Play Readings

We have just had two very successful play readings, to fill the two weeks before the AGM.

The first was Separate Tables by Terence Rattigan. Sue Beck put this forward as a potential play that she would like to direct.

Separate Tables is the collective name of two one-act plays, both taking place in the Beauregard Private Hotel, Bournemouth. The first play, entitled "Table by the Window", focuses on the troubled relationship between a disgraced Labour politician and his ex-wife. The second play, "Table Number Seven", is set about eighteen months after the events of the previous play, and deals with the touching friendship between a repressed spinster and a retired English army officer, Major Pollock. The secondary characters - permanent residents, the hotel's manager, and members of the staff - appear in both plays.

The second play was Accidental Death of an Anarchist by Dario Fo. This is being put forward by Godfrey Forder.

The play is a farce based on events involving a real person, Giuseppe Pinelli, who fell - or was thrown - from the fourth floor window of a Milan police station in 1969. He was accused of bombing a bank (the Piazza Fontana bombing). The accusation is widely seen as part of the Italian Far Right's strategy of tension.

The events of the play itself, however, are fictional. The play opens with Inspector Bertozzo interrogating The Maniac, a histrionic character, on the first floor of the police station. The Maniac, however, constantly outsmarts the dim-witted Bertozzo and, when Bertozzo leaves the room, intercepts a phone call from Inspector Pissani. The phone call lets the Maniac know that a judge is due at the police station to investigate the interrogation and death of the anarchist. The Maniac decides to impersonate the judge, and successfully does so. He gets the police to re-enact the events, in the actual fourth floor room, and also involves a woman journalist who is trying to probe the events

Both play readings were well attended and everyone who came both weeks seemed to enjoy themselves.

Productions With Other Groups

Nick Moon has been cast for a lead role in the EODS production of ‘Crazy For You’. Performance dates are: 25-29 May 2010.

Douglas Dalziel has just been cast in Shakespeares, A Midsummer Nights Dream also with EODS, as Snug the Joiner. Performaces are in July, dates to come.