Reviewed: A Respectable Funeral and Hit Man by Reigate Methodist Players

By dtucknott

Double Bill: A Respectable Funeral, Hit Man

Reigate Methodist Players

Rank Memorial Hall, High Street

Reviewed by Derrick Graham

Jimmie Chinn is a playwright whose works form the backbone of many drama festivals as does local author Barry Lambert.

Reigate Methodist Players staged a play from each and director Ginny King achieved a double masterpiece with the productions.

Chinn's A Respectable Funeral is set in the 1980s in the north of England and brought forth some very convincing accents from Sarah Tease (Joyce), Fiona Radford (Evadne) and Jane Emburey (Greta).

The sisters meet in their mother's house after her funeral and provided different characterisations developed after moving away from the family terraced home. Costumes set their style of living and their plans of what to do with the money from the sale of the house indicated their priorities.

Their elder brother Charlie arrives and reminds them that after their father died he worked all hours to provide for the teenage girls and their mother. Keith Lock made a very moving character out of this role - no northern accent but then he'd moved south to Milton Keynes to find work once the girls were married. A very effective mood change was portrayed as the sisters realise what they owe him and agree he deserves to have the old family home.

Lambert's Hit Man was a fast paced drama of a marriage failing, the husband deciding to commit suicide with an overdose, and his wife engaging a contract killer so she is free to go off with someone else.

Kevin Trease was excellent as the despairing husband, realising he'd lost his wife to another man and then encouraging Smith, the killer, to put an end to his misery with a bullet instead of the doped glass of whisky.

But Smith, a very believable out of work accountant played by Clive Greig, tells the husband he should fight back and they go off to the pub for a drink.

The wife, a really horrible character played by Amanda Nobel, returns with her lover, played by Jonathan Framp, who convincingly portrayed a man who has got into a situation far deeper than he wishes.

With no whisky left in the bottle they divide the doped glass left out by the husband, with fatal results.