The Arden Players create an interesting, gripping piece of theatre from a nugget of 13th Century history. Dealing with greed and corruption in the church, the story follows Francis de Bernardone and tells of his revolutionary acts resulting in an new order of Christianity. This story is cleverly re-told through well-defined characters and a clear plot. The script has a natural flow with comic moments dotted throughout, giving the piece a certain charm and supplying some welcome relief to an otherwise heavy subject matter.Tad Jones doubles up roles for the corrupt Father Augusto, Bishop of Perugia and the Sultan Al Kamil. Father Augusto has strong stage presence, emphasised by his powerfully manipulative voice and wicked tongue. When Jones changed roles to Sultan Al Kamil the accent felt forced and he appeared to struggle with it, however after a short time the audience came to accept him as the other character. Francis (Matthew McCollum), the honest Godly figure, provided an excellent contrast to the corrupt Bishop. McCollum’s performance, though nervous at first, was of a good standard, able to portray a complicated character.The production fell down, however, because of the technical conventions used in the performance. The music in the black-outs promoted a tacky, cheap feel to the piece, a feeling also achieved by donkey sound-effects elsehwere. The final scene employed three spotlights on three characters facing the audience, yet talking to each other. This was sadly a predictable and ineffective way of ending the performance as it was clear that a ‘dramatic last scene’ was being striven for.The production catches and maintains one’s interest and delivers an entertaining, well-acted drama.
