A talented cast of sixth formers from Magdalen College School really impress in their 80 minute romp through four of Chekhov’s farces. The quartet is comprised of The Dangers of Tobacco, The Proposal, The Bear and The Wedding Festivities and the strong performances and excellent comic timing help to make it a very entertaining show.
Topping and tailing the evening is Nathan Sames as the lecturer Nyukhin in The Dangers of Tobacco. He has been told to present a lecture about the harmful effects of smoking, but repeatedly gets distracted from his subject by talking about his controlling wife and, as his levels of drunkenness increase, his unhappiness at home and his desire to run away. Sames is very strong throughout this surely nerve-wracking monologue, and keeps good control.
The strongest of the four farces, The Proposal, rapidly follows, bringing much laughter from the audience. Kirill Lasis is fantastic as Lomov, a hypochondriac suitor who has come to ask for his neighbour’s daughter’s hand in marriage. However, before he manages to propose he repeatedly gets into ridiculous arguments with the daughter, whilst simultaneously suffering from various bodily complaints. Lasis together with the father, Louis Paine, and the daughter, Jenny Matthews, are lightning fast with the dialogue, whilst never letting the pace get away from them.
After a seemingly redundant scene change swapping the sofa from one side of the set to the other comes the very enjoyable The Bear, yet again featuring strong performances from the young cast. Laura Sullivan plays the widow Popova, who thinks of herself as inconsolably bereaved, and Gus Mills (also director of The Proposal, and an impressive eater of apples on stage) is the bear in question, a man who comes to collect a debt and gets more than he bargained for.
The last of the quartet is The Wedding Festivities, which is a rather more hectic affair, not least because there are eleven people on stage at the same time. This section doesn’t quite have the tightness of the others and so feels a little more rushed, though Kirill Lasis is once again hilarious, this time as an ageing naval officer who steals the scene with a completely incomprehensible, very funny speech that definitely included the word fo’c’sle.
Magdalen College School should feel very proud of the quality of this show, particularly if it is true that they put the whole thing together in the space of three weeks, amongst maths exams, Waynflete projects and UCAS applications. The short run at the Burton Taylor Studio is a good chance to refine things before they transfer to the Edinburgh Fringe in August, and they deserve a very silly, very successful trip. ★★★★☆ Deborah Sims
