![](https://www.sardinesmagazine.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2022/10/20221012_184930.jpg)
Show: Countess Jeanne And The Necklace Scam
Society: London (professional shows)
Venue: The Drayton Arms Theatre. 153 Old Brompton Road, London SW5 0LJ
Credits: Written and Directed by Bern Hogan.
Type: Sardines
Performance Date: 11/10/2022
Countess Jeanne and the Necklace Scam
Marie Antoinette never actually said “Let them eat cake!” apparently… that’s if you trust in playwright, Bern Hogan’s, latest offering currently playing at London’s Drayton Arms pub theatre (until 22 October). I should have said the posh part of London where the myriad of estate agents don’t wince at listing rental properties for a whopping £6-7k per month!
After my shock at the capital’s property prices my surpise continued as I went to watch Bern’s ‘professional’ debut above the pub. I remember directing the same person on the ‘amateur’ circuit just over ten years ago in Glengarry Glen Ross. How times change eh. So shocked was I at this turn of events that I’ve even interviewed Bern inside the new edition of Sardines about his new direction, although it may not have been possible without a couple of local amateur companies closing down. The cost of costume and props hire would probably stopped Bern’s new direction (pun intended) before it had begun had he and fellow producer, Sophia Danes-Gharbaoui, not acquired a lot of items from the respective ‘amateur’ stores. That’s what Bern and Sophia told me anyway.
So the new play: Countess Jeanne and the Necklace Scam, a four-hander comedy set around the real-life scandal involving a woman named Jeanne de Lalois-Saint-Rémy, a descendant of the French nobility (‘Jeanne de Valois’ in this play), and how she attemped to ‘relieve’ Marie Antoinette of the necklace and its diamonds she intended to buy (worth a staggering 1.6 milliom Livres – a lot of money!). That’s not all though; Marie Antoinette was also involved in the scandal and would never receover her reputation – right up to the point in the French Revolution where her head was chopped off.
The play is a long way from Bern’s most resent offering, In His Wake, which was centred around the playwright’s upbringing in Ireland and performed just a few weeks before lockdown at Beckenham Theatre Centre (now sadly closed). It opens just after Jeanne de Valois’s fatal fall fom a window (was she pushed?!). Her ‘spirit’ looks back over her life, meeting Marie Antoinette and the entire necklace scam.
The accents start off with a heavy French twang before changing to British via all of Vicky Pollard’s mates. As Jeanne de Valois (or ‘Comtesse de la Motte’ as she preferred in real life), Isobel Lamers is impresses in her stage debut in the leading role. Elise Williams makes a splendid Marie Antoinette while Hannah Moss and Joshua Jewkes play multiple roles throughout and have the real fun, with Moss taking on the pivotal role of Cardinal Rohan among others and Jewkes, Retaux de Villette as perhaps his most important part.
It’s interesting that on opening night, while the house was fairly full, there were no big belly-laughs from the audience, perhaps the occasional titter. That could mean the action was very wordy and confusing despite the fast pace of the onstage action. I’m not convinced that the entire audience understood what was happening before them. Perhaps a look at the script might pay dividends. But nevertheless an admirable prefessional debut.