Before I begin my personal critique of See how they run, I thought it might be helpful to include a little background information. This is a play set in the 1940’s, during WW2 in England. It was originally done by Phillip King. The cast is in their late 20’s- 70’s. This play is full of confusion and mayhem, a true comedy. There is a crazy old woman who believes the vicar’s wife is having an affair and meddles in their business, the maid Ida is trying to keep peace. As these people start showing up, more and more characters are thrown into the mix. An old male friend of Mrs. Troop’s, her uncle, and a family friend. The last straw is a prisoner who escaped from the army and causes trouble in the household. All of these characters are trying to hide secrets from each other and it all becomes very chaotic and hilarious, the audience unsure of where it will go next.
I went to see “See How they Run” on November 20th at 3:00 pm. This play was a rollercoaster of feelings. The play began with the wife upstairs singing, and every few seconds you hear “la la la, la la la”. I understand that it might have been an important piece in the play but they did it too many times and for too long, in my opinion. I was so annoyed by this that it actually took me a while to relax and enjoy the play. However, I did begin to relax and then there was a constant crying baby. It cooed and cried and made so many noises that it took away from the play, the woman after 15 minutes of sitting there finally stood up and took her baby away. By away, I mean to the back of the theatre, not even outside of it. It was so distracting and so disrespectful for everyone that had bought tickets. Now, with all the negativity aside, I’ll get into the good parts of the show because there definitely was many. The audience was very reactive, laughed a lot and seemed to really enjoy the show. My personal favorite part was just before the intermission as everything started getting really chaotic.
The acting was so big and over extenuated- I loved it! They always made their faces and actions known to the audience. The director definitely made use of levels and movement throughout the play. There was standing, sitting, running, jumping, punching, ducking and rolling on the floor. There was stage fighting, and blocking involved. The actors always turned toward audience. The clothing was appropriate for the time, with the exception of Mrs. Troops. She was an ex-actress who was moving forward and not stuck in the times. At the beginning of the play she is wearing a housecoat even though there was company present. Later she wore a pantsuit. The other ladies, Ida and Mrs. Skinner were traditional. They wore long dresses, with tights and hats. There was a part of the play where everything became chaotic, and the reverend, Mr. Troop, had his clothing taken by the spy. Mr. Troop comes out wearing boxers, with a table cloth over top, and a tank top. It was hilarious because it was so unexpected.
The whole stage was utilized as the actors were walking upstage, downstage, left and right. As well as utilizing the 3 doors and set of stairs. Almost everything on stage was used at some point in the play. When I first sat down I took a look around and thought the golden rule is “everything on stage has a meaning”, I wonder what they’ll do with those. The director, Wendy Collins, even took into account the smallest details. She put trees out the backdoor so you knew it lead you outside. There were three main elements that I thought were interesting. There was a pillow with a UK flag on the chair. Even though you knew they were English by their accents it helped make the point that they were in-fact in the UK. The newspaper that was picked up was very old, probably from the same time as the play- 1940’s, during WW2. My third notice was the shoes of the prisoner. All the men in the play had clean black dress shoes, but even when the prisoner put on the priests clothes his big, dirty combat boots were still noticeable. Lighting was another element. There were many projection lights focused at the stage. To set the scene there were 3 lamps on stage. One important thing was the lighting that came from the back door. At the beginning of the play it was light, so they had used bright lights to convey this. By the end it was dark, and they had switched the backdoor light to dark blue to show the time change.
