Who Needs Sleep Anyway? Regional Tour
29 May – 08 June, 2007
NAPPY SLAPSTICK HITS THE SPOT!
Otago Daily Times - Reviewed by Barbara Frame May 4, 2007
Roger and Pip Hall's assignment was to dramatise Plunket's century of history, and to make it fun.
The result is a bright slapstick comedy in which episodes from Plunket's annals (Truby King takes on the mission of helping New Zealand mothers and saving their babies, Karitane Hospitals start up, and so on) with snippets of social history (baby farming, campaigns for flouride and car seats) and milestones from the life of Baby P (from feeding and the horrors of nappies through to the first schoolbag), who is played gleefully by the very adult sized Mark Neilson. Neilson and Sara Best as the starchy, irreproachable and very nice Nurse Daisy are the only actors with single parts, while Joel Allen, Cheryl Amos, Kelley Young and Craig Geenty swap almost seamlessly between multiple roles (my favourite was Cheryl Amos' take-off of television personality Jude Dobson). Mostly it works.
The set is bright and nursery-like, the pace unrelenting, and the production has a generally bright and polished air.
Sometimes, though the tension between informing an audience and entertaining it shows: now and then the good humour degenerates into banality, and the jokes are not always as funny as we expect from a Hall play.
Still, Who Needs Sleep Anyway certainly hit the spot with last night's large audience, almost certainly consisting largely of people who have been both Plunket babies and Plunket parents, at its world premiere at the Fortune last night.
FROM DELIGHTED PATRONS FROM VICTIM SUPPORT
What can I say – I’m still laughing!!!! What a fabulous play. We all enjoyed it so much and it was great to have real belly laughs (heaven knows that part of me needs lot of exercise). The seats (front row) were excellent and it added so much to the performance as we got full blast of Baby P “sucking” on his dummy and various other objects!! Amazing performances but such an interesting mix – part comedy, part drama and part documentary. I have today strongly encouraged our Team members unable to join us on Friday, to get their tickets and see this brilliant play.
Blessings and congratulations to all at the Fortune and a HUGE thanks again from the Victim Support Team.
