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ONE MAN TWO GUVNORS
Review

ONE MAN TWO GUVNORS

April 3 2013

ONE MAN, TWO GUVNORS, National Theatre of GB and Sydney Theatre Company at the Sydney Theatre, 2 April-11 May 2013. Photos by Lisa Tomasetti; main: Owain Arthur and the company; right: Edward Bennett.

It was the Reader's Digest that advised, decade after decade, "laughter is the best medicine" and how right were the Digest's founders DeWitt Wallace and Lila Bell Acheson Wallace. They lived to 92 and 95 respectively and would have adored One Man, Two Guvnors: the rewrite and update of Goldoni's The Servant of Two Masters is a veritable pharmacopeia of laugh remedies.

It began at the National Theatre, toured the UK to rapturous applause; transferred to the West End; was broadcast around the globe to cinemas in the NT Live series; then it went to Broadway and was loved there. A second touring company is on the road in the UK now and this touring company is in the air on an international tour and will be for close to a year. Sydney is the latest destination and the chance to see this fabulous show should not be missed.

Like Goldoni's original, One Man, Two Guvnors is complete nonsense and brilliant all at once. The setting is removed from 18th century Italy to Brighton in the Swinging 60s and Francis Henshall (Owain Arthur) is the man. He's a rotund fellow and passionate about food and food, in that order. His guvnor is Roscoe Crabbe (Rosie Wyatt) who is actually Rachel disguised as her recently deceased twin brother. Because too much is never enough, Francis agrees to another job - doing for Stanley Stubbers (Edward Bennett). Stanley is an upper class twit yet has somehow managed to murder the twin and also have Rachel fall in love with him.

Roscoe was owed money by spivvy Brighton identity Charlie Clench (Colin Mace) and was engaged to be married to his daughter, the gormless but gorgeous Pauline (Kellie Shirley). In his absence, Pauline has fallen in love with aspiring actor Alan Dandle (Leon Williams), and he is also a total goose, but lower middle class. Charlie is desperate for Pauline to marry Roscoe, however, because he doesn't have the money; meanwhile, Roscoe/Rachel reveals her true identity to a hyper-ventilating Pauline and succeeds in having her go along with the disguise for the time being.

Meanwhile, Francis yearns for haddock, chips and mushy peas and a week in Majorca with Charlie's voluptuous secretary Dolly (Amy Booth-Steel) while struggling to keep his employers from meeting and discovering his duplicity. The rest of the plot is as convoluted and absurd and because it's (a) British and (b) the Swinging 60s, there are also layer upon layer of social and cultural jokes and references swirling about. 

ONE MAN TWO GUVNORS

The show is launched and then punctuated by music from a four-piece band that morphs from skiffle to The Beatles (music by Grant Olding), played by The Craze: Richie Hart, Philip Murray Warson, Oliver Seymour-Marsh and Billy Stookes.

Think early Michael Caine (Gambit), two-tone Tonik suits, Carry On films, Joan Sims, Kenneth Williams and Barbara Windsor, the Mini Minor, Absolute Beginners (the novel) Mods and dolly birds and add to that the broad and blue comedy of Frankie Howerd, Benny Hill, Tommy Cooper, Tony Hancock and you have the DNA of One Man, Two Guvnors

It's a volatile mix and the explosions of slapstick, farce, double and treble entendres, intense physical and verbal comedy come thick and fast. The cast, led by the now legendary performance of Owain Arthur, is uniformly terrific and the actors are deceptively at ease with the unrelenting speed, precision and utter conviction demanded by the script and style. Written by Richard Bean and originally directed by Nicholas Hytner (Cal McCrystal, physical comedy) and now under the hand of Adam Penford for the touring production, the show is more than a laugh a minute and deserves every award and accolade showered on it since it opened in 2011.

Anyone feeling even a little under the weather should buy a ticket and if you're feeling fine in the first place, you'll fairly bounce out of the theatre on a wave of exhilaration. This kind of laughter is the best medicine of all.

 

 

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