Past Productions
Gilly's Gem + Ernie's Incredible Illucinations
Great Expectations - Charles Dickens
Under Milk Wood - Dylan Thomas
page last updated 23/05/2011
Dr Arthur Wicksteed Richard Turner
Mrs Swabb Josie Kinnaird
Muriel Wicksteed Julie Cox
Dennis Wicksteed Matt Womble
Connie Wicksteed Mandy Buckley
Canon Throbbing Andrew Cook
Sir Percy Shorter Lady Terry Cox
Delia Rumpers Jo Thomas
Felicity Rumpers Rhianna Liddy
Mr Shanks Richard Kinnaird
Mr Purdue John Birch
The Press Release
Habeas Corpus, which in legal jargon means ‘you have the body’, is Ravenshead Theatre Group’s next offering.
This play by Alan Bennett is one of his wittiest and concerns Dr Arthur Wicksteed’s attempted seduction of his young but secretly pregnant patient, Felicity Rumpers. Meanwhile Muriel, Dr Wicksteed’s much ignored wife, seeks to reignite the spark of an old flame with Sir Percy Shorter (president of the BMA) who in turn is pursuing Connie, Dr Wicksteed’s sister.
Meanwhile Connie, passed by in life’s glamour stakes, tries to enhance her chances by transforming her unappealing body with an ‘outstanding’ augmentation to find Mr Right and so not be saddled with consolation prize, the seedy Cannon Throbbing.
And into the melee fall Denis, Dr Wicksteed’s hypochondriac son, Lady Rumpers, a colonial lady with a something of a past and more of a present than she knows, a trouser dropping appliance fitter and a would-be suicide Mr Purdue.
And above them all the housekeeper, Mrs Swabb, pulls the strings as compare and chorus.
I hope you got all that, but it really does not matter if you didn’t. Come and see who does or does not get whom. Will love triumph over sex? Who might live or die?
Alan Bennett’s hilarious comedy, Habeas Corpus, with our own Ravenshead Theatre Group will be at the Village Hall at 7:30 on Thu-Sat, 19-21 May. This is sure to be a popular show so the best seats will go fast.
Director's notes
Habeas Corpus is my fourth outing as director with RTG (previously - Under Milk Wood, Great Expectations and Oedipus). So this is a bit of a change – into comedy. I was drawn to this Alan Bennett when I saw it some years ago with my wife Christine in the role of Muriel Wicksteed. This is vintage Bennett at his funniest, but without his more recent gratuitous vulgarity.
Elements of the plot set this play firmly in 1964 or 1965. The cultural background is therefore the beginning of the Vietnam War, the rise of the Beatles, death of Winston Churchill, Edward Heath elected as conservative leader, the Auschwitz trails at Frankfurt, Che Guevara leaving Cuba, assassination of Malcolm X, the first spacewalk, The Sound of Music, Mary Poppins, Doctor Zhivago and My Fair Lady are at the cinema, Bob Dylan goes electric and the death penalty is abolished.
But more importantly, as far as this play is concerned, this was the time of the ‘sexual revolution’ and the ‘permissive society’ when social norms became more liberal with challenges to traditional attitudes to sexuality. Society or some of it at least, became more accepting of sex outside conventional marriage.
These fast changing times were associated the availability of the pill and of abortion; a time when pre-war values of morality clashed with those of the emerging hippie generation. But of course 1965 was just a couple years before Hair, Woodstock and the Summer of Love.
But fear not. If the last two paragraphs sound a bit heavy, this show is a very witty comedy; right up there with the best of Oscar Wilde.
I lost count of the times the flow of our rehearsal came to a halt as we collapsed with mirth. I hope you enjoy tonight as much as we have enjoyed putting this show together.
Alan
Bennett
Many consider Alan Bennett to have achieved the status of 'National Treasure'
although it is doubtful that he would see himself in those term. His life's
output, other than Habeas Corpus which will shortly be performed by Ravenshead
Theatre Group at the Village Hall includes work for stage, television, film,
radio, book and even CD and cassette.
Born in Armly, Leeds, Yorkshire in 1934 he is noted in performance for his
strong regional accent. His career started in academia as a student at Oxford
where, following a first in history, he stayed to research and teach Medieval
History. However success in Beyond the Fringe at the Edinburgh Festival with
Dudley Moore, Peter Cook and Jonathan Miller called him to the stage and more.
His first play was 40 Years On and was staged in 1968. There followed plays for television, radio as well as screenplays. 'Habeas Corpus' is also one of his earlier works but already we see his humanity reflected in the fallible aspirations of the characters; a preoccupation with sex and aging and regret for opportunities not taken are major themes of this play and of others.
One of the most bizarre incidents in his life, if incident is the right word, concerns the way he let a Mrs. Sheppard park her van in his drive in Camden and live in it for 15 years. It became the subject for a small book and a more substantial play, The Lady in the Van as well as a section of Untold Stories.
Other than Habeas Corpus Alan Bennett's best known works are the film and play about the Madness of King George, the monologues for television Talking Heads and more recently the play and film of The History Boys for which he clearly drew on his earlier experiences as a teacher.
His major recent written work, Untold Stories, reflects something of a clearing out of the cupboard where his looks back over the whole of his career from the early days, in Armly, through the period of his mother's death up to the present. He probably saw it as his last work, to be published after his death, as he was suffering from cancer at the time. Although his orientation was known for some time it is really only here that he publicly 'came out'. However the cancer went into remission and a further memoir, The Uncommon Reader, appeared in 2009 along with the stage play, The Habit of Art.
He maintains an unassuming style, having refused an honorary doctorate from Oxford; he has also declined a CBE and a knighthood. He still lives in Camden, we understand, with his long time friend, the magazine editor, Rupert Thomas.