Appleby College - Argus Yearbook (Oakville, Ontario Canada)

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It is now many years since that lazy but irrepressible Russian- blooded genius of the theatre, Peter Ustinov, wrote what is probably his most successful play, Romanoff and Juliet . Its popularity both on stage and as a film may be attributed to the solidity of its dramatic ar- chitecture. It is a beautifully craf- ted piece of stage writing. It has a good plot. It is very clever. What succeeds, however, on the professional stage is not necessarily ideal material for a School Production, which makes all the more creditable and wor- thy the achievement of Appleby College in producing such a solidly competent and at times inspired version as that seen on the College Stage, April 22 - 24. I suppose in a sense, you could say that Peter Ustinov cheated in stealing such a sure-sell plot as Shakespeare ' s Romeo and Juliet but since the great bard himself was not averse to borrowing here and there, I think he would be rather amused by the way Ustinov has made the story a vehicle for political satire. It is great fun and Appleby ' s boys together with the young ladies from St. Mildred ' s Lightbourn School obviously sensed the par- ticular style Ustinov has given his own play. Ustinov ' s demands on the resour- ces of the actors, designers and technicians are fairly excessive and the Appleby production had to contend with these in a per- forming space that is woefully inadequate, for even the simplest dramatic presentation. Sight lines from the flat gymnasium floor are simply appalling, there is virtually no wing space and only the scantiest lighting equipment. From all this unpromising situation, the students contrived a technical wonder: an exposed two-storey house on either side of the stage with a fully operational clock-tower in the middle distance. Of course, the top floors nearly touched the ceiling of the stage, and nobody could enjoy the carpets which I am assured were laid for the comfort of the actors! And what about those actors and actresses. Well of course you cannot expect uniform professional excellence from a cast of relative beginners. The remarkable thing is that a general high level of acting WAS achieved. Satirical material is not the easiest thing to handle: how well these young people un- derstood the demands of the script! In the cast of thirteen, certain performances stood out. Tim French and Edward Dickens as the First and Second Soldiers respectively, developed well the buffoonish nature of their roles as did Richard Wilson as the Spy. As the American Ambassador, Hooper Moulsworth, Hartland Paterson gave and endearing performance. His pomposity was entirely appropriate to the character. The way Hartland sustained it was extraordinary.

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ii Romanoff and Juliet 55 The play taken on by the Dramatic Society this year, Romanoff and Juliet , offered its audience a differen t type of drama from the musicals usually seen on stage at the School. This play, by Peter Ustinov, reflects the various stupidities of in- ternational politics, but makes its statements by the vehicle of exaggerated personages going through their motions in an at- mosphere of vague and remote fantasy. The satirical barbs thus strike the audience with a clarity made all the more stark by their complacement, somnolent background. The light-hearted focus of the story was the apparently doomed love of Romanoff and Juliet, the son and daughter of the Russian and American ambassadors. Chris Zahovskis in the role of Romanoff, conveyed with con- sistent discipline the determined helplessness of this Russian ideologue who has seen his world shattered and remade in an encounter with love. Maureen Mcllveen walked, as Juliet is supposed to, crassly, roman- tically beside her Russian coun- terpart, contrasting his severity with flightiness. The character who brings the two of them together, and without whom all the relationships of the play would fall apart, was the General played by Milind Pendharkar. This difficult role, which necessitates an attentive toying with the audience, was handled by Milind with the affection for detail more natural to a genuine drink-carrying diplomat than to a student portraying the part - a fine achievement. Special praise belongs to the supporting cast, who saved their roles from the danger of caricature by acting with sen- sitivity and variety of emotion. Tim French and Edward Dickens played two soldiers with a political conciousness they could have carried in a wheelbarrow, but they gave their characters a complexity of feeling which made them real. The same can be said of Har- tland Paterson and Phillipa Hall- Brooks - the American am- bassador arfd his wife - who, while typically American, were sympathetically genuine. Charles Stacey and Elizabeth Woodliffe as Vadim and Evdokia Romanoff, the Russian opposites of the Moulsworths, depicted more than adequately the spectacle of cold politicizing brought low by sen- timent. Perhaps the most drastic turnabout of the plav was the one produced in Freddie , the American boy, played by Ian Cameron, and Marfa, the female Russian army comander, played by Amanda Keay. This tran- sformation displayed more than any other the tendency of all the characters not to conform to but, instead, to escape from their types. The one to steal the show, however, was Alasdair Halliday in the role of the Archbishop. With his competent sidekick, a reformed spy, played expertly by Richard Wilson, the Archbishop held the stage and the audience for the entire final act, a feat achieved by the best piece of ac- ting in the show. The skill of Alasdair ' s portrayal combined with the pageantry and colour of the closing, brought the play to a rewarding and satisfying con- clusion. It was a night made en- joyable by the evidence of hard work from many hands showing its successful fruits on stage. P.J.

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Amongst the ladies of St. Mildred ' s, I was particularly taken with the carefully modulated intensity of Philippa Hall-Brooks. At times, she managed to inject a kind of con- trolled hysteria into the anxiety she felt for her daughter Juliet Moulsworth (played by Maureen Mclleveen). Amanda Keay also had come to grips with the humour in her part as Marfa ZIotochienko, the loyal party member come to correct a suspicious decadence in the household of the Russian em- bassy to the smallest country in Europe. The subtle chemistry of an actor finding the essence of his part defies analysis but when it ac- tually occurs nobody can mistake it. It certainly did happen for Alisdair Halliday as the Ar- chbishop. This was a small but sparkling mature performance from a young actor of great promise with a natural sense of how to manage both himself and an audience. A parting word. Congratulations to the sound man: and who put the desk upstairs in the Russian Embassy with the front facing to what would have been a wall?