Stage Dragon: Relatively Speaking At The Yvonne Arnaud Theatre

Published on: 14 Oct, 2016
Updated on: 14 Oct, 2016

By Ferenc Hepp

Having gone through a major facelift, brand new seating and fresh new look bars awaited us when visiting the Yvonne Arnaud Theatre this week to watch Alan Ayckbourn’s classic, Relatively Speaking.

A scene from Relatively Speaking at The Yvonne Arnaud Theatre. Picture by Nobby Clarke.

The play had its world premiere in Scarborough in 1965, followed by a London premiere at the Duke of York’s Theatre in 1967. It was in fact Ayckbourn’s first West End hit and starred Richard Briers amongst others.

This production features a cast of four; Ayckbourn veterans Robert Powell and Liza Goddard, as well as Antony Eden and Lindsey Campbell.

The play is set in 1965 and we start off in London where Eden and Campbell play a young couple (Greg and Ginny) sharing a small flat.

All seems to be fine between them and they seem very much ‘loved up’ until certain things are discovered, such as flowers everywhere, a strange pair of slippers and numerous boxes of chocolates in a drawer.

There seems to be some suspicion from Greg, but we never get to the bottom of this and these suspicions seem to be brushed aside.

Ginny is then off to an address in Bucks written on a cigarette packet which she says is her parents’ address, but why would she need that written down?

I felt that this part of the show went quite slowly and we were waiting for ‘something to happen’ for quite a while. However, the lady in front of us had a fantastic time with lots of laugh out loud moments and this was just setting the scene for what was to happen later.

After a short pause and a clever scene change, the stage was transformed into the garden of a posh country couple (Philip and Sheila, played by Powell and Goddard).

Credit must go to Peter McKintosh the designer here as the setting is completely changed on stage here in a relatively short period of time, so there must have been some clever tricks going on with the original set to make this happen.

This couple seem to be the older versions of Greg and Ginny, their lives revolving very much round routine. However, all is not all as rosy as it first seems. Without giving away the plot for anyone who is not familiar with the play, Philip and Sheila are not in fact Ginny’s parents and the humour and laughs arrive with abundance in this part of the show, due to the characters not quite knowing what is going on or who they are speaking to, and Goddard’s brilliant facial expressions when these ‘strangers’ turn up in her garden.

I think one of Powell’s lines: “I think there might have been a certain amount of misunderstanding” sums up this part of the play rather well.

Does Greg want to marry Sheila? Who do the slippers belong to? Who is Philip taking with him on his business trip?

The performances from all four actors are quite understated but with an element of humour, with the relationship between Powell and Goddard more believable than Eden and Campbell.

However, a traditional Ayckbourn play with a couple of well-known actors in the cast always attracts a good sized audience in Guildford and this was certainly the case on opening night. People left with smiles on their faces, which is what you really need for a good night out at the theatre.

Relatively Speaking runs until Saturday, October 15, and tickets are available via the website: www.yvonne-arnaud.co.uk or by calling the box office on 01483 440000.