HOW DO YOU SPEAK TO ME?

We have  a small intimate theatre with seating for about fifty-five people where the  local amateur dramatic group put on productions.  They  can be really good.  The regional theatre company do a rolling programme around the small communities, of which there are very many, and we get to see their work at this theatre too.

Using mostly, local people,  a  local published  play- write  gave a one act, two-hander play he had lying  in his cupboard, an airing recently.  The in-training,  theatrical director ( a local person), selected his two cast members and in the space of six weeks, the production went live.  The writing was clever, it was humorous, it had pathos, it was not just  about communication, but communicating on multiple levels.

It was a wartime story of a girl in the countryside meeting with an American airman.  Once they have learned to understand one another, they form a relationship, they, never knowing if  either one can ever  fulfil the promise of it.

Both actors worked with their scripts.  Occasionally,  'Ellie' discreetly prompted herself from it.  She had a brogue to hold  in her large role, which was laced occasionally with a little mimicry of American  speech,     I got so frustrated at one stage with 'John' stumbling through his character, though doing it, while holding his American accent, I grant you,  I shut my eyes rather than watch him.  It was then I realised, with a little adaptation, this play could work really well as a radio  play.

The female lead who gave a sparkling and powerful performance, was totally untrained.   Her  acting was so good she carried the performance.  The male  who had received  two years  formal drama training, looked the part and at various moments, demonstrated that he might, with more development, become an interesting actor.


Why would this play need need a bit of tweaking to be heard elsewhere? That's the catch.   The female lead was written in a local dialect and if you did not have any real knowledge of it, the interplay and the repartee would have gone  over your head.  There were people in the audience who were long time residents though not born here,  who did not understand all of it.   There were foreign visitors who, even with a little bit of  English, would have been utterly lost.  This is where another, if unplanned level of communication was important, and that was body language.