By Douglas Kruger
HOW much production value does it take to make a show outstanding?
Andrew Lloyd Webber replicated an entire opera house for Phantom, complete with subterranean tunnels. Each night began with a crashing chandelier and newbies in the front row wetting themselves.
Travel to Vegas and you can sit within the world’s largest sphere, dedicated entirely to larger-than-life productions. It features 580,000 square feet of shimmering LED screens on the outside and a 16K-resolution wraparound screen within. This is backed up by wind machines so that your viewing of, say, the tornado scene from Wizard of Oz becomes utterly immersive. You’re right beside Dorothy, grit whipping at your face, watching two men row by in a storm that spans horizons.
Iron Maiden will inflate a giant Eddie monster. Go the Disney route and ingenious puppeteers can make entire African landscapes materialise before your eyes, complete with flowing rivers made of cloth.
Great fun.
But it turns out you don’t need any of it.
For a truly unforgettable evening, get yourself an Ommaroo Hotel. Add food and mix in three actors. No stage, no props, no fancy lighting. Best show I’ve seen in quite some time.
The Ommaroo has always looked stunning at night, its Victorian façade lit up and reflected on the water. We toddled down there last week for a dinner show based on the old comedy hit ‘Allo, ‘Allo!
Remember the opening accordion music? Believe it or not, that first played 43 years ago, launching what was possibly the naughtiest, sauciest, raunchiest comedy ever to sneak by the censors and become a cult classic.
I sincerely doubt you could make anything like it today and that’s a prudish shame. In fact, the BBC rejected the idea of a reboot, for fear of “causing offence”. What’s offensive about a sexually explicit comedy that mocks national stereotypes?
Packed with double entendre, most of the characters in the original were French, though not a single French actor played any of them.
And it translates so well into dinner theatre.
The logistics were simplicity itself. We, the audience, are seated at our dinner tables, as though we are in René’s iconic café. The actors, just three covering all of the parts, then move about between the tables, dolling out bits of the show between courses.
A single talented actor played Herr Flick, Lieutenant Gruber and, suspiciously, René’s wife, Edith, who flashed us a great deal, and repeatedly left lipstick kisses on one audience member’s brow. He wiped them away several times, only to give up when they were replaced.
The second actor played a very harried René, but also Officer Crabtree. His ability to correctly mispronounce every word in a sentence at pace was genuinely impressive (“Good moaning! I was pissing by the door when I heard two shats!”).
Finally, there was Yvette. Ah, Yvette!
She swooned, she minced, she feather-dusted audience members. She disappeared upstairs for her 9:15 with the wet celery and the flying helmet. Best of all, she begged René to “old her, squeeze her, crush her in his big, strong arms”. (Cue Edith and “You stupid woman!”).
Oh, and she even smothered my head into her bosom at one point. I suffered nobly through the ordeal for the sake of art. I may go back and suffer through it again tomorrow.
The same actress then switched wigs and accents and somehow even body language, and instantly became Helga, locked into her uptight and dysfunctional relationship with Herr Flick. “You may kiss me”.
And the story?
Well, it’s the same every time, isn’t it? The producers of ‘Allo, ‘Allo! somehow pulled that off for ten straight years without ever running out of steam and so we got a condensation of all the most memorable bits packed into one glorious evening.
It began with René’s famous soliloquy: “I suppose you are wondering why…”
We then fell down a rabbit hole of duplicate knockwursts, forgeries of the Fallen Madonna with the Big Boobies by Von Klomp, barely disguised onion sellers and British airmen who were apparently secreted somewhere in the café, though René himself had lost them and had to search beneath tables.
The airman spent the entire evening being…well…just voices in the distance (“Halloooo!”). Same for Edith’s mum, a disembodied voice who banged at the walls and complained about the food.
It worked like a bomb. Or if you prefer, like an exploding knockwurst.
Kudos to the actors, who had been up since 3am in order to get to Jersey on time. And to the Ommaroo for a fine meal and a wonderful show. More, more!
Dinner theatre works a charm in Jersey. Foregoing the need for giant sets, big budgets, scads of support staff, it relies simply on good food and strong actors.
We attended the Beowulf production a couple of years back and it was magic. The audience is in the Mead Hall and a small crew of actors make it all come to life. The same for A Christmas Carol, which was absolutely brilliant.
There’s talk of Fawlty Towers coming to the Island. I have every confidence it will be booked out instantly, because the concept works.
If you get the chance, go. Dinner theatre in Jersey is a rare treat. And try the onion soup, it is a rare French delicacy.
Douglas Kruger is an author and speaker based in Jersey. His books are all available via Amazon and Audible.
