Brian Rix, the Whitehall Farces, and their successors from the 1950s were part of my life growing up, as they must have been for almost everyone packed into what felt like a matinee for senior citizens of Noises Off at the New Wolsey Theatre, Ipswich, last Thursday.
A jaw-dropping sensation.
Michael Frayn’s frantic farce premiered in 1982 but draws on a long tradition of the genre. Specifically, it was inspired by his 1970 play The Two of Us. One day, he watched a performance from the wings and commented, “It was funnier from behind than in front, and I thought that one day I must write a farce from behind.” Hence, he went on to write Noises Off, which starts at the technical rehearsal for another farce, Nothing On. This creates maximum chaos and complexity, as we have a farce within a farce, with the same actors playing parts in both productions.
It’s set in a modernised mill house, replete with that vital ingredient in farces: doors. There are seven of them, along with three other exits. This set provides the bookends for a middle section, which depicts a matinée performance one month later. The set is turned inside out, and we witness the same opening act from behind, with silent gesturing, mad business, and already faltering relationships.
Finally, the set is rotated back to where we started, but this time it’s a performance in Stockton-on-Tees, at the end of the ten-week tour. Relationships have decayed further, stress is the dominant emotion, and wear and tear have taken their toll on the set and props, causing the actors to frequently abandon the script and ad-lib their way to the bitter end.
It’s a high-energy show that demands physical agility, impeccable timing in both delivery and movement, and the creation of credible, often eccentric characters in both plays. The cast—Hisham Abdel Razek, Ezra Alexander, Clare-Louise English, George Kemp, Harry Long, Hilary Maclean, Russell Richardson, Ailsa Joy, and Gemma Salter—under the tight direction of Douglas Rintoul, create a jaw-dropping sensation that makes one wonder just how they manage to do it. The same goes for the creative team, with sound design by Helen Atkinson, assistant direction by Charlie Flynn, lighting design by KJ, fight, movement, and intimacy direction by Haruka Kuroda, set and costume design by Clio Van Aerde, and wardrobe supervision by Rebecca Rawlinson-Allen—all of whom rise to the occasion. An actual round of applause that afternoon also went to the highly efficient team of stagehands, who physically rotated and rebuilt the set without the aid of a revolve.
This production marks New Wolsey Theatre’s first-ever international collaboration and is co-produced by Queen’s Theatre Hornchurch, Les Théâtres de la Ville de Luxembourg, and Theatre by the Lake. It can be seen at those venues as part of its tour.
