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Walmington-on-Line Review

A Tribute to Dad's Army - Court Theatre, 27th April 2002

A matinee performance by amateurs at a small theatre in the Hertfordshire countryside does not normally attract crowds. But the car park and foyer of the Court Theatre, near Tring, is heaving. Four generations pack the auditorium, and outside posters pronounce the performance 'sold out'.
And the cause of all this excitement - Popstars? The second coming of Elvis? No, a staged tribute, in the year of the Queen's golden jubilee, to a sitcom whose final episode was shown 25 years ago during the silver jubilee.

Seating is unallocated and ushers help find bemused latecomers scattered seats in the auditorium. Six-year-olds perch excitedly on the edge of their front row chairs and silver haired octogenarians adjust their hearing aids in anticipation of the show.
The auditorium lights dim, searchlights scan the walls and ceiling and explosions fill the theatre. No longer a peaceful afternoon in Hertfordshire - suddenly we are experiencing the Blitz, in a small seaside town, somewhere on the south-coast of England.

Dressed in a dinner suit, with slick Brylcreemed hair the narrator tells us of pre-war life in a typical south-coast resort. The the coming of conflict, the raising of barbed wire, laying of mines, blowing-up of the pier.

It is no mean feat to recreate Walmington-on-Sea. Nor to bring alive Captain Mainwaring, Sergeant Wilson, old Godfrey. The ghosts of such fine actors as Arthur Lowe, John le Mesurier and John Laurie cast long shadows. The comedy talents of Clive Dunn and Bill Pertwee are not easy to replace. But this was the task set for the Tring Festival Company. Assembling a cast of thirty-five to perform two complete scripts from the sixth and seventh series of the show, this company determined, as far as possible, to reproduce the originals - even down to the opening titles in which animated union jacks and swastikas battle for supremacy.

This was an untypical performance: somewhere between revue and drama, consisting of two complete TV scripts tied together by a factual narration telling the story of the series. Amongst the audience the atmosphere was more like that found at a rock concert - a group of fans there to see their favourite pieces performed. There was palpable excitement in the first act when Chris Noble, as Private Pike, chanted the lines "Whistle while you work, Hitler is a twerp .....".

Alan Linfield, as the German U-boat captain glowered the feed-line "Your name will also go on the list. What is it?" For a fraction of a second the entire audience held its breath in anticipation of the funniest line in British TV comedy:
"Don't tell him Pike" blustered Peter Cherry's Mainwaring. The audience roared their approval - it was what they had come to see.

This was a performance in which mimicry sat alongside reinterpretation creating a sense of familiarity and confusion. Malcolm Stubbs captured Corporal Jones' mannerisms perfectly - had the voice not been so different one could have believed Clive Dunn was on the stage. In contrast Richard Worland as Sergeant Wilson often sounded more like the original than did John le Mesurier himself - a willowy languid performance perfectly in keeping.

Peter Cherry as Mainwaring had surely the most difficult role - seldom off the stage and attempting to recreate one of the most distinctive characters on television. As Mainwaring Arthur Lowe bristled with the energy of a small man full of frustrated ambition, social inferiority and self-regarding pomposity. Peter Cherry's interpretation was slightly more laid back and world weary. In one episode from the series Mainwaring declares despairingly "sometimes I think I'm in charge of a bunch of idiots". Cherry's Mainwaring was built around that sentiment, but was no less effective for it. Physically he cleverly borrowed from Lowe's performance and wove it into his own - producing a hybrid delivery which carried the role with panache.

Chris Noble gave Frank Pike the gawky adolescent treatment that fully deserved the description 'stupid boy'. Gordon Bishop as Godfrey had few lines with which to carry the part, though he was seldom off the stage. His performance captured the frailty and determination of the silly-old-fool to such an extent that when he did have a line to deliver it was certainly Godfrey that spoke.

Amongst the myriad smaller roles some of the most enjoyable performances came from actors who abandoned the attempt to mimic the original and gave a full blooded reinterpretation. John Copas as the mad Scottish undertaker, Frazer, and Ray Brown as the weasly Warden Hodges stood out in this regard.

It was never going to be the same as the original. The television series was dominated by the interplay between the towering talents of Lowe and le Mesurier. The pace of the programme was carried by slick editing and television's ability to focus on close-up and reaction shots. Theatre is less focused and cannot have the pace created in the editing suite. Director Val Warden's staging emphasised the ensemble aspects - filling the church hall with a full complement of German sub-mariners, and a bevy of swimsuited 'silly girls'.

Wisely they did not try to capitalise on the show's catchphrases - 'stupid boy', 'don't panic' and 'we're doomed' were all there, but the cast recognised that they belonged to the original cast and would never quite work in the lips of anyone else.

That an amateur adaptation could sell-out for six consecutive performances is a testament to the popularity of the original. It must be hugely daunting to stand on the stage before an audience who have one-third of a century of familiarity with the script you are about to perform. It could so easily have fallen flat and been simply embarrassing. Instead the Tring Festival Company have pulled-off a coup and produced a fine tribute to a much loved comedy programme that, twenty-five years after its demise, seems to find a new audience with each succeeding generation that sees it.

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Last Updated 26 Feb, 2004