Cautionary Christmas Tales

Madness, madness, I say!

Sunday, 5.30 in the evening, and the Stage Door bar at The Maltings Theatre was heaving at a time of day when civilized folk in the Borders settle down to The Antiques Roadshow or the Come Dine With Me omnibus.  People don't leave their homes on a Sunday evening unless it's on fire.  It's as likely a state of affairs as Katie Price being declared a feminist icon.

Emmeline Pankhurst — the early years

Clearly word had got out about 'Cautionary Christmas Tales' .  Clearly, my anonymous correspondent knew that here was something just a little bit special, and the chances of me giving the production a whipping with a wet towel, slim.  Between you and me, I'm liking the chutzpah. 

So, anyway, there I was, Sunday tea-time, threading my way through a thronging foyer and into the Henry Travers Studio to catch the last performance of this specially commissioned spoof written by Tom Mallaburn of The Fitzrovia Radio Hour (who have something of a following) and presented as a 'live recording' of three short radio plays, namely:

• 'A Life Less Awful'
• 'The Woman Who Didn't Prepare' 
• 'The Romance of Helen Simms'

The cast was in full evening dress, and when they weren't delivering their lines in exquisitely clipped RP, they were adroitly making sound effects from an array of unlikely props. Who knew that a pair of umbrellas opening and closing could pass for an in-flight angel?  Not me for one, having to try it for myself as soon as I got home.

'A Life Less Awful' was the weakest of the three plays, despite the best efforts of Justin Gudgeon as Bill Mott to drown himself in a tumbler of water — dedication above and beyond the call of duty to produce a sound effect of, er, somebody drowning. 

I've been trying to put my finger on just why this play didn't work as well as the others and can only put it down to:

1. The spin on 'It's A Wonderful Life'.  I mean, how is it possible to spoof something so intrinsically spoof-proof?  (Interestingly, and thoroughly by-the-by, Henry Travers played Clarence the angel opposite James Stewart in the film.  This was before he became a studio.  Obviously.)


2. Fraser Wood.

Don't get me wong, I'm a fan of Fraser.  Stick him on a stage and he reliably delivers.  But he is never without a glint in his eye — uh-huh, ladies, you know what I'm talking about — which made it difficult to believe that his character, loser Gerald Mott, was a suicidal man in need of our sympathy.  You had the impression that he and sexy emissary from Hell, Clarissa (played with wonderful languor by Tamiko Mackie), were just waiting for the signal to kick up their heels and paint the town scarlet.  Which is probably why we laughed so hard when Gerald eventually threw himself off Berwick Bridge. 

No, Fraser was much better cast as Roger Hunter, 'savage seducer', in 'The Romance of Helen Simms'.  With an impressively straight face, Anna Emmins played the eponymous heroine, a secretary caught in a love triangle and being threatened by — gosh, I say — Roger's  enormous dictation. 

The whole cast was excellent but, perhaps down to the script having stronger parts for women, a special round of applause has to go to Anna Emmins and Tamsin Davidson.  Tamsin's repentant housewife,

Hilda Gray, learnt the bally hard way that a turkey late to the table by half-an-hour can cost a husband his career and a woman her marriage in 'The Woman Who Didn't Prepare'. Personally this was my favourite of the three, tickled as I was by Tamsin's spot-on delivery and the idea that she was married to John Gray (Ross Graham), a generous man who gave her a pair of reconditioned compasses for Christmas. 

(As an aside, and not meant to detract from their acting ability in any way,  I simply have to mention that both Anna and Tamsin have exquisite eyebrows.  No, really.  Feathered arches of Forties loveliness.)

If I were in a super-picky mood, I'd grumble that on occasion the background music drowned out some of the lines. But that's me being a pain in the arse, to be frank. On the whole this was an original, funny, fast, and slick production, well directed by Miles Gregory and Do Shaw (a real person, not a typo). The Milester himself, btw, appeared as the Continuity Announcer, and I like to fantasize that his urbane charm was not an act... 

If you weren't afraid of missing all the fun on stage, you could have listened to 'Cautionary Christmas Tales' with your eyes shut and pretended you were gathered around the wireless with the family.  It's good to know that video hasn't quite killed the radio star, after all.