THERE is something new about the programme for Shaftesbury Arts Centre’s latest production. It is square and the cover names writer Charles Dickens, and, in type just a little bit smaller, adaptor Neil Bartlett and director Diana Banham. In recent years Dickens classics have been dissected and reconstructed by many theatre companies, turning their backs on traditional productions to find the essence of the timeless appeal of the great Victorian writer.
These stylised, choreographed and symbolic presentations could be thought to be far beyond the reach of an am dram soc – but Diana Banham is having none of it. Her vision and ambition have already proved stimulating and satisfying for the cast and crew at Bell Street, and, after an unforgettable The Thrill of Love last year, she returns further galvanised to mount this electrifying version of the very well-known Great Expectations.
From the first moment, as the company gathers on the stage, the audience knows it is in for something very different. Performing Bartlett’s version of the story of Pip, his larks, his love and his expectations, calls for huge versatility from the company, most of whom take on multiple roles as the tale unfolds. This is done on a simple set, with minimal costume changes (sometimes at high speed), varying voices and carefully-controlled and choreographed movements to lead the audience from one location to another.
Rafe Commissaris, a well known local dancer who was so impressive as Rolf in SAC’s Sound of Music, underlines his talents as the hero Pip, from his early days as a terrified youngster on the Essex marshes to a swaggering young man of means to a good-hearted man who has learned from his lessons – is it a picture of Dickens himself?
He is joined by the vastly versatile, peripatetic local actor Robert Brydges, bringing frightening power to the escaped convict Magwitch, but ceaseless determination and real love to the man who risks all for the boy who saved him that night on the marshes.
Rosalind Drew is perhaps the finest Miss Havisham I have ever seen, on screen or stage, encapsulating the fragility and driven vengefulness in this woman whose life teeters on the fringe of madness, but whose emotions are what we now call relatable.
Jemma Kirby’s resentful Mrs Joe amd loving Biddy, provide two strong female characters in young Pip’s life – and later the reliable and intelligent Wemmick – and Carl Davies is a marvellously contrasted blacksmith Joe (he of “what larks), and scheming and suave Jaggers. Charlotte Berry brings the tortured and conflicted Estella to vivid life, and Harvey Cormack takes on the triple roles of the loveable Herbert Pocket, the duplicitous Compeyson and Mr Wopsle, the fawning vicar, with great charm and skill.
Phil Elsworth is both the condescending Pumblechook and the nasty Sarah Pocket, with Bryan Farrell as the arrogant Bentley Drummle.
This is one of those rare productions in which the ensemble – everyone in the cast who is not in the particular scene – is always on stage, requiring a degree of physical and emotional involvement that is remarkable in an amateur company, and all credit to Sallianne Davison, Lisa Ford, Janine Rutter and Justine Peroni for their contributions as many other characters.
The SAC Music and Drama Group production of this great Dickensian story will remain long in the memory. Diana Banham’s incisive intelligence, eye for nuance, chutzpah and ambition, and a cast ready to take up the challenge, created an extraordinarily intense experience for the enraptured audience.
GP-W