Noises Off

By Robert Iles - 14th Dec 2011

It's after midnight and Garry, Frederick, Belinda and Brooke, hapless actors rehearsing the trouser-dropping farce, Nothing On, are confused. Should Dotty be holding the newspaper or the sardines? Should there even be sardines? What's gone wrong with all the door handles? And where the hell is Selsdon Mowbray? A month later the troupe hits Goole, and tempers are fraying, hearts are breaking and the riotous fun on-stage is paralleled only by volcanic excitements off-stage. But will the crises turn the comedy into a catastrophe? Can the show go on? Everything desperate director Lloyd Dallas does to make things better, just makes things a little worse.

Madness rules and you will rue the day you said yes to a part in Nothing On, the play-within-a-play in Michael Fryan's hilarious farce Noises Off. Stunning, high-energy performances from TV and stage glitterati visibly and emotionally breakdown as the play-within-a-play disintegrates in front of our very eyes. Oh what torture it must have been signing up to, and acting in, a tour of a frightful play with an inept cast, directed by a philandering fool, visiting the back-end of empty theatre across the land! This collection of negatives, converges in an all-embracing theatrical romp to lighten these dark evenings of chill and gloom. A classic farce that had us all rolling in the aisles. Now, where did I put those blasted sardines?