Stellar performances in The Long Weekend
Arts/Life
Posted By ALWYN HORSCROFT
Updated 4 months ago
COBOURG – The Northumberland Players production of The Long Weekend is not quite a normal Norm Foster play, in that this one doesn't have his regular 'poignant' section. It is funny, sometimes hilarious, throughout. It is a really great evening out, and the cast consists of four of the area's best, and best-known, actors.
To tell much of the story would spoil it for anyone who goes to see it, so let's just give you the opening situation. Max and Wynn Trueman, played by Jamie Hunt and Heather Jopling, have bought a rather large (second) house in the country. Max is a lawyer and Wynn is a psychologist who also writes.
They have invited Roger and Abby Nash, played by Dave Clark and Beth Hunt, for the weekend, ostensibly for Wynn to give Abby a copy of her new book which is to come out next day. We quickly gather that there is not only friction between the husbands and wives, but also between the two couples.
The story develops from there, and that is where we'll leave it. The four players have encompassed their characters well. Wynn, as the psychologist, doesn't mind practicing her science on her husband. She is very self-assured, and as a result Max has become a bundle of nerves and gets up-tight very easily.
Abby is in the design business. She owns a shop and is very opinionated about style and colour. She and Wynn are best friends from 'way back, but Wynn is obviously scared of what Abby is going to say about her decorating.
Jack Boyagian is the director, and he has worked with his cast to give them easy movement around the set, and the designer, Keith Emery, has given them easy access to the outside, both to the barbecue area and coming into the house. There is just the one set, with a change of some of the props and furniture between acts. It all works very well.
Our visitors, Abby and Roger, are also interesting characters. Abby, all dressed up and very critical of other people's decorating, is also a bit of a slob and dumps things around. Roger is a former mathematics teacher who has quit work to write a book. He got started well enough but then got a writer's block over one word. Abby and Roger, of course, disagree about the outcome of that.
I really can't divide this cast up to show their abilities or disabilities. There isn't a weak link. They are all excellent actors and have absorbed their characters and fit right into them so that they are totally believable; word perfect, too, I would suspect.
Since the Northumberland Players recently changed their audio system, and no longer use individual microphones, many of their old problems have disappeared and I only once heard a slight edge of feedback.
The lighting is always good for the dinner theatre shows, and everyone can be clearly seen wherever they are on the stage.
The Long Weekend runs on Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays for the next two weekends, until May 2. For tickets call 905-372-2105.
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