St Nicolas Players Spalding

Review by June Atkins, BBC Lincolnshire website

 

It's that red glow, the dilated pupils, that rush of swoon, that ahhhh moment. Ain't love grand? It can be, it's been proven, it's a fact, it makes the world go round. St Nicolas Players have other ideas. Bunch of cynics! By the time we left the theatre we all had something to think about!

 

'Cole Porter' suggested 'Let's fall in love' and Beverley Moore convinced us we could. That was soon short lived when Arline Evenden decided Alan Bennett's monologue 'Bed Among the Lentils' about a Vicar's wife whose passion for the sherry and alter wine and an even bigger passion for a young Indian shop owner would serve us up a different helping of love and it did. The love at first sight, the fairy tale ending, the honeymoon period we never want to end, the girl next door, and the 'Alphaman' typical Mills & Boon hero. 'I could feel my flush deepen as our eyes met across a crowded room. I longed to feel the touch of his lips on mine, his caress igniting a deep passion in my loins!'. Got the message? Good!.

 

St Nic's selection of short plays, love songs and poems allowed an evening of raw truth. From David Ives 'A Sure Thing' Through to Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet. A generous helping of genius from all our actors/actresses. I have to say Karl Gernert's performance from Les Miserables 'Empty chairs at Empty tables' was brilliant, as indeed was the whole company performing Victoria Wood's  'Ballard of Barry & Freda'

 

A very unusual fresh evening performed with a passion (excuse the pun) that exercised the believer and the cynic to look again at romance. Love touches us all in many ways, what could be, will be, has been. St. Nicolas Players left no stone unturned, a very humorous and imaginative production.