Spring Production 2010 – Don’t Dress for Dinner!

Wednesday 21st – Saturday 24th April 2010

The curtain came down on Saturday 24th April, sadly, on our Spring production, Don’t Dress for Dinner! by Mark Camoletti, adapted for the English stage by Robin Hawdon.

This is a true French farce, and follows the antics of Bernard who is hoping to weekend in the country with his chic Parisian mistress Suzy. He has arranged for a cordon bleu cook, is in the process of packing his wife Jacqueline off to her mother, and has invited along his best friend Robert as a suitable alibi. It’s foolproof. What could possibly go wrong? Well … hilarious confusion piles upon hilarious confusion as Bernard and Robert improvise at breakneck speed

For this production, we were pleased to welcome new member Stuart Forsyth from West Meon. Thanks to Ria Edmenson, also taking a role, for her poster illustration.

Vivienne Heller wrote this about the play in the Hampshire Chronicle the following week:
“Premiered in 1985, Marc Camoletti’s French farce is equally as pertinent today for an audience hooked on the marital intrigues of Bruni-Sarkozy and sundry other celebs in the gossip mags. And as an antidote to Election fever, the gloriously inconsequential Don’t Dress for Dinner is as good as it gets.

Bernard’s plans to spend the weekend with his Parisian mistress go awry when his wife, Jacqueline, cancels her trip away on discovering that her secret lover – Bernard’s best friend and intended alibi, Robert – is due to visit.  Chuck a canny agency cook into the mix, and you have all the ingredients for a dramatic feast.

With seasoned sleight of hand, Camoletti shuffles his character cards, manically producing all manner of combinations and confusions before plucking a perfect resolution out of a plot replete with identity theft and double entendres.

It’s a fun conceit from a sterling cast carried by the superb Ria Edmenson as dewy ingénue Suzette, who can add ‘instinct for a fast buck’ to her cordon bleu credentials. Delivering tongue-twisting lines with astonishing verbal dexterity, she was a youthful foil to the formidable Sally Williams as the conniving wife, and her nemesis, Suzanne, who circled each other with the pathological loathing of cougars competing for the kill – a contrast to the palpable friendship between Richard Perkins and his put-upon alibi, Stuart Forsyth, for whom an aggressive ice-tongs incident never reached more than 2 on the Richter Scale.

Despite French manicures and Sherpa supermarket bags, the setting could have been as much a Hampshire farmhouse as a Gallic retreat; and, indeed, the capacity audience took the play to their hearts, always laughing on cue in celebration of a dramatic triumph.”
Also appearing were Cheryl Brennan as Suzanne and Ian Monier-Williams as George. The producer was Angela Ledsham and the director was Tim Day.