T’is Pity She’s A Whore

RoughCast Theatre at the Fisher Theatre, Bungay

Review published in the Eastern Daily Press, 26 April 2010

T’is Pity She’s A Whore

Forbidden love (incest), obsessive jealousy, teenage desire and problems endured by parents wrapped in gruesome revenge are the ingredients of the latest from RoughCast Theatre given two interesting innovations.

Written about 1630, this is a post-Elizabethan/Jacobean classic, drawing heavily on Romeo and Juliet, Othello and other revenge tales. What RoughCast do is to make it relevant to a modern audience.

The first big experiment is to to combine young actors from regional company The Keeper’s Daughters, with regular and older performers from RoughCast. The result is a realistic generational conflict. Directed and produced by Mark Finbow and Emma Martin, they take convincing parts themselves.

Young players Ryan Hill and Alice Mottram bring style to the doomed sibling-lovers. Danny Ridealgh and Adrian McKeogh complement the strengths of Simon Evans, Amy Gibbons, Pat Quorn and Paul Barker.

The second, effective development is a traverse stage, the audience halved across a rectangular space, the action brought closer to more people. The relationships between older and younger people ring totally true, and the quality of acting prevents the savage cruelty becoming comic.

Recommended for all ages.