Lords and Ladies
About the Production
It’s a hot midsummer’s night in the tiny kingdom of Lancre, up in the far northern hill country of Discworld. Crop circles are turning up everywhere, bursting like raindrops, a portent of wayward magic leaking into the land from between the standing stones known as ‘The Dancers’.
Magrat Garlick, witch, is getting married in the morning – to King Verence of Lancre no less. The wizards of the Unseen University are journeying north from the great city of Ankh-Morpork to bless the union, and the Lancre All-Comers Morris Team have been lined up to stage a rustic entertainment for the happy couple. In short, everything should be going like a dream.
But all is not well in Lancre. Elves, long banished from the human realm are pushing at the iron boundaries of their barren winter land, bringing with them all those things traditionally associated with the magical, glittering realm of faerie: cruelty, kidnapping, malice and murder.
‘The Dancers’ form the gateway between the two worlds, and for many years, Granny Weatherwax and her tiny argumentative coven have worked to keep that portal tightly closed. But now a new coven, led by the young, ambitious and wilful Diamanda (real name Lucy Tockley, but Diamanda sounds so much better) are determined to overturn the old order…
And when the Lancre morris team gets seriously drunk on a fairy mound, all Hell is ready to break loose. In short, it’s a festival of dwarves, wizards, trolls, morris dancers – plus an orang-utan, with a fair helping of hey-nonny-nonny and blood all over the place… We hope you enjoy tonight’s performance!
A big thank you to Debbie Bradshaw and Katy Tupholme at Bluetree Design and Print of Rotherham for designing our posters for the production, and to Mark Lewis and Nick Hewson at Mastercolour of Tunbridge Wells for printing them.
The Cast
Behind the Scenes
Image Gallery
The Reviews
Awarded Five Stars
Despite the vicissitudes of our summer weather the optimistic (and hardy) folk of the Theatre Workshop continue their annual production in the garden of The Woodman pub in Woodmansterne and this year the tall trees amongst which the sets were built added hugely to this tale of faerie folk, where the witches were good and the elves were bad.
To try and explain the plot of this Terry Pratchett Discworld piece, with all its twists and turns, would cover the whole page. Suffice it to say that Granny Weatherwax and Nanny Ogg are two benevolent if slightly mischievous witches – Nanny with three sons who help the tale along in various guises and Granny with a thwarted love affair behind her. Add in Magrat – wannabee witch and betrothed to marry King Verence – three wise men and an orangutan from The Unseen University who are travelling to the wedding and the tale begins to get complex. Tanya Allison and Penny Payne, as Granny and Nanny respectively, delivered their intrigue with clarity and cunning with Emma Griffin as the delightful Magrat turning from demure bride into a virago to defend her groom.
Luke Argles brought just the right amount of pomposity to Verence, bumbling nicely when wedding night expectations were mentioned. Bumbling wonderfully too was Chris Argles as the hapless Bursar whose dottiness and pill-dependency increased as the tale progressed. Bullish rather than bumbly are the Morris men tasked to present a play as entertainment for the wedding – boozy local yokels for whom Pratchett ‘borrowed’ the tale of the Rude Mechanicals from Midsummer Night’s Dream. Another blatant borrow is the tale of the Billy Goats Gruff, cleverly interwoven.
Further players inhabit this enchanted world like the Archchancellor, to whom Richard Lloyd brings longing for love, Stibbons (Mark Taylor), and Paul Ford as the animated orangutan. Dawn Lock was commanding as the Elf Queen and Tim Young as Casanunda used his best Italian accent to woo Nany Ogg. Lisa Lloyd had an excellent line in curtseys as Millie and Hannah Montgomery as Diamanda led her team of rebellious young witches with aplomb. John East was the put-upon palace servant Shawn Ogg
The many cameo roles added appropriate mystery to the show with a special mention for those eerie elves. Costumes were, well, magical, and plaudits must go to the creators of the set and designers and operators of the sound and lighting – not easy tasks outdoors.
Director Mike Brown, aided by a large and very competent cast, really did create a fairytale of note and I trust the rest of the run stayed as dry as we all did on the first Thursday night.
Theo Spring for The Croydon Advertiser, Wednesday July 29 2009
It’s always nice to see something different and visit somewhere new, and Theatre Workshop Coulsdon’s production of ‘Lords and Ladies’ in the garden of The Woodman pub was certainly just that. With a natural tree-lined backdrop on a balmy summer’s evening, this was the perfect setting to conjure up the imagery of Terry Pratchett’s Discworld, which formed the base of this Irana Brown adaptation.
The set was minimal, comprising of a 10ft turntable positioned stage right, on which were mounted the standing stones, or ‘Dancers’, while a stairway surmounting a red oak door was placed stage left. The addition of some well-selected (and manoeuvred) furniture and props were more than adequate to suggest the various locations of each scene. Lighting is always interesting in the open air and such that there was helped to highlight the working areas and the colourful array of superb costumes. The radio mikes were levelled so that not a spoke word was missed, while the underscore music and sound effects, especially composed and performed by Mark Taylor, gave the piece an added dimension.
One suspects that there was more than just a passing interest by director Mike Brown and his cast in Pratchett’s writings, as not only was this their third such production but the characters were so well drawn as to suggest some serious research by the players. A few scenes in Act II seemed unnecessary, so this half would have benefitted from a few cuts, but the play was well directed. There were many fine performances from within this large cast. Projection, pace and timing were all well observed and helped to maximise the comedy of the humorous script. Chris Argles, as The Bursar, delivered the opening narrative with great ease, Richard Lloyd’s Archchancellor was akin to a very chilled out George Harrison, while Luke Argles presented a foppish King Verence that would have done Eddie Izzard proud. Of the girls, Tanya Allison – a canny Scottish Granny Weatherwax – Penny Payne – The straight-talking country bumpkin Nanny Ogg – and Emma Griffin – whose new-age witch, Magrat Garlick, becomes an axe-wielding blonde heroine – all combined to form a spirited witches coven.
Peter Reed for Surrey Today, Tuesday August 18, 2009
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