Revue So Far Out It Misses The Bus

Press, Volume CIV, Issue 30739, 1 May 1965, Page 16

Revue So Far Out It Misses The Bus

This year’s students’ revue is so far out that it missed the bus nearly all along the line. It was not very witty, seldom subtle and never hilarious.

The sketches were nearly all very short, and seemed to labour to bring forth a mouse of a laugh. If spontaneous, topical, undergraduate unbending is to give way to more sophisticated revue then both the material and the presentation will have to be better conceived. The ballets, however, were first-class. The ballet mistress, Judy Cooper, managed to produce routines that were exciting and fresh: helped by imaginative costuming and stiumulating music, the dancers all exuded personality and vitality. David Hindin had more to do than any other performer and certainly demonstrated his versatility as a character actor: as the modern artist at work and as the fusty chairman giving his committee’s judgment on the Bible he was at his best. Gerry Orchard and Jeremy Agar both showed potential as actors in this style of revue. There were, of course, some very funny lines and a few first-rate parodies: the epic re-enactment of “How TTiey Brought the Good News from Ghent to Aix,” and the abridged version of “Waiting for Godot” were well worth seeing. The only attempts at sustained fun were based on Mr Bond and Dr. Kildare—but once again the games were hardly worth the candlepower. A satiric look at the service one might get in a stationery store was almost too true to be really funny. The partial failure of this year’s show should make some pertinent points about the difficulty of reconciling the resources of an undergraduate cast (even one heavily bolstered with well-gradu-ated graduates) with the de-

mands of commercial-theatre revue.

Certainly, if this style of entertainment is to be tried again next year, some machinery for pre-testing material must be organised, for it might take 50 attempts, 50 good ideas on paper, to produce an evening of lively entertainment for the general public.