Footloose by Darlington Operatic Society

"Let's hear it for the boys....and girls"

As a child of the 70's my early teenage years were filled with the Brat Pack style 80's movies - St Elmo's Fire, Pretty in Pink,  Stand By Me (I can't add Top Gun into that list, never seen it!) and of course Footloose.  The soundtrack was huge, the rebellious lead was instantly identifiable and the feel-good ending meant no matter what was going in life, you could escape for 2 hours and emerge feeling better (for a while at least).  Life seemed simpler, more black & white, more good & bad than it does now so it's great timing that we get to go back to mid America and relive some good ol' happy memories.

The story goes like this: 

When Ren and his mother move from Chicago to a small farming town, Ren is prepared for the adjustment to his new high school. What he isn't prepared for are the local laws - including a ban on dancing - which are the brainchild of a local preacher bent on exercising control over the town's youths. When the Reverend's rebellious daughter Ariel sets her heart on Ren, her muscle head boyfriend tries to sabotage Ren's reputation and with many of the locals so eager to believe the worst about the new kid, Ren has to prove to the preacher, the school and the whole town that dancing is something to enjoy and share.

Amazingly, the premise for the story is based on fact - a small town in Oklahoma had banned dancing for 80 years until a campaign by a local school class had the rule repealed.

Ren, wonderfully played by Nick Holmes, is the epitome of adolescent frustrations, still believing he can change the world and yet to experience any good reasons why he shouldn't.  The previous freedom he enjoyed whilst in Chicago gives way to the stifling small town rules, brilliantly portrayed in the song "Somebody's eyes".  Nick does a great job of treading the fine line between Ren's well intentioned but frustrated 'outsider' view and coming on too strong which would have undermined the still existent 'respect for y00our elders' culture of mid America.

Ariel, the feisty preacher's daughter, was originally played in the movie by Lori Singer but I always found this a little too contrived (what with her smouldering eyes and legs that just kept going on & on she was more the prom queen type of gal than the preacher's daughter).  Likewise, in the movie, Ariel looks old enough to be soon moving away from home thus removing the conflict between her & her father - Ariel needs to be younger, more innocent but with still a bit of dare and a lot of sass, and in being so the relationship between the preacher and his little girl is all the more important to be saved.  With this in mind Beth Stobbart simply nails it- Beth brings all the believability to Ariel that is needed to help the audience connect, not just with her character but also the preacher, plus she's got a great voice too.  Looking mighty purty in her foxy red boots she dominates each scene she's in and plays the perfect counterfoil to the ever impressive Julian Cound as her reverend father. 

There are also great performances from Claire Wilmer as Rusty and Ben Connor as Willard, the love shy couple who, once Ren teaches Willard to dance, are never out of each others arms (or off the dance floor).  Also of note is Rob McDougal, Ariel's meat-head mechanic boyfriend who brings the stereotypical menace akin to Biff from the Back to the Future films.

As expected from a musical there are great songs throughout the show; the big ones from the film went on to have chart success including "Let's hear it for the boy", "Holding out for a hero", "Almost paradise" and of course "Footloose" immediately spring to mind, but for me, the best number by far was Samantha Morrison (as preacher's wife Vi) singing "Can you find it in your heart?".  Samantha gives a heart rendering delivery as a devoted wife seeing her husband drift away without him realising anything has changed - there were a few sniffles and much searching for tissues in the audience around me after that one.

The stage show has brought a few areas of the story up to date but still retains it's mid American small town charms & prejudices.  What was wonderful to see was the number of young people in the audience, I was sat behind a group of children and dancers who had come together from Melsonby - all were still of junior school age so there's no way they would have seen the movie first time round but they all loved the show, the dancing, the songs. Given that there are one or two rather 'risque' snapshots ("...so just what do you do around here for excitement ?") I bet that a few of their mum's would be fielding some strange questions last night too.

The group dancing scenes, including the square dance at the C & W hall and the finale are a fitting testament to the hours and hours of dedication put into rehearsals- it is all too easy to forget that these performers are not full time dancers, they have lives outside of Footloose although I bet many have forgotten that over these past 5 months.

As with all Darlington Operatic Society productions, this is a masterful presentation of high energy, tight choreography and brilliant singing. Again the whole production team need to take their rightful and well deserved applause - Lets' hear it for the boys and girls of DOS.

Great Expectations @ Darlington Civic

Deeply and darkly delicious

It was a dark night; rain was brooding, the last vestiges of summer had been swept away by the cold north breeze while curtains were pulled tight to keep the night out and the warmth in.  It might sound like the start of a gothic horror but it was actually the weather in Darlington as we ventured to the Civic to watch Jo Clifford's adaptation of the classic Dickens tale, Great Expectations.  It seemed very fitting that it was such a bleak, cold and uninviting night for this tale by London's finest storywriter is not one of fun, love and joy but bitterness, resentment and betrayal and boy, does this version deliver.

I've always loved Great Expectations but I've been regularly disappointed by dramatised adaptations which seemed unwilling or incapable to delve truly into the depths of the darkness which lies beneath the story.  They always wanted to provide a happy ending, lighten the scenes with redemption and benevolence and paint both the main characters (Pip and Estella) as intrinsically happy souls who ride the rough passages before finding everlasting joy and love.  That's not what this story is about and Jo Clifford does a magnificent job in keeping the macabre, soul destroying darkness intact throughout the performance.

Set,in part by a recounting older Mr Pip, the story follows the life of Pip as he progresses from poor urchin to gentleman, from love hopeful to cold and stony hearted realist, from wealthy city toff to poor and cast aside wannabe.  In Taylor Jay-Davies (who played all but the oldest Pip) we had a lead who was able to very convincingly portray Pip from his earliest years, right through adolescence and into early manhood.  Taylor was totally believable in each of his characters' guises, taking the audience through Pip's maturing without any question of doubt that we were watching a young man grow, blossom and then harden to the cruel world around him.

Estella, played by Grace Rowe, was the epitome of stone-hearted - her tutelage by Miss Havisham (played by the delightful Paula Wilcox) into the follies of love and the pursuit and ruination of all men was a delicious foray into the gothic, macabre horror of the soul so often lamented by Byron and Shelly.  Ms Rowe was utterly brilliant; her portrayal of Estella's journey from total acceptance of Miss Havisham's philosophies on love to her own realisation that she has been damaged beyond all repair was played with a sad, sad pathos which at first was the juxtaposition to Pip's blind affections, but soon became the undercurrent for both the lead characters.

Jo Clifford's adaptation doesn't just rely on Pip, Estella and Miss Havisham hold the story, she takes the audience into a world of dark, circus-like horror which catapults the viewers onto an almost surreal and certainly unnerving trip amongst the Dickensian underbelly of life.  Humour is used sparingly, and even then only to accentuate the darkness that follows whilst only Joe Gargery (played by the wonderful Steve North) and Magwitch (played by the uber-talented Chris Ellison) were allowed to hold onto any semblance of goodness.  There was no place for a London friendship for Pip, no place for sentiment from Pip to his sister and certainly no place for any lightening of the mood at the end.

It was great to see so many students in the audience, obviously drawn by the fact that Great Expectations is always heralded as one of Dickens' greatest writings.  What was even more pleasing was that they will have witnessed a version of the story which is the closest to how Dickens wanted his story to be known - it has not the moral ending like Christmas Carol, it is not a rags-to-riches happy ending like Oliver Twist - this has the dark, original ending which left readers feeling so cheated and despondent that he was urged to write an alternative happier ending.

Charles Dickens' Great Expectations, brilliantly adapted by Jo Clifford is on at Darlington Civic until Saturday 20th October.