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A
Bedfull of Foreigners
By
Alex Browne - Peace Arch News
Published: August 03, 2011
She’s
one of the most assiduous producers of farce in this region.
But Ellie
King, founder and artistic director of the Royal Canadian
Theatre Company, admits that it is only 10 years ago that
she directed her first.
That was
Michael Frayn’s Noises Off, at the late, lamented Burr
Theatre in New Westminster, where she was formerly resident
artistic director.
“I’d
seen a few farces,” said King, also well-known as a champion
of the traditional English Christmas pantomime (her version
appears at the Surrey Arts Centre annually).
“But
the idiom hadn’t really appealed to me that much.”
She feels
now that it was only because she’d seen the wrong farces
– done in the wrong way.
Flash
forward a decade and King is now presenting her latest in
the idiom – A Bedfull of Foreigners, by Dave Freeman
– at White Rock’s Coast Capital Playhouse until
Aug. 28, a prelude to a regional run as follow up to a healthy
response to last year’s offering, No Sex, Please, We’re
British.
Working
with a hand-picked cast, including such reliables as Sam Gordon,
Wendy Bollard, Becky Hachey and Nicole Smashnuk (who were
all in No Sex), plus strong players Walter Ekins, Gary Peterman
and Brett Harrison, she’s pleased at how everything has
come together in this door-slammer set in a seedy hotel on
the French-German border.
The whole
mess is predicated on a simple incident – a wife (Smashnuk)
leaves her husband (Gordon) alone in a hotel room for a few
hours, setting in motion a series of disasters that follow
one on another like a series of dominoes.
“It
appealed to me as sort of a Fawlty Towers-meets-Benny Hill
kind of situation – and heaven knows I’ve stayed
in enough hotels like this on the Continent,” said King,
whose background includes years as a professional entertainer
in her native Britain and across Europe.
Freeman’s
script fulfills King’s vision of the farce as something
akin to an aircraft on a runway – it starts off grounded
and connected to reality, but after an event fires the engines
it accelerates faster and faster until it is airborne.
“And
there’s no parachute,” she adds.
But there
is still a need for the connection to reality, she contends.
“No
matter how crazy it gets, the audience still needs to be engaged
with the characters.”
The problem
with farce, like pantomime, is that seems easier to do than
it is, King said. Effects that seem arbitrary and chaotic
in performance must be meticulously planned and timed during
rehearsal.
“It
appears simplistic on the surface, but when you actually get
into it, it’s just the opposite. Just tracking the props
that are necessary, and where they should be for each scene,
is a huge job. It’s all about the props.”
Farce
also calls for a deft touch in playing that explores the comedic
potential without obliterating character, King maintains.
“As
broad as it is, farce is a delicate thing. The art of it is
in the subtlety. If you go too far, and you don’t give
the characters a chance, you’ve lost it.”
In this
regard, she said, she has no complaints of her current cast,
who have all done their homework on their characters, even
if the goal is to create something gloriously ridiculous.
“These
guys are amazing,” she said. “You give them an idea
and they run with it, and embellish it and put a cherry on
top. And they’re a great team – they love each other
and respect each other and spark each other.”
The only
challenge, she said, has been occasionally reining them in.
“There
was one scene that was ‘a bridge too far’ –
it was actually hysterically funny, but I felt we were losing
the play.
“They’ve
broken the set three times – we’ve actually had
to reinforce it.”
A Bedfull
of Foreigners runs Wednesdays to Saturdays at 8 p.m. with
2:30 p.m. Sunday matinees. For tickets, call 604-536-7535
or visit www.rctheatreco.com
'Foreigners'
frolic in White Rock
By Brittany
Tiplady,
Surrey Now, August 4, 2011
Royal
Canadian Theatre Company is bringing A Bedfull of Foreigners
to the stage this month at Coast Capital Playhouse in White
Rock.
The British
farce employs a cast of seven veteran actors ranging from
age 20 to 60, with the intent to give audiences an evening
of entertainment and laughter.
"I
play Brenda, the wife of Stanley. We are just a young couple
wanting to have a nice holiday and things go wrong,"
said actor Nicole Smashnuk.
A Bedfull
of Foreigners is set in a hotel on the border of Germany and
France. A young couple ventures to the hotel, but they are
given a room that has been mistakenly passed on to another
couple, all the while building up the ridiculous hilarity
of a traditional farce.
The cast
had only 10 days to rehearse and put together the production,
but the actors hardly seem to mind.
"What
I love the most is the spontaneity," said Brett Harrison
who plays the role of Heinz.
"Theatre
is so rare, you don't get that feeling a lot where a whole
group of people get carried with you, and when you know they're
with you, it's one of the most amazing feelings ever,"
said Smashnuk.
Many in
the cast have returned from last year's Royal Canadian production,
No Sex Please, We're British, in hopes of once again engaging
audiences with the fresh hilarity of British comedy.
"Last
year, we performed nearly every night to sold-out houses and,
to actors, that's an amazing thing, so when (the company's
artistic director) Ellie King asked me to do Bedfull this
year, I jumped at the chance," said Wendy Bollard, a
30-year theatre veteran who plays the role of Helga.
This Benny
Hill-meets-Faulty Towers play is bound to make even the most
cynical person laugh, says Bollard.
"Being
an actor is a licence to play, a licence to exercise those
parts of yourself that you don't get in everyday life,"
said Sam Gordon, who plays Stanley, hapless husband to Brenda.
"Everything we're taught is to behave; being an actor
allows you to access all of those moments, all of those times,
where you don't have to obey the rules. It's a chance to investigate
other lives."
Ellie
King founded Royal Canadian Theatre Company six years ago
with her specialty in pantomimes.
King's
enthusiasm and passion for theatre has actors and audiences
alike returning to Royal Canadian productions with the same
devotion.
A Bedfull
of Foreigners runs from Aug. 3-28 at Coast Capital Playhouse
in white Rock and Sept. 20-24 at Coquitlam's Evergreen Arts
Centre.
For show
details in White Rock, call 604-536-7535 or visit www. rctheatreco.com.
twitter@yellowbird888
© Copyright (c) Surrey Now
REVIEW:
Alice In Wonderland
The
comforts of tradition
The
Red Queen (Kerri Norris) grabs ahold of Alice (Crystal Weltzin)
in the Royal Canadian Theatre Company's pantomime production,
Alice in Wonderland.
By
Alex Browne - Peace Arch News
Published: December 22, 2010
It may not be exactly as Lewis Carroll intended, but the
Royal Canadian Theatre Company’s Alice In Wonderland
(Surrey Arts Centre mainstage, to Jan. 2) is definitely enjoyable,
family-friendly Christmas fun.
It’s
also the nearest thing to a traditional English pantomime
you’re likely to find in a local season where –
all the hard work of talented performers notwithstanding –
the tendency has been to obliterate the traditional recipe.
For those
seeking holiday jollies, settling in with the current RCTC
offering, written and directed by Ellie King, is a warm and
comfortable experience; akin to filling up on the expected,
but well-done, turkey with all the trimmings, rather than
nervously sampling a dish of roast emu with sushi and a side
of fries.
Good sets,
fine costumes and a pleasant cast and chorus add to a show
in which the sense of family is as strong on stage as in the
audience – not just from the familiar faces but also
from the range of ages, right down to the tiniest scene-stealing
tots (and King has taken care to place the latter front and
centre).
She and
her husband – ace keyboardist and musical director Geoff
King – have also composed some agreeable new tunes (Alice
Alone, Have A Cup Of Tea, Tap Dancing On A Rainbow) which
are well performed by the cast and certainly worthy of reprise
in future pantos.
Two of
the strongest performances are in the framing roles of Red
Demon (James King) and Blue Fairy (Wendy Bollard). The junior
King’s booming voice, villain’s laugh and jovial
sense of evil grow more effective with every year. Bollard’s
sense of fun and decision to deliver her dialogue in Scots
brogue make her fairy a memorable one, and her highland dancing
adds to a strong duet with King on Loch Lomond.
Crystal
Weltzin’s Alice is suitably perky and feisty and not
too ‘grown-up’ in concept for the kiddies; Amanda
Ram’s Prince Albert the White is pure English pantomime
from bobbed wig to fishnetted gams, with a sense of the ridiculous
for good measure.
Also pure
pantomime is Alan Cedargreen’s endearingly scatterbrained
and ludicrous Dame Patti Cake, while Kaitlin Sandwell makes
a conscientious White Rabbit, and Shara Nixon offers fine
support as the Duchess.
Michael
Roberds’ Mad Hatter, Michael Charrois’ March Hare
and Jacqueline Becher’s Dormouse seem a little too relaxed
at first meeting, but, led by the appealing Becher, they soon
establish their own distinct comedic interplay which gathers
momentum steadily – particularly during an impromptu
mock ballet sequence.
Kerri
Norris contributes a nasty Red Queen as principal villainess
(as well as co-ordinating the splendidly colourful costumes);
Stephen Elchesen transforms the Knave of Hearts into a likeable
‘Idle Jack’ character, and Bob Wilson is an amusingly
bumbling Red Wizard.
Erstwhile
Surrey politician Judy Higginbotham lends regal dignity and
clear delivery to the White Queen; Stefani Delisimunovic and
Amanda Smith-Weston have some effective moments as Tweedle
Dum and Tweedle Dummer; Daniel Chai is a suitably laid-back
and pschedelic ‘Rasterpillar’ and Lorne Jones strikes
the right mysterious note as the Cheshire Cat.
Flower
girls Iris, Lily and Daisy (Lana Garland, Erin Coon and Jennifer
Campbell) and the Guards, Deuce, Trey and Ace (Chai, James
O’Neill and Manfred Schulz) add just the right touch
to the fun, and a nicely harmonized While Strolling In The
Park.
Physical
comedy rules in 'No Sex' farce staged by King and her crew
British farce on stage in White Rock until Aug. 1
By Melanie Minty, Surrey Now - July 23, 2010
Peter
(played by Jarrod Terell) and his new wife “Frances”
(Becky Hachey, right) are no match for good-time girl Susan
(Nicole Smashnuk) in the comedy No Sex Please, We’re
British, on stage at Coast Capital Playhouse in White Rock.
Royal
Canadian Theatre Company, established in 2006 by founding
artistic director Ellie King, is making strides to establish
itself as Surrey's professional theatre company. It's not
an easy task for anyone at any time or place.
King was,
at one time, successfully establishing a theatre company in
New Westminster at the Burr Theatre. When that venue closed
down, the energetic Langleyite regrouped and formed the RCTC.
Future plans for RCTC include a World Classic Theatre Festival
outdoors in the summer months, a mentoring program to give
theatre virgins an opportunity to work with professionals,
and to bring theatre events to our community at reasonable
prices.
King firmly
-- very firmly -- believes that a professional theatre company
"strongly supports the statement that Surrey is a great
place to live and do business." Can't fault her passion,
determination or talent.
She has
already collected a crew of like-minded individuals to RCTC,
some of whom worked with King at the Burr. So the foundation
is set, and ready to go. But did I mention that King is both
ambitious and energetic -- not content to put on a panto or
two, perform her signature role of Shirley Valentine and generally
grow slowly but surely (or is that Shirley?). Not on your
Nellie. King is taking her company on tour this summer with
a production of No Sex Please, We're British.
First
stop for the tour is White Rock's Coast Capital Playhouse.
The show runs Wednesday through Sunday until Aug. 1. Sticking
to the RCTC mandate, tickets are reasonably priced at $19/$22,
and are available through the Surrey Arts Centre box office
(604-501-5566). Gee, that's awfully nice of the arts centre
to lend a hand for ticket sales. And thanks, too, to White
Rock Players for making their space available. Just love the
community interaction and support.
No Sex,
Please is a typical British farce, with a very thin plot that
follows the desperate efforts of a young married couple (Jarrod
Terrell and Becky Hachey) and their nerdy bank-clerk friend
(Sam Gordon) to dispose of unsolicited pornography. Keeping
it away from his nosey mother (Wendy Bollard), the pompous
bank manager (Douglas Newell) and the visiting police inspector
(Adrian Hughes) is bad enough, but when the good-time girls
(Nicole Smashnuk and Jackie Faulkner) show up, the silliness
slides into sheer hilarity. Alan Cedargreen portrays the hapless
visiting bank inspector, Mr. Needham. This talented cast handles
the physical comedy very well, and makes the most of this
farce.
I will
admit that I am not a fan of farce, but RCTC cast and crew
do a creditable job with this production, and White Rock audiences
are certainly enjoying this show.
Full compliments
to diction coach Adrian Hughes, and I just loved "the
girls," fishnets and all. Next stop on the tour is Vancouver's
Waterfront Theatre from Aug. 3-28, then on to Coquitlam's
Evergreen Arts Centre from Sept. 21-26. May the tour be a
huge success, and long live the King!
For more
information about Royal Canadian Theatre Company, visit www.retheatreco.com,
and you can email King (at ellie@retheatreco.com) for information
about acting classes beginning in October.
melminty@telus.net
© Copyright (c) Surrey Now
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