Venue: Sweet ECA
Lovely big room, good crowd and a PG Wodehouse script. Pity we didn’t find out they were going to run 15 minutes overtime until we got there.
The play itself concerns a young ne’er do well Lord, his fiancee, his sister, her husband, Jeeves the butler (having a rest from looking after Bertie), a great white hunter (GWH), a rich American psychic and a police captain (very brief but memorable). The plot is, as always, convoluted. It appears the lord has been moonlighting as a bookie to pay the bills, but has sworn to his fiancée that he’s keeping away from the betting ring. His troubles begin when he takes a bet from the GWH which comes in and he can’t pay. He is also trying to sell the house before it falls down. His sister invites the American lady to the house and thus begin the hi-jinks and disasters that, until the last moment, seem insoluble.
The cast do a fair job of interpreting this work but they really need a bit more rehearsal as they fluffed quite a few lines. I also worried that the plot didn’t really have Jeeves doing much of the problem solving which was the hallmark of the Jeeves and Wooster stories. It almost appeared at times that he was as much at sea as the rest of the characters. Another problem was that there were hardly any costume changes. Surely the ladies would have at least changed their dresses for the next day?!? Economy is one thing but costume was a very important part of the J&W stories and it seemed strange to have avoided it. It was also a pity about the noise outside from the building works next door.
For booking details go to Come On, Jeeves