Ayckbourn Moments: Damsels In Distress

Ayckbourn Moments is a monthly feature highlighting photographs held in the Ayckbourn Archive illustrating significant events in Alan Ayckbourn's career.

Damsels In Distress

Copyright: Scarborough Theatre Trust (to be confirmed)

This week in 2001 saw the launch of a new play by Alan Ayckbourn called GamePlan; the first part of a plan to restore a repertory company plan to the Stephen Joseph Theatre, Scarborough.
The photograph - sadly not of the greatest quality - is the earliest image held in archive of the Damsels In Distress company which would be the first Scarborough company to entirely transfer into the West End.* It features Alan Ayckbourn (centre) and (left to right) Alison Pargeter, Saskia Butler, Beth Tuckey, Bill Champion, Tim Faraday, Jacqueline King and Robert Austin.
When the photograph was taken though, GamePlan was just one part of a duology alongside FlatSpin and there were no grand intentions for the plays other than a tour. However, during rehearsals for FlatSpin, Alan Ayckbourn announced he had an idea for a third play, RolePlay - utilising the same company and set as GamePlan and FlatSpin if the company were interested.
At this point, the Damsels In Distress trilogy was born which proved to be a huge success in Scarborough with audiences and critics. This response - and the productions are still fondly remembered in Scarborough - led to Alan Ayckbourn taking his Scarborough company to the West End with the trilogy opening at the Duchess Theatre in September 2002.

* To be strictly accurate, Robin Herford and Lavinia Bertram did take the two-hander Intimate Exchanges into London from Scarborough in 1983; but Damsels in Distress was the first time a substantially sized company had transferred en masse to the West End.

Relatively Speaking: reviews round-up

The West End revival of Relatively Speaking at Wyndham's Theatre has now opened and reviews are being published.
This page will be offering a summary of the major reviews over the next few days with links to the full reviews.
Relatively Speaking is directed by Lindsay Posner and stars Felicity Kendal, Jonathan Coy, Kara Tointon and Max Bennett. It can be seen until 31 August.

Reviews

The Guardian (Michael Billington) 4/5 stars
"Although it is delightfully done, the evening's success is due to Ayckbourn, whom we consistently underestimate. He is as funny as any of the classic comedy writers and, in this early piece, showed how prolonged misunderstanding can become a source of painful truth."
Click here for full review.

The Times (Libby Purves) 4/5 stars
"This deft — if dated — verbal farce of social misunderstanding is intriguing as well as enduringly funny: a memento of lost mores.... with elegant Ayckbournian cunning, hysteria rises from beneath the wisteria."
Click here for full review (paywall).

Daily Telegraph (Charles Spencer) 4/5 stars
"The comedy is so clever, and the laughter so frequent, that it is only at the end that one realises quite what a monster the philandering husband is."
Click here for full review.

The Stage (Mark Shenton)
"What’s immediately clear, in Lindsay Posner’s pitch-perfect period production, is what deep, sometimes uncomfortable waters ripple beneath the surface of this comic portrait of two relationships - one just starting out, another long-established - that collide hilariously, but also sadly, in an atmosphere of comic distrust."
Click here for full review.

The Arts Desk (Matt Wolf)
"Far nervier than its study in middle-class mirth at first lets on, Relatively Speaking hands Felicity Kendal her giddiest stage assignment in years, and she is well served by a Lindsay Posner staging that once again gives Ayckbourn pride of place: the man of the moment (to co-opt one of his subsequent titles) as alert on domestic malaise as he is attuned to a surefooted craftsmanship that holds up, and then some, all these years on."
Click here for full review.

London Theatre Guide (Peter Brown) 4/5 stars
Relatively Speaking is more complex than a simple comedy. Underlying the humour are issues about trust, honesty and commitment, so that even if we are no longer shocked by the sexual relationships the play exposes, there are still themes which are as challenging and relevant today as ever they were.
Click here for full review.

What's On Stage (Mark Valencia) 4/5 stars
"Relatively Speaking, short, sweet and savage, has been a regional stand-by for decades for two very good reasons: it's an expertly-constructed laugh-fest that punches way above its weight, while its modest constituents (two sets, four actors) are just the thing for theatres in cash-strapped times. Lindsay Posner's revival freezes the play in 1965, the year it was written, and reveals that even as a 20-something writer Ayckbourn had pinpointed genteel suburbia as a hotbed of infidelity and desperate housewives."
Click here for full review.

The Londonist (Sebastian Mann)
"This is the first West End run of Relatively Speaking since its premiere in 1967 - I wouldn’t risk waiting another 46 years to see it return."
Click here for full review.

Metro (Claire Allfree) 3/5 stars
"Felicity Kendal is terrific as the cuckolded wife, delightfully juggling various wrong-ended sticks before finally getting her revenge, while Jonathan Coy is powerfully plausible as her ugly, old-school chauvinist husband."
Click here for full review.

Last updated: 1.45pm, 22 May 2013 (Metro)

This Week In HIstory: 20 May 2013

Our regular feature in which the News Blog offers a glimpse at significant Ayckbourn events in the equivalent week of years past.

20 May: Broadcast premiere of Alan Ayckbourn's Service Not Included on BBC2 in 1974.

21 May: World premiere of Alan Ayckbourn's A Small Family Business at the National Theatre, London, in 1987.

22 May: World premiere of Alan Ayckbourn and Paul Todd's revue Mere Soup Songs at the Stephen Joseph Theatre In The Round, Scarborough, in 1986.

23 May: World premiere of Alan Ayckbourn and Paul Todd's revue Boy Meet Girl at the Stephen Joseph Theatre In The Round, Scarborough, in 1985.

24 May: World premiere of Alan Ayckbourn's GamePlan at the Stephen Joseph Theatre, Scarborough, in 2001.

25 May: World premiere of Alan Ayckbourn and Paul Todd's revue Girl Meets Boy at the Stephen Joseph Theatre In The Round, Scarborough, in 1985.

This Week in 2013: Alan Ayckbourn's first major hit - Relatively Speaking - is now at Wyndham's Theatre in the West End until 31 August. Its stars Felicity Kendal, Kara Tointon, Jonathan Coy and Max Bennet. Elsewhere, Robin Herford's production of Intimate Exchanges is currently playing at Colchester's Mercury Theatre until 22 June.

To find out more about Alan Ayckbourn and other notable events during his life, visit www.alanayckbourn.net.

Time Of My Life: Inspirations

Alan Ayckbourn's is reviving his 1992 play Time Of My Life this summer at the Stephen Joseph Theatre, Scarborough. Each week until the blog will be looking behind the scenes of the play at its history.
We continue our exploration of Time Of My Life with Alan Ayckbourtn discussing one of its significant inspirations.

Time Of My Life is essentially a play about how we fail to appreciate the important moments of our life; so obsessed are we with looking back or forwards, we fail to recognise the good times - the time of our lives - as they are happening.
It is also a play which explores time, it shows events past, present and in the future all leading to (or from) a pivotal unseen event. It explores how time can be used on stage, moving backwards, leaping forwards and also present in second-by-second real time.
But here we're looking at a third inspiration - a rare instance where Alan Ayckbourn can point to specific experiences which influenced the writing of a play. It has frequently been noted in books and articles about the playwright, how at restaurants his attention can wander to what is happening on other tables and here, the playwright explains, some of the experiences which influenced Time Of My Life.

"The table next to me is an invaluable source of insights into character. I just can't help it. Inevitably someone, somewhere, is having a more interesting conversation than I might be, and that's not to insult who I'm with!
"Women often seem to use restaurants to talk things over. They know that there's nothing much for men to hide behind except the menu when they ask the inevitable 'What is going to happen to us?'
"It's a situation where people are sitting face to face, in a small space, for a considerable amount of time, with possibly the assistance of alcohol.
"I remember once a man and his wife, or girlfriend, were talking in very low tones which suggested they were having some sort of guerrilla-like argument. He was getting very angry. Then he suddenly leaned right across the table and lowered his voice even further, but just as he spoke the music playing finished and there was a lull in the restaurant. I heard him say: 'Shall I hit you now, or wait until we get home?' It was the most terrifying line I had ever heard.
"Another time, I watched a couple arrive at a restaurant looking happy. Then things started to look grim and suddenly he was gone. She was just left sitting there, with her plate, crying.
"It was as though I had seen a whole relationship disintegrate over dinner."

Copyright: Alan Ayckbourn

Time Of My Life is in repertory at the Stephen Joseph Theatre, Scarborough, from 6 June - 4 October, 2013. Further details about the production, schedule and how to book can be found at www.sjt.uk.com.

Ask The Archivist: West End Revivals

Ask The Archivist is a regular feature allowing you to put your Alan Ayckbourn related questions to the playwright's archivist Simon Murgatroyd.
If you have a question regarding any aspect of Alan's work, email it to: admin@alanayckbourn.net (labelled Ask The Archivist) and we'll publish any interesting questions.

Question: With Alan Ayckbourn's Relatively Speaking now back in the West End, how many of his other plays have had West End revivals?

Answer: Surprising few, particularly when you consider more than 35 of Alan Ayckbourn's plays have transferred to the West End since 1967.
The first Ayckbourn play to have a West End revival was How The Other Half Loves in 1988. This had originally been staged in 1970 at the Lyric and in 1988, the Greenwich Theatre's production of the play transferred to the Duke Of York's Theatre marking the first West End revival of an Ayckbourn play.
Since then Absurd Person Singular has been revived twice (1990 at the Whitehall and 2007 at the Garrick) and Bedroom Farce has also been revived twice (2002 at the Aldwych and 2007 at the Duke Of York's).
In 2008, The Norman Conquests trilogy was famously revived at the Old Vic and the following year Woman In Mind was revived at the Vaudeville Theatre; the same venue where the original London production was held in 1986. Season's Greetings was notably revived at the National Theatre in 2010.
Last year (2012) saw two further revivals with Absent Friends and A Chorus Of Disapproval both revived at the Harold Pinter Theatre.
Which brings us to 2013 and the current revival of Relatively Speaking at Wyndham's Theatre. This means 11 of Alan Ayckbourn's plays have had West End revivals.

To submit your question to Ask The Archivist, email Simon Murgatroyd at: admin@alanayckbourn.net  labelled Ask The Archivist.

Returning To The West End

Forty-six years ago, a play with no expectations by a playwright with a West End flop behind him opened in London. It's success was unexpected, immediate and thrust its author into the spotlight.

Felicity Kendal in
Relatively Speaking

The play was Relatively Speaking by Alan Ayckbourn and tonight, almost five decades after it last appeared in the West End, the play returns to London.
Relatively Speaking is a pivotal play in Alan Ayckbourn's playwriting career. It was his breakout play, enjoying phenomenal reviews during its London premiere and it still remains one of his most popular works today.
Despite this, it hasn't been seen in the West End since the original London production closed in 1968 making tonight's return a notable revival.
The production is directed by Lindsay Posner and stars Felicity Kendal, Kara Tointon, Jonathan Coy and Max Bennett. It previously toured last year to great success leading to a West End transfer.

Kara Tointon in
Relatively Speaking

Much as Relatively Speaking is credited with launching Alan Ayckbourn into the wider public eye, so another of Alan's most famous works - The Norman Conquests - is seen as a pivotal moment in Felicity Kendal's career, the success of which in 1973 is credited as launching her theatre career (and subsequent to which, she would find even wider fame on television). This is her first appearance in an Ayckbourn play since that production.
Kara Tointon's first experience of the West End was Jeremy Herrin's acclaimed revival of Alan Ayckbourn's Absent Friends last year - a production lauded by both the critics and the playwright himself.
Relatively Speaking has a limited run in the West End and can be seen at the Wyndham's Theatre until 31 August 2013. Further details about the production, performances and booking can be found by clicking here.

This Week In History: 13 May 2013

Our regular feature in which the News Blog offers a glimpse at significant Ayckbourn events in the equivalent week of years past.

14 May: Broadcast premiere of Alan Ayckbourn's Woman In Mind on BBC Radio in 2000.

18 May: Television premiere of Alan Ayckbourn's Time And Time Again on ITV in 1976.

19 May: London premiere of Alan Ayckbourn's Confusions at the Apollo Theatre in 1976.

This Week in 2013: Tomorrow night sees Alan Ayckbourn's first major hit - Relatively Speaking - return to the West End for the first time since it launched him to fame in 1967. Felicity Kendal, Kara Tointon, Jonathan Coy and Max Bennet appear in the production which is at Wyndham's Theatre until 31 August. Elsewhere, Robin Herford's production of Intimate Exchanges is currently playing at Colchester's Mercury Theatre until 22 June.

To find out more about Alan Ayckbourn and other notable events during his life, visit www.alanayckbourn.net.