“Kitch”, by James Norcliffe, Directed by William Lennox. Shirley Boys’ High School. July 17 to 20. Running time: 8pm to 9.20pm (approx.)
James Norcliffe will be remembered as one of the contributors to the “New Zealand Heritage” series, and it seems that one of the fruits of his researches was the discovery that a certain Viscount Kitchener once passes through Christchurch. Kitchener was apparently a military gentleman of some note, and his name has now been rescued from obscurity by the pen of Mr Norcliffe. The play, which is named after him, centres on a school cadet corps’ preparations for an inspection by the field-marshal. Pupils rehearse a mechanised “three cheers” ritual, some bogus policemen appear and take away the school teachers trousers and so everyone either hides in dustbins or goes to Sumer. Kitchener quite reasonably, chooses the latter.
It was once cogently argued (by Jeff Nuttall in “Bomb Culture”) that the Goon Show originated from the absurdity of British National Service in the Hoomb era. Certainly, that seems to be the central principle behind “Kitch” and there seems no reason why it should not work in the same way – it has a competent and experienced director, and a literary author with a keen sense of farce.
Its main weakness is in the voices of the cast: 15 years ago, every school playground rang with Secombean neighings, but today’s education even fails to teach pupils a basic Milliganese grunt. Lines are thrown away by the pageful, the very necessary padding of business tends to be rushed, and even though the script is in the places very funny it cannot quite take treatment like this; of course all this will be considerably improved as the season progresses.
Even on the first night, though, there were plenty of good things about the production. Nicholas Dangerfield put it off to a good start as Captain Withers, and Philip Burn drew a lot of laughs with his suicide and protracted resurrection. As other officers, Nicholas Hawes and Philip Cook both has the makings of a good performances, and Philip Harding, as the headmaster, showed a laudable ignorance of the principles of lighting a pipe.
Craig Hibbert and Mark Doran both showed plenty of disciplined liveliness as the leading boys, and there were also competent showings from Craig Dickson, Ross Kieth, and Nigel Lawry. Petrina Months presented a sinister, veiled, transvestite form lurking at the edge of the stage, and was impressed with Peter Weekes as the bogus constable, though I thought he might have been clearly identified as such on his first appearance.
Pieces of verse in the script were badly delivered, but could, I think, work well. Indeed, there is nothing basic at faulty with either the script or the director’s conception and by the last night episodes like the duel with brandy-snaps and the paper bagged staff-meeting should be quiet hilarious- all needs is better voice work and a more confident playing to the audience.
Photo credit – Lawrence Skurr (left) and Craig Hibbert are two of Canterbury’s representatives at the national team of individual squash
championships in Hamilton at the weekend. Twelve competitors from the province are taking part.
