Red Wall Community Theatre

'Optimistic and educating' World War Two play that made me 'proud to be a Knaresborian'
by John Harris

The title of Red Wall Theatre's latest production at COGS (Centre On Gracious Street) in Knaresborough suggested a rather sober, if informative, event. I certainly hadn't expected an evening of music, poetry and sing-a-long choruses by this Harrogate/ Knaresborough theatre company that made me proud to be Knaresborian. Part of Knaresborough's Feva festival, the setting is a concert to celebrate VE Day, compered by authoritative WVS officer Marjorie Manley, (Jan Williams, who also scripted and directed).

She shares wartime reminiscences, amidst interruptions, the first from officious ARP warden, Horace Hooper (Colin Beveridge) even before the concert starts. He arrives to insist Marjorie digs up her roses to 'put seed potatoes in pronto,' only to leave after agreeing a future rendezvous to sample her rose-hip wine. More challenging for Marjorie is North London child evacuee Mildred (Lizzie Medwell) 'twelve going on twenty,' unimpressed by Knaresborough's charms and desperate to get back to exploring bombsites and sharing a bed with her big sisters. George Formby is off entertaining the troops but older brother Albert (Mick Caulfield) gives a rousing rendition of George's 1940 hit Bless 'Em All, inviting audience participation with much flag-waving. Disappointingly, George demurs from performing the infamous 'Little Stick of..,' citing 'Ladies present.'

More laughter ensues when lovelorn landgirl Edie (Edna Barker) sings the comic lament, 'I'm knitting a singlet for Cecil,' her boy at the Front, supported by fellow 'lumberjill' Netta (Sandra Smallwood.) Both work at Kitchen's Stockwell Road woodyard and Marjorie explains that here land girls are called lumberjills, as they chop down trees to make pit props. While stay-at-home Edie is 'saving herself' for Cecil, extrovert Netta boogies off to the Boathouse Dance Club 'to practise on Italian POWs' as she plans to land an American GI when that country enters the war. Visiting academic Professor McMurdo (Edna Barker) darkens the mood, with video footage of the wars in the skies and the desert, the poems of John Pudney and Keith Douglas movingly voiced by Shan Oakes and Toby Holbrey.

A Berlin nightclub is next the setting for the 1930's song Mack the Knife, Brecht's words warning of the horrors that can follow the democratic election of a hate-filled sociopathic leader. As Marjorie despairs of the special guest ever arriving, we hear a Very Special Guest is coming instead. While excitable housewife Mrs Bradley confirms that the great man visited Scriven Camp that morning and gave her 'a smashin' V-sign,' Churchill (the multi-talented Colin Beveridge) appears. Congratulations abound as he pronounces Knaresborough winner of the Yorkshire championship trophy flag for raising the most funds per head for the war effort.

Joining in the chorus was inevitable when the cast came together in 'This Little Light of Mine,' new words to the old song stressing that each of us, in our own way, can make the world a happier place. We left the hall entertained, educated and optimistic that, even in challenging times, we can win through if we unite and support each other.