Show: On Golden Pond
Society: Lighted Fools Theatre Company
Venue: The Mill Studio, Yvonne Arnaud Theatre,Guildford
Credits: Ernest Thompson
Type: Sardines
Author: Nigel Dams
Performance Date: 25/10/2018
On Golden Pond
Nigel Dams | 31 Oct 2018 18:03pm
On the very weekend the clocks go back signalling the goodbyes to another summer and plunging us into the winter gloom, Guildford’s Mill Theatre, courtesy of The Lighted Fools Theatre Company, offers up ‘On Golden Pond’ reminding us of the passing of time and the inevitability of the future.
If that sounds all rather depressing this production certainly is not! Ernest Thompson’s play, better known perhaps from its award winning screen version with Henry Fonda and Katherine Hepburn, is full of shade and light, humour and pathos, joy and sadness and ‘The Fools’, under David Hemsley-Brown’s assured direction, neatly explore the fragility and perception of life.
Norman Thayer Junior – was he the original Grumpy Old Man? – is back with his long-suffering wife Ethel at their summer vacation log cabin on the lake that is Golden Pond.
He’s about to celebrate his eightieth birthday and there’s not much right – even the telephone, the family photographs on the mantelpiece and the mosquito door screen are bones of contention. And to make matters worse Chelsea, the daughter Norman always wanted as a son, is about to arrive with soon-to-be new husband Bill Ray and equally soon-to-be stepson Billie Ray. And lurking in the background is Charlie, the local postman who always wanted Chelsea for himself.
And so the plot thickens as do the biting mosquitoes from the lake and the wailing loons on the water.
You have to feel sorry for Norman as his faculties desert him, cross with him for wasting his life seemingly not loving his daughter and delighted that, in his dotage, he perhaps comes good with an enduring relationship with his step grandson Billie.
Richard Parish is, as one would expect, quite outstanding as Norman. Did the Fools founder choose ‘On Golden Pond’ with himself in mind for the part? No one could have played it better.
And for those of us who know Sue Pollard from elsewhere the only question is – why has it taken her so long to make her debut with the company as Ethel? Sue shines through with all the skills she learned as a professional actor and dancer in a former life. Ethel is the long suffering wife and Sue beautifully brings that characterisation to life. May Sue return time and again to The Fools.
Also debuting is thirteen years-old Harry Jarvis as Billy. An assured performance from a teenager who could also do no wrong with a longer attachment to the company but sadly there are probably not so many roles for young actors in this genre.
Polly King never lets the side down and her Chelsea is no exception whilst real life husband Eddie as Charlie, the postman, and Nick Lund as Bill Ray complete an exceptional cast making for an equally exceptional evening’s entertainment.
So is everything all too late on golden ponds, or elsewhere for that matter, or is that quite simply life and aging? Enjoy it whilst you can!
- : admin
- : 25/10/2018