CityLife

JB Shorts 3

JB Shorts 3
Joshua Brooks
March 17, 2010

While the pub rocked on St Patrick’s night, the basement resounded to the laughter raised by six new 15-minute comedies. On flagstones underneath a brick arch, a score of actors, up close and personal, performed plays by writers who, like many of them, are better known for TV credits, especially in the soaps.

This is the third innovative JB series presented by Real Life Theatre Company, bringing these talents together to provide live theatre of sparkling originality and zestful performance in the city centre. They gave us a couple of hugely entertaining hours.

First off is actor James Quinn, a regular writer for these shows, with a smartly topical invention, Backlash, a new eco-friendly political party preparing for – and poking fun at - a General Election on May 6. Directed by Trevor MacFarlane and featuring Vicky Brazier, Anthony Crank and Chris Hannon.

Emmerdale writer Lindsay Williams, another regular, reveals the intense rivalry in the final of the Rochdale and Littleborough Scrabble Society annual tournament in Quixotry, directed by North West Playwrights’ Chris Bridgman.

Another Emmerdale writer, Andrew Kirk, focuses on a home-made Big Brother audition taping in I’m Mad Me, where wannabe housemate Vicky Binns (Molly Dobbs in Coronation Street) appears as a bunny girl, confounding her boyfriend (Jarrod Cooke). Louise Hill directs.

Quite the funniest – and rudest – is Dianne Whitley’s S.H.A.G.G., where the audience becomes the Chorlton-cum-Hardy branch of the Sex Addicts’ Help and Guidance Group for meetings run by a camp and outrageous Russell Brand lookalike. MEN Award Winner Caroline Clegg directs a terrific trio in Chris Jack, Nicola Jayne Ingram and Marvyn Dickinson.

The award for the zaniest goes to Real Life co-founder Trevor Suthers with Shakespeare’s Monkeys, directed by Noreen Kershaw. A research institute populated by monkeys with computers aims hopelessly to produce the Bard’s texts, with little progress over 114 years. Antony Bessick deserves a special monkey medal.

Finally, we come to a topical skit on gun-handling police in Peter Kerry’s Truncheons and Blackberries, directed by Brainne Edge – a well-judged parting shot.

What cracking entertainment – six plays for £5, adjacent to the bar, as intimate as live theatre can get, with the actors only feet away. That’s what I rate a good night out.