Bill Bray remembers an age of intimate review:
Those Were the Days. The days of "intimate revue" were comparatively short and, when the public tired of the vogue, it disappeared rapidly. There were, of course, the much larger, spectacular revues from the pre-war days of C B Cochran and George Black. They continued into the fifties with the long string of Crazy Gang shows at the Victoria Palace, and the Folies Bergére Revues at the London Hippodrome.
The 19-year-old Shirley Bassey made her London debut and stole the notices from the star, Jimmy Edwards, at the Adelphi, in Al Read's revue, Such Is Life, which ran for over a year. Smaller in scope, were the impresario Laurier Lister's revues such as Pieces of Eight and Share My Lettuce, which dispensed with chorus girls and spectacular scenery, but tried to jump on the latest theatrical trend by including sketches by Harold Pinter performed by Beryl Reid. Kenneth Williams, Maggie Smith and Fenella Fielding made their first West End appearances in Share My Lettuce.
The Royal Court Theatre, bombed in the blitz, re-opened in the 1950's with a small scale Laurier Lister revue Air On A Shoestring (1953) featuring Moyra Fraser and Flanders and Swann. This was before the theatre was targeted for an initial 3-year lease by the English Stage Company, bringing the Look Back In Anger revolution.
The intimate revue, sometimes with a cast of one and a pianist (à la Joyce Grenfell), included At The Drop Of A Hat, at the Fortune Theatre in 1958. It featured the comic songs of Michael Flanders and Donald Swann. Flanders had served in the Royal Navy in World War II, contracted polio and was paraplegic. He moved about the stage in a wheelchair. Swann was anchored to his piano. It was very successful and was followed by At The Drop Of Another Hat which was equally popular.
In the same theatre in 1961 came the sensational Beyond The Fringe with Oxbridge students emerging into the world of theatre. Alan Bennett, Jonathan Miller, Peter Cook and Dudley Moore soon moved into television satire with That Was The Week That Was (directed by the late and lamented Ned Sherrin) and Not Only But Also etc. Beyond the Fringe was very successful but it was the last gasp of the intimate revue in theatre as it swiftly moved to television in a plethora of programmes including Monty Python's Flying Circus. Television had now taken over the form.
Intimate revue in theatre had its heyday during the forties and fifties when it offered a lucrative career to performers, writers and musicians. I still remember favourite moments. Beatrice Lillie was a comic genius who rarely performed in London as she grew older but I was weak with laughter at her weaving sketch:
"I've lost my warp right up my woof and I can't
get the bloody thing back."
I remember, too, Joan Heal in the very successful The Lyric Revue (1951), complaining, at a time when the cleaning of old masters had become a controversial issue:
"I'm a half-cleaned dirty portrait and there's nothing quite as gruesome
Than to hang upon the wall
In the sight of one and all
With one clean and one extremely grubby boo-som."
At the same time there was a big drive to export British goods and Heal and Graham Payne appeared as figures on a willow pattern plate and sang,
"We're ornamental oriental export rejects."
The ambitions of intimate revues were modest and their success was largely due to clever writers, good performers and skilful directors. The satire was tame by the standards of Private Eye and Rory Bremner. When Noël Coward wrote his song "Don't let's be beastly to the Germans" for a wartime revue it caused a bit of a stir. The satire was lost on so many that the BBC banned it.
Ross Holland and Paul Wharton are giving us a taste of that era of comparative innocence in their re-creation of Flanders and Swann. I have seen them doing it and they are very good. You will enjoy it a lot.
Ben Gaston writes:
Due to unforeseen circumstances outside of our control we have been forced to make a change to our advertised season. Our November play "The Breath of Life" has now been withdrawn and in its place we are very pleased and excited to be bringing you "An Evening with Flanders & Swann".
As a result of a chance meeting in 1948 Michael Flanders and Donald Swann formed a musical partnership that led to them performing around the world and becoming two of the most loved performers of their generation.
Their revue shows "At The Drop of A Hat" and "At The Drop of Another Hat" featured a mix of songs and comic monologues with both men famously remaining seated, Swann behind his piano and Flanders in a wheelchair (he contracted poliomyelitis in 1943). Over the course of 11 years they gave more than 2,000 performances.
Perhaps their most famous songs come from the many they penned regarding different beasts. Most of us are familiar with "The Hippopotamus", "The Gnu" and "The Warthog".
Our evening will feature Paul Wharton at the piano and Ross Holland on the words, both of whom have much experience performing the work of these two musical giants. Hosted by Alan Goodwin, directed by Colin Hill and with the skills of Paul and Ross the evening promises lots of fun and laughter and I've no doubt a chance for all of us to sing along!
Be sure not to miss this welcome addition to our 60th anniversary season.
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