Thursday, 27 March 1997

Sunday Roast, March 27, 1997


The Sunday Roast  by Sue Ingleton
Melbourne Comedy Festival
Trades Hall 6pm until  April 20, 1997
Reviewed by Kate Herbert around March 26,1997

Girls dressin' up as blokes has a totally different effect from blokes in drag.

Somehow it is easier to take them seriously, to listen. It is not an instant joke and so it works as a vehicle for theatre not just as a drag show.

Sue Ingleton's play, The Sunday Roast performed with Jennifer Ludlum, is simply two old geezers in suits and aprons cooking a Sunday roast and exchanging reminiscences. It is set in fifties Melbourne and these two are definitely men of their time and place. They prattle about beer and Californian Poppy, Gillette ladies and Craven A.  

They play two-up rib each other about being old bachelors left on the shelf then consider themselves lucky because women are fickle. Grace Kelly is their pin-up. Black pepper is a nouveau culinary condiment.

Ingleton created this script during 1996 in the dressing rooms of the M.T.C. production of Patrick White's A Cheery Soul.  Mr. Bleeker and Mr. Furze are characters from White's dark comic play and here they have a chance to strut their stuff for an hour.

Mr. Bleeker and Mr. Furze are characters from White's dark comic play and here they have a chance to strut their stuff for an hour.

Ingleton and Ludlum appear to be having a ball playing the two bachelors cogitating and espousing their rum theories. Ingleton's fella is drawn in detail. She chews her lip and tucks her head into her neck like an old tortoise while Ludlum is a lighter, less wizened chappie.

 It is a light clown piece with a witty edge and a charming post-war feel to remind everybody of their grandads.

KATE HERBERT

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