Teachers’ College Play Ungainly Production

Press, Volume CIV, Issue 30809, 22 July 1965, Page 18

Teachers’ College Play Ungainly Production

Robert Bolt’s play, “The Tiger and the Horse,” is concerned with a conflict of duties in the mind of a kind, simple, and intelligent woman. Faced with a decision (whether to sign a petition calling for a cessation of nuclear tests, with the possibility that signing will endanger her husband’s chance of achieving his one remaining ambition), Gwendoline Dean finds it easier to go rather ostentatiously mad. By setting the play in a university background the playwright has a chance to exam ine the attitudes of one (typical?) long-haired undergraduate. These themes may make the play an obvious choice for a student production. Whether it is a wise choice for inexperienced actors is another matter. Certainly last night’s presentation by the Christchurch Teachers' College illustrated the inherent crudities of the play. In spite of an apparently partisan audience the cast seemed ill at ease and failed to rise to any great heights. Christine Apel and Alan Bradshaw, in parts near to

their actual age and experience, gave the best performances, but even these were far from consistent. Jennifer Morton was somewhat out of her depth in her big scene in Act 111, and Brian Taylor lacked the self-satisfied mellowness which is vital to the development of the plot. This was an ungainly production: set construction was crude in the first and last acts; doors were awkwardly placed and opened the wrong way; there was a good deal of cluttering up of entrances: and there were many pointless moves. With the time and talent at its disposal it is difficult to excuse the Teachers' College for mounting a production which is not of a higher standard.

It would be unfortunate, however, if those associated with .“The Tiger and the Horse” were discouraged at this stage. They showed considerable potential talent which, with the right sort of discipline, should develop into something worth while. The season at the Teachers’ College hall will end tonight. —P.S.