A bomb in the lobby? No, that’s a Pack of Lies
IT WAS dramatic enough on stage as it was — with Finty Williams and Chris Larkin playing a suburban couple asked to spy on their neighbours — but then a woman in black calmly walked on stage, told the actors to leave and asked audience members at the Menier Chocolate Factory to depart the building, immediately.
We waited outside the theatre while bomb disposal officers checked out a suspicious bag found in the lobby. False alarm.
Williams, Larkin, Tracy-Ann Oberman and the rest of the crack cast led us back to our seats and the show went on. The make-believe on stage was thrillingly better than the real-life incident.
Pack Of Lies (which originally starred Finty’s parents, Judi Dench and Michael Williams) was inspired by a real case, and I felt that writer Hugh Whitemore would have chuckled at all the goings-on. But he’d also have been impressed that the actors didn’t miss a beat.
Sadly, the playwright, who also penned Stevie and Breaking The Code among many other theatre, TV and film productions, died in July. He will be remembered at a memorial at St George’s, Kensington, on Wednesday.
Actors Joanna David, Derek Jacobi and Richard Clifford are speaking, along with producers Frank Doelger and Tracey Scoffield, who made the Churchill miniseries The Gathering Storm.
Others expected to attend include Penelope Wilton, Simon Williams, Timothy West, Zoe Wanamaker, Antonia Fraser, Joan Bakewell and Edward Fox.