[Stage Review] Guards! Guards! - Crown Players, Gloucester
We arrived slightly early in Gloucester, and after dodging a rain shower under the nearby MOT centre porch, approached the very colourful King Theatre (someone with a set of printer inks cyan, yellow, magenta, black and some white had had a field day), it was magnificent in primary colours.
Once inside the decor calms down and you enter the rather small bar / shop area where we picked up a programme. The building opens up once inside the auditorium itself. It turns out to be a nice, relatively compact theatre.
Guards! Guards! productions were all the rage a while back but we've not seen it performed for some time. So we were not as up to date with the script as we might have been for say Wyrd Sisters.
The play starts with Carrot's father sending Carrot played by Eliza McFowell off to Ankh-Morpork with the book of Laws and Ordinances of Ankh-Morpork and a huge sword.
Next we find a rather drunk Sam Vimes played by Matthew Bunce. There are quite a lot of drunken / pub scenes in this production and all of the actors appeared to be playing caricatures of drunk people. Almost as if it was kids copying their parents. Vimes grew on me during the production but the start was shaky.
Nathalie Eeckhout took on the role of the Patrician and played him as a man in true theatre traditions. Disclaimer: I've been friends with Nathalie for nearly two decades. Nathalie's performance was solid as the Patrician and some of the looks she threw at Vimes would turn less men to stone.
Kirsten Gooding was brilliant as Lady Sybil Ramkin. Her accent, her posture, everything just worked for me.
Luping Wonse is a tough character to play. Switching between the normal almost grey assistant to the Patrician, and the over the top manic madman that is the grand master of the lodge. Oli Ryder did a good job trying to balance the two roles.
The comedic team of Martyn Camm as Colon and Nathaniel Ingledow as Corporal Nobbs keep the play up beat and fun. The librarian needs a mention here Daniel Waite took on the role in a very interesting Orangutan suit. But still acted like a man in a suit. There was little or no attempt to stoop down or exaggerated arm movements we come to expect from our primate friends. The librarian's first entrance on the screen had him walk right across the stage, wave at other characters and walk off the other side. I wasn't sure if I was watching one of those videos that test how observant you are and later ask if you saw the gorilla walk past! I've seen a lot of librarians in Pratchett plays over the years and this is the first time I've seen one played like a drunk Bungle from Rainbow.
The production featured quite a few short scene changes and a cleverly constructed set that allowed performances on both ground level and on top of buildings.
One mishap near the intermission caused confusion for the audience. After the dragon attacks the watch the curtains were pulled closed. This would have made for an excellent intermission point in the play and many people in the audience took this as a clue to exit the auditorium for toilet / bar use. It wasn't the intermission and after a short pause the curtains opened again and the production continued. Sadly it meant that the doors at the back of the auditorium had been wedged open and both light and noise spilled in from the bar area drawing out some of the performance. The intermission proper happened about ten minutes further into the play.
This I should add was the closing night of the run. I have to wonder why this hadn't been corrected by this point. A lot of the jitters and mishaps I would have expected on opening night were still apparent.
As I mentioned in my introductions it's been a while since I've read the script to Guards! Guards! (our copy is currently in storage). But it appears that The Kings Theatre may have been to use Terry's works mucking about with the script. There were some lines like "its just people init" that I doubt ever came from Terry's keyboard. I'm not sure why some productions feel the need to change Terry's words because, inevitably, Terry's words were better.
After the aforementioned proper intermission the second act started with a footnote. I forgot to mention that throughout the production a strange siren would sound and the actors would freeze while Sarah Snell-Pym would come onto the stage to deliver a footnote. While these were funny and informative they really did pull you out of the story. Sometimes, especially if one of the actors was blocking her way, it took a seemingly long time for the footnote to get to the appropriate space on the stage before giving her lines.
The dragon king was done very well with some appropriate lighting and a booming voice over the pa system. And I have to say the Errol model was adorable (and obviously based on Paul Kidby's illustrations). I loved the simplicity of having a smaller version or Errol on a stick being run around by a cast monster to simulate the dragon mating ritual.
The second act moved on at quite a pace and all the actors seemed to relax into their roles. Once we got past the inevitable interruption because an audience member even after being asked to turn off mobile phones thought they were more important than everyone else.. And then took an age to cancel the call. The play continued to its conclusion and the curtains closed again. This time the audience were a little more savvy and the curtains opened for the actors' curtain call. After this the curtains closed for a final time and the house lights came on and the show was officially over.
Despite my concerns noted above it was a fun production, just one that needed a lot of polish. I guess I've been lucky and have seen some very solid performances of Pratchett plays over the years but this one just wasn't quite good enough. To be fair though I have seen a lot worse. Bye me a drink some time and I'll tell you about some of them!