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 The
Cicala Players in: Lady be Careful by Stafford Dickens
Staged: - 30 November and 1 December1965 at Cripplegate
Theatre Golden Lane London
 Reader beware,
as the the first few sentences of Martins Bank Magazine’s review of “Lady be
Careful” are a blistering attack on members of staff who either stayed at
home to watch TV, or purchased a ticket and then did not bother to turn up at
the theatre rather than come out to the theatre to support the Cicala
Players! In 1965, much of Martins Bank’s accounting procedures are still
manual, and as they play was staged over the month end November into
December, there will have been some branches at which the work did not
balance first time, and whose members of staff will have been stuck at their
desks and behind their counter positions long after 5pm. It does seem a
little unfair to criticise them for then missing the play, or feeling so
tired they just wanted to go home and put their feet up! Despite everything so far mentioned, there
was still a fair turnout of paying audience members, and the requisite number
of staff to be able to stage the play…
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 ‘Mikes yer
sick, dunnit? Work yer blinkin' 'eart out, annen wot? Nuffink! Ah'm all
right Jack, 'n the best o’ British to you!’ Those bitter words of a former
batman came to mind as the curtain rose at the Cripplegate Theatre to show
Captain Nick Bates (Peter Henty) arriving on leave at his flat and. with
anticipatory eyebrows aflap, phoning his girl friend. The stage, the
setting and the theatre were excellent. The attendance of 60 was about the
same as on the previous night. Of course it was the first of December, so
the night before had been the month end. hadn't it? And everyone knows what
that can mean in banking—a wonderful get out. One can even pay for a ticket
and not use it. That shows willing, doesn't it? Then one can nip off home
and get stuck into all that tripe on the telly, can't one? After all one
did finish late, didn’t one? It was a good reason/excuse, wasn't it?
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Change partners ? Gill Mann and Peter
Henty dance
while husband (John Collins) and fiancée
(Joan Burd) look pensive
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But
enough of that! Six playing members,
a producer, and at least a dozen others from stage manager to helper
managed, along with about 120 people, to get away from their offices in
time to enjoy the Cicala Players’ production of Lady—be careful, a farcical
comedy by Stafford Dickens, produced
with customary flair by Renee Forder.
All
the ingredients for happy nonsense were provided—the charmer already installed
in the flat (Gill Mann) whose husband's failure to appreciate her has led
her to tell him she is having an affair with the Captain (most embarrassing
the fellow showing up, but how else to create a situation?) Gill Mann made
a grand job of a difficult role despite the flinty antipathy of Joan Burd
as the fiancée who, though she got her man in the end, would make quite
certain that he conducted himself thereafter as an officer and a gentleman.
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A
woman feeling she is not appreciated by a husband who agrees with
everything she says, makes friends with the alleged boy friend, and
promptly approves the idea of divorce as the pair seem so well suited,
would really be up against things in real life, never mind in a stage
farce.
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Gill
Mann coped convincingly and this seemed a pity, for her professor husband
(John Collins) was such a patently nice chap. and no fool as it later
transpired. Peter Henty had the hardest and longest role. He tackled it
happily and deceived nobody, not even his admirable foil, Parker, the
general factotum for the flats. With panache and gusto George Kent squeezed
every ounce from a fruity, earthy role. The character who almost stole the
show was the seedy private detective (Clive Willis), leching at every door,
carefully documenting the 'guilty party', and deftly scoffing the whisky.
The
plot? Oh yes. there was one (and that's a pleasant change!) and everything
came right in the end. But the highlight came in the few minutes in the
second act when it really looked as if the players were making a farce of a
farce. The audience was convulsed. Unfortunately this was followed by some
overtime by the prompter. Pity so few were there to see it, innit? But they
enjoyed themselves, dinnay? Perhaps more would have come if the tickets had
been marked NEW! 3d OFF!!!' That really fetches ‘em these days! Mikes yer
sick, dunnit?
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Clive
Willis helps himself, watched by an admiring George Kent
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 M
Sep3M x
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