Future for Luing drama remains in good hands
Everyone likes a good murder mystery and the capacity audiences at the recent Luing Amateur Dramatic Society’s performances of The Great British BumpOff thoroughly enjoyed three excellent shows at Cullipool Hall.
Slightly adapted with local references from the two-act play by Lesley Gunn, the plot centred on the unlamented demise of ‘the queen bee’ judge of an annual island baking competition whom everyone disliked and had good reason to bump off.
Luing’s well-deserved reputation for the quality of its baking made the choice of play all the more appropriate.
Ably played by Helen Thomson, Patricia McLaren blackmailed her fellow baking judge Eduardo D’Angelo, handsome Italian TV chef (suave charmer Gregor Shuff) and the ladies’ man chairman of the fete committee Major Gordon Watt OBE (rising star John Morgan). She also accused Hilary
Stanton (the delightful Fiona Cruickshanks), business owner of Bakes and Buns, of cheating by buying her competition entry cakes from Tesco.
In true Agatha Christie style, the murderer could have been almost any of the play’s quirky island characters but what was different in this case was that towards the end the audience was invited to ask questions of the cast and to guess who it was. This ensured active audience participation and kept everyone guessing until the last moment.
What was also remarkable about this show was that it saw the debut as director of 20-year-old Hazel Cruickshanks, and what a very fine job she made of it.
The young Luinneach demonstrated that she was the opposite of the Patricia McLaren character by leading her team in a harmonious and positive way that was reflected in the way the cast clearly enjoyed the whole occasion.
As the ever reliable actor Kay Benn said in thanking Hazel on stage afterwards: ‘We’ve all had the greatest time you could imagine.’
There was strength in depth too in the large cast of experienced actors with Joan Morgan as a hippy baker who used dodgy ingredients, pink-wigged Mary Whitmore as the smitten admirer of celebrity chef Eduardo and Pam Baker as Oban’s accomplished answer to Sherlock Holmes, well supported by Rachel Cruickshanks and Sarah Ferguson.
However, with his specially grown moustache, cravat, pipe and upper crust accent, John Morgan practically stole the show with his brio and humorous quips. He seemed to be enjoying himself as much as the audience did.
Even the music links between scenes were brilliantly chosen such as The Galloping Major by Stanley Holloway and Dean Martin’s That’s Amore which had audiences singing along to lines like: ‘Bells will ring ting-a-ling-a-luing.’
This show was a splendid community effort with a large number of volunteers of all ages working behind the scenes to ensure everything went off well on the night.
The Isle of Luing has a long and renowned tradition of amateur dramatics and these performances made it abundantly clear that its future is in good hands.
Norman Bissell