Aldwych Farces Vol. 1 [DVD]

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Before the screening, film historian Geoff Brown will be in conversation with Mark Newell, author of the new book, “Oh, Calamity!” – The Lost, Damaged and Surviving Films of the Aldwych Farces and Farceurs, talking about the Aldwych films and their theatre origins, aided by film extracts and publicity stills. The Aldwych Theatre was built in 1905, named after its street location. sits on. The Aldwych Theatre was built as a pair with the Novello Theatre by designer W. G. R. Sprague. The piece opened on 4 July 1927 and ran for nearly a year. Travers made a film adaptation, which Walls directed in 1932, with most of the leading members of the stage cast reprising their roles. A newlywed man gives shelter to a damsel in distress in his wife's absence, and has to head off scandal stirred up by his interfering sister-in-law. The play was first performed in 1926 at the Aldwych Theatre in London, the third of the Aldwych farces, [1] and ran for 409 performances. [2] In 1930 Walls directed a filmed version of the play, with most of the same performers, and the piece has been revived and adapted as a musical.

Leslie Henson and Tom Walls co-produced the farce Tons of Money in 1922 at the Shaftesbury Theatre. This was a great popular success, running for nearly two years, and they collaborated again, moving to the Aldwych Theatre. Walls secured a cheap, long-term lease on the theatre, which had fallen so far out of fashion with playgoers that it had been used as a YMCA hostel during the First World War. [1] The Aldwych Theatre today During absences of the RSC, the Aldwych theatre hosted the annual World Theatre Seasons, foreign plays in their original productions, invited to London by the theatre impresario Peter Daubeny, annually from 1964 to 1973 and finally in 1975. For his involvement with these Aldwych Theatre West End seasons, run without Arts Council or other official support, Daubeny won the Evening Standard special award in 1972.

THE ALDWYCH THEATRE, LONDON

The Illustrated London News said of Hare, "that plaintive air and furrowed brow of his rank with the Tower and the Monument as one of the sights of London", and thought the play "very good entertainment, though … some of the Rabelaisian jests will not appeal to all." [6] The Daily Mirror thought the piece "will not rank with the best of the Aldwych farces but … has a lot of odds and ends of fun, plus a dash of charm." [7] Revivals and adaptations [ edit ]

A series of now-legendary stage comedies from the 1920s and ‘30s, the Aldwych Farces broke theatre Box Office records and made the transition to celluloid with a run of hit films, making stars of Tom Walls, Ralph Lynn and Robertson Hare. Most were penned by leading comic playwright Ben Travers and peopled by a regular cast of silly-ass aristocrats, battleaxe wives and put-upon husbands; nimble wordplay and finely crafted buffoonery were their hallmarks and the public loved them. An Aldwych Farce in White Flannels – A Bit of a Test", The Manchester Guardian, 31 January 1933, p. 8 The British New Wave of the early 1960s initially meant kitchen-sink realism, but Billy Liar and Tom Jones both enlivened cinema screens in 1963. The following year, A Hard Day's Night was much more than just a Beatles promotional vehicle. The work of its American-born director Richard Lester was hugely influential, as was the early 1960s satire boom, which paved the way for unprecedentedly dark comedies like Dr Strangelove (1964), The Ruling Class (1972) and Britannia Hospital (1982), turning deadly serious issues into risk-taking farce. The following table shows the opening and closing dates, and the number of performances given, in the original productions of the Aldwych farces. All were written by Ben Travers, except where otherwise shown: [18] Title Turkey Time is a farce by Ben Travers. It was one of the series of Aldwych farces that ran nearly continuously at the Aldwych Theatre in London from 1923 to 1933. The story concerns two guests, staying at the Stoatt household for Christmas, who offer shelter to a pretty concert performer left stranded when her employer absconds, leaving his cast unpaid.Travers (1978), pp. 138–139; "Broadcasting", The Times, 26 September 1970, p. 16; and "Richard Briers", British Film Institute, accessed 3 May 2013. English Shakespeare Company: Coriolanus & The Winters’ Tale(3 April 1991 – ?May 1991) Limited Season. Running 25 April. Closed by 10 May Many of the Aldwych farces were made into films starring Lynn and Walls, and the two were ranked among the most popular British film actors of the 1930s. He continued his stage career during and after the Second World War, scoring another hit in London and on tour with Is your Honeymoon Really Necessary? (1944). He continued to play in both new works by Travers and others, and in revivals of his earlier successes, and made his last London appearance in 1958. Lynn became an actor at the age of 18 and very soon began to be cast in knut or "silly ass" roles. He played such parts as a supporting actor for more than two decades until 1922, when he was cast in the lead of a new West End farce, Tons of Money, in which he achieved immediate stardom. After the success of this play, its co-producer, the actor-manager Tom Walls, leased the Aldwych Theatre in London, where for the next ten years he and Lynn co-starred in a series of successful farces, most of which were written for them by Ben Travers.