Wiltshire Times
Musical Comedy More Than Satisfied requirements
WHITE Horse Inn, the musical comedy in an Austrian lake-and-mountains setting, is nothing if it is not a first-class spectacle. Fortunately, the current production by Trowbridge Amateur Operatic Society at the Civic Hall – last two performances today (Friday) and tomorrow – is just that. An enormous amount of planning and work behind the scenes must have gone into the effective sets and the varied and versatile costumes of the chorus, bright and fresh with lots of primary colours in “match and mix” combinations. Colin Wyatt, who produced, directed and choreographed, deserves high praise for the way he has used the bigger stage of the Civic Hall (the society’s previous productions have been at St. Augustine’s School) to deploy his large chorus so effectively in such bewildering quick-change transformations from waiters and chambermaids to foresters, tourists, councillors, alpine guides, firemen, teachers, climbers, gamekeepers etc., etc., all twirling, marching, waltzing, tripping about, dancing the schuhplattler etc., etc., with never a hitch and never a dull moment. COMPENSATION All this was compensation enough and to spare for the slow-moving progress of the plot, especially in the first act – no doubt this will have been speeded up somehow in later performances than the one I saw on the first night on Tuesday – and the occasional inadequacies of some of the solo voices. Now I must confess that by some quirk of fate, I have never until Tuesday actually seen a performance of White HorseInn, though of course I seem to have been familiar with the tunes more than half my life. I must say that although one expects a musical comedy – more so than a modern “musical” – to have a silly plot, I could hardly credit that this one would be so extremely silly. All the principals put a lot of effort into making the most of such unrewarding material, some even to the point of hammy over-acting. But there again, who really minds, when there are those extremely hummable tunes, and the attractive dancing by members of the Pauline Dawson Morphew School, and always some new and surprising entry by the chorus in yet another combination of costumes and characters? LEADING LADIES The leading ladies – Joan Francis, masterful as the owner of the inn; Juliette Baker, assured and vivacious and Ottoline; and poor Sue Asplin, rising above the awful limitations ofthe part of Gretel, the lisping Swiss maiden – and the leading men – Dennis Duro, almost too emotional as the lovesick head waiter; Nigel Thompson, suave but oddly costumed as Sutton, the handsome solicitor; and Jim Baggs (or Don Boyland), as the rich, sinuous playboy Sigismund (also oddly costumed) – sang their solos and duets pleasantly enough. But – dare I say it? – the nicest voice of all was that of Doreen Williams, who had the very minor part of Kathi the postwoman, whose brief solos nevertheless seemed to set the keynote of carefree gaiety of this artless mountain hostelry where the visitors seemed always to be vastly outnumbered by the staff. The little goat lent by Dean Kibblewhite behaved well in the arms of Myra Brewer, as Zenzi, the goatherd; Norman Pascall produced a couple of nice vignettes as Professor Hinzel and an extremely aged parish councillor; Des Tidball was suitably dignified and nicely spoken as the Emperor; and I liked the even tinier vignette of Nora Cavendish Cook as the secretary to the parish council. One must not forget the orchestra, led by Michael Oliver and conducted by the society’s musical director, Ronald Foxwell, which appeared to gain in confidence as the first-night show proceeded but seemed curiously more at ease in the village band type of tune than in the thirties-style waltz-foxtrot-one-step kind. The chorus, in all its manifestations, sang with good tone and firm control. MJL
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