Welcome to Huntingdon Drama Club’s production of
Hay Fever
Directing ‘Hay Fever’ marks my return to Huntingdon Drama Club after a
brief hiatus that ended up lasting about three years! I’m very pleased to
find the Club lively and vibrant – and full of new faces. However, I’m
probably the ‘new face’ to many of you, so I’ll give you a quick résumé.
I first joined Huntingdon Drama Club back in the mists of time (actually
about 11 years ago), having been previously involved with amateur
dramatics in London, Godmanchester and Vancouver (yes, the one in
Canada). I appeared in several HDC productions, of which my favourite
was ‘The Real Inspector Hound’. I also directed three plays for the Club.
It’s hard to pick my favourite there, because one was the incredibly funny
and surreal ‘Picasso at the Lapin Agile’ by Steve Martin, but the other two
were (in the words of Ernie Wise) ‘plays wot I wrote’. I am proudest of the
last one, ‘Worlds Apart’, which seriously threatened to out-surreal Steve
Martin.
It’s great to return to directing, which I adore and have missed. I must
praise my stellar cast and crew, who have worked very hard whilst (I hope!)
enjoying themselves. I’d run out of space if I tried to name everyone who
has helped, but I want to record a special thank you to my Producer, Ann
Monk, who has relieved me of all the tiresome details and relentlessly
dotted all the ‘I’s and crossed all the ‘T’s. Thanks also to Brampton Drama
Club and OCAG for inviting us to put on this production.
Noël Coward designated ‘Hay Fever’ a ‘light comedy’, and that it is, with
plenty of opportunity for histrionics and what is best described as
sophisticated farce. Directing this has been a challenge – as you have
probably surmised, it is not my usual choice of play. In its own way,
however, it too is surreal. And very funny. You will see a family of drama
queens take centre stage – much to the consternation of their hapless
weekend guests. Very quickly, the fine line between real life and high
blown fantasy begins to flicker and fade. (Hmmm – perhaps my sort of
play, after all.) As is typical