Director: Catherine Harvey
Ghosts of yesteryear mingle with timeless historical settings in an engaging new digital offering which explores the vivid life and times of Earl’s Court in London.
From old time music hall players to suffragettes and from artistic geniuses to regulars at the local pubs, there’s a sparkling array of personalities and places featured in Finborough Theatre’s latest online offering, which gives a colourful flavour of the area in which the theatre stands.
An Earl’s Court Miscellany is a cleverly curated work, devised and directed with warmth and passion by Catherine Harvey, who is also among the performers. The piece is the first production in a new digital initiative #FinboroughFrontier, a development of online work started during lockdown, and it sets the tone well for what may follow.
The device used is that the viewer is looking to rent a room in the area and the landlady (a jolly and occasionally mysterious Ninka Scott) invites us to soak up the spirit of Earls Court by telling stories of famous locals and well-known haunts in the hope of tempting us to move in to this savoury slice of Bohemian life.
The 13-strong cast present more than 50 pieces of poetry, prose and music, which range from the hilarious and light to the sinister and sad. There’s certainly a natural flow to the whole, with explorations of the geography, the artistic, memories of true-life residents and visitors past and present. A picture is painted of an area of London that is whispering some of its secrets and teasing many more.
There are neat references to individuals as we see a gravestone in Brompton cemetery and then hear a tale or a piece of poetry that links to them. So it is that we hear examples of the work of writer Mary Louisa Molesworth, and the music hall delights of Charles Coborn (Elaine Wallace, conjuring up music hall memories of the likes of Hetty King with Two Lovely Black Eyes and The Man Who Broke the Bank at Monte Carlo). The founder of the cricket Bible John Wisden is recalled by Peter G. Pearson in a beautiful recitation of Henry Newbolt’s haunting cricket poem Vitai Lampada, and other lives remembered include shipbuilder Gustav Wolff as the fate of the Titanic is referenced in a work by Thomas Hardy (an atmospheric reading by Annabel Mullion) and Henry “Old King Cole” who was instrumental in mounting the Great Exhibition at Crystal Palace.
There’s contemporary offerings as well: Catherine Harvey’s own poem The Magic of The Who is a wonderful memory of Earl’s Court Exhibition Centre as a concert venue, while the famous Troubadour Café is recalled courtesy of Amy Glynn’s 2020 Troubadour International poetry prize-winner Entre-Deux-Mers, June
If this were a live production it would be an effective promenade piece, with performers telling a particular story at a linked venue or location and this might have been taken up more with the freedom a filmed work gives. It is telling that Olivette Cole-Wilson’s performance of Dobson’s The Forgotten Grave accompanied by moving film of the cemetery is one of the more evocative scenes.
Fading away of performers reflects an ethereal quality and underlines the sense of ghosts reminiscing, but it eventually feels overdone.
Yet each player as well as the overall style always provides a meaningful sense of place and atmosphere, largely filmed in various parts of the Finborough itself. Every single performer genuinely has moments to shine and you feel they are sharing in the heartfelt desire to sell the location, living out the show’s strapline, “Passion has left its mark on this place.”
We can only follow in the footsteps of those who have gone before digitally, but there’s a staged presence that brings the scenes alive – even if the creative device at the heart of this premiere is sometimes too limiting.
Available here until 25 February 2022
