Adderbury Theatre Workshop – Calendar Girls

This was a Great Show!  Back in March we did a Contact interview with ATW chair Karen Dwyer who planned to celebrate their 50^th anniversary over this year and next – but wanted to kick off with a big impact show – and there’s none bigger than Calendar Girls! The hit West End play adapted by Tim Firth from the original film was a real challenge – it’s an expensive licence with very strict controls and the obvious other demands – but they were going for it! To cover costs and be able to make their usual charitable donations they decided to put on no less than six shows. So was it all worth the hours of planning, casting, rehearsal and trauma?
Firstly Karen and director Paul Cox had to find seven members of the ATW team willing to bare all – no problem!? – and how they revelled in their characters!
So congratulations to Alison Heath as controlling Chris, Diane Grant as the soon to be widowed Annie, Linda Leslie / Su English as deep-thinking Jessie, Aud Humphrey as the mixed-up WI pianist Cora, Laura Szekely as the golfing feminist Celia  –and Suzie Taylor as the reluctant Ruth. All such good sports!
We opened with the typical jam and Jerusalem WI with lots of bitching and Lisa Smith perfect as the officious Chair. Now enter Annie’s husband John, (Andrew Green – more perfect casting) lover of sunflowers, but now terminally ill, and then the need to raise funds for a new sofa in the hospital waiting room!
Chris’s nude calendar idea takes hold and with gradual persuasion and a great deal of vodka the fun begins. This was ATW at its very best with the girls clearly loving it as much as the audience who wildly applauded each and every month’s scene. Especially for Celia – larger than life – who had to call for ‘considerably bigger buns’/

Spare a thought for the poor photographer having to endure all this hardship – a perfect night for Lewis Coles!

Then on to WI HQ for Chris’s awesome speech, and the amazing success the project created. The ensuing conflicts and emotions amongst the girls were all brilliantly played – a lot of food for thought in there!

There were some lovely cameos throughout – Jamie Cox as Chris’s mocking husband, the evergreen Wendy Gardner as Lady Cravenshire and the M&S cake, Lucy McKenna (more WI mocking) and Ashley Dwyer as the health spa gossip/

As ever the background stuff was spot on – great visuals, minimal but very effective props, Gill Osborne’s wonderful costumes – loved Celia’s Santa outfit! – and all backed throughout by Val Scarff’s haunting piano.

Then with a poignant finale, and a hearty standing ovation we left with barely a dry eye in the house, and a free packet of sunflower seeds!
So Karen was it all worth the huge effort?  You bet it was – you just nailed it!!

Well done ATW

Nick Fenn