell and Ross Workman.  The somewhat smaller parts of Jill's fiancé, Mark Graham, and her younger sister, Phyllis, were excellently filled by Barrie Bowen and Ann Skemer.

The greatest credit must go to Betty Elliott for her delightfully Dora Bryan-esque playing of Violet Watkins, secretary and prospective wife of Julian.  The lack of originality was more than compensated by brilliance of performance.  The small part of the doctor was quite adequately filled by Ralph Dawes, but why with a scale rule  in the breast pocket?

The set design by Barrie Bowen and Frances Moulton was quite delightful, and John Chatfield's sound effects very good indeed.

Another Review of the time

W.G.G.

"This was comedy at its very best "

The plot was based upon the dream of two young people, both engaged to two other people.  Their dream was 'an imperfection in time and space' which, in a succession of dreams, they relived a former life they lived together a thousand years before. Their dreams were startlingly parallel with events and circumstances of their present-day lives, and the situation became both exquisitely funny and broadly farcical.  Anne Skemer, as Phyllis Peabody, rather fey, shy creature who loved another, her sister's fiancé, ably filled her rôle.  Her part was not designed to add much to the comedy situations: indeed her position of unrequited love made her a little tragic, but she held her own in the midst of the storm of farce.

The main comedy theme was carried on the capable shoulders of the rest of the cast. Brian Moulton Julian Peabody, infatuated with the pulchritudinous nitwit Violet Watkins plated by Betty Elliott, was excellent indeed.   Betty Elliott reached heights of comedy with her portrayal of the shrewdly simple - or was she simply shred? - secretary out to marry the boss after having seduced him and holding over his head an indiscreet letter.  She acted right into the heart of the part.  Jill Peabody, played by Clodagh O'Farrell and Stephen Clench, played by Ross Workman, thrown together, willy-nilly, by  a shared and rather erotic dream, gained every ounce of fun from their part, and Ralph Dawes, who made two brief appearances as a Doctor, was also very good.  Barrie Bowen, handsome and tall, was perhaps a little too strained but he did not fail.  

The setting was simple and well designed and the production, a joint effort by Ralph Dawes and Raymond Hopper, was without fault.  It had a brisk, professional air about it that lifted it out of the rut of normal amateur stage productions.  The off-stage sound effects were as realistic as tape recordings could make them, entrances and exits were executed with a professional finesse and the whole show, from beginning to end, went with a fine swing.  

Faults?  They are so few and so trivial that they hardly worth mentioning.  Ann Skemer's lack of vocal volume, might have made her hard to hear at the back of the theatre, but her acting spoke volumes.  Brian Moulton's rather heavy-handed affection rang slightly out of tune now and then, but his performance in the comedy scenes more  than cancelled out that small fault.

Altogether it was production the Young Wick will have to work hard to equal.

 Don't Listen Ladies

by Sacha Guitry
adapted by 
Stephen Powys 
and
 Guy Bolton

November  3, 4, 5  1960

Directed by

Bess Blagden

Review of the time

A.R.T.

"Charming Breath of French Air "

Another review of the time

Thespis

"Players aimed high "