KIDDERMINSTER PLAYHOUSE
1946 - 1968 A Souvenir
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The Golden Age 1948-1949
This was a golden age for post-war provincial repertory. Pause for one moment to consider the plays which were produced and applauded and reflect that this was just four years before Kidderminster saw John Osborne and eight years before Look Back in Anger dealt the English theatre a punch from which it never recovered.
The catalogue read like this: The Rotters; Gaslight; The Cat and the Canary; To What Red Hell; Hindle Wakes; Ma's Bit of Brass; The Ghost Train and Sweeny Todd (with Jack Wood as the demon barber); The Wind of Heaven; Blithe Spirit; Suspect; See How They Run; Artificial Silk; and two new plays having first performances, World Without End and Moonlight Sonata.
The Nonentities' season opened with Quiet Wedding, in which Janet Harvey and Valerie Scott made first appearances. The Scarlet Pimpernel introduced John Hunter, Harry Purcell (the present Mayor of Kidderminster), Marjorie Timmis, Denis Smith and Patricia Busby. It was also the farewell appearance of Sybil Biggins, who went on to greater fame in the north of England.
Musical Chairs saw Robert Gaston's return as producer, included a sensitive performance by Melville Child and introduced Madeline Newbury, later to turn professional and to play many leading parts with the rep.
George Slater in Priestley's own part as the press photographer and Dorothy Bird as the comic maid were the pick of When We Are Married (already revived for the final season). Honeymoon Island was another joint production of a Rose musical, assembling almost all the amateur talent in the district, with Mary Gilchrist and Jack Hardiman in good voice, Len Reeves and Marjorie Baker looking after the comedy and John Hay conducting.
Len Reeves scored another success before the end of the season, as the mysterious Puck character called Lob in Barrie's Dear Brutus (first appearances here by Josephine Jarrett and Mary Molyneux).
The professional touring programme was probably the strongest of any single season. The shows which still stand out in the memory after so many years include The Long Mirror, a minor Priestley but with an incredible performance by a great talent, Jean Forbes-Robertson. There was also The Glass Menagerie and The Little Foxes and two more magnificent contributions from the Young Vic company, As You Like It, with Jean Wilson as Rosalind, and The Snow Queen, with a cast including Pierre Lefevre, Powys Thomas and Mervyn Blake.
Terence de Marney was here playing Heathcliff in Wuthering Heights, Geoffrey Kendal was touring Shakespeare-on-a-shoestring with a company which included former local amateur Joan Mills. Productions of The Two Mrs Carrolls and Dr Angelus appeared under one of the most famous names in the touring theatre, Frank H. Fortescue.
Other plays by visiting companies were It Might Happen to You; The Winslow Boy; Man About the House; Candida and No Trees in the Street.
There were also return visits by the Ballets Negres and the Sherry Brothers and the first appearance of the Imperial Opera Company directed by a dedicated leader, Vere Laurie, carrying off a task which would be impossible, today. The pantomime was Ernest Binns's Cinderella and there were weeks by the St James's Ballet, and shows called Spanish Rhapsody, Happy Days and Springtime Revels.
The KAOS staged The Desert Song, Carpet Trades The Country Girl and the Stourbridge Amateur Operatic Society The Student Prince.
Finance
A full 50 weeks with takings averaging £400 (still falling). The Nonentities' six plays were £l,433 on the right side and the Playhouse made an over-all profit of £266. A familiar see-saw pattern was setting in. Taking all sources of revenue into account the debt was reduced by £2,441 to £7,755.
But although business had fallen off marginally the society made a bold decision to reduce from ten years to five the period set for wiping off the initial cost of the theatre and its restoration, £19,000. The target date was November 18th, 1951, the fifth anniversary of the opening night, and the race to find the money was on.
The theatre received its first subsidies in this season - £628, made up of £500 from the Town Council plus £128 (the product of a halfpenny rate) already received from the Rural Council. The Town Council had reversed its previous decision by 18 votes to five.
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