Not quite the comic hit of summer

CHARLEY’S AUNT, Royal Exchange, Manchester

AH, Charley’s Aunt. Written almost 120 years ago, but when it’s done right still possessing the power to make you laugh and, like “The Importance of Being Earnest”, a comedy that makes you feel good in the way all its loose ends get neatly tied.

But that’s the problem: when it’s done right.

About 90 per cent of Braham Murray’s Royal Exchange “go into the summer laughing” production is beautifully done, as usual. Wonderful costumes, terrific casting, smart lighting, and an attention to set detail that would stagger the vast majority of theatres out there.

But it’s that last 10 per cent, and unfortunately, it’s the most important 10.

In Oliver Gomm, Murray has chosen an actor to play the cross-dressing Lord Fancourt Babberley who has already proven himself in previous Exchange productions.

In this one, Murray has made the right-looking choice, then apparently not managed to direct him properly. Or even at all.

The point about Babberley, whom friends Jack and Charley persuade to dress as Charley’s aunt from Brazil to chaperone their lunch with the beautiful Kitty and Amy, is that when he is in the company of the two students he is as masculine as any pantomime dame. When he is surrounded by anyone but Jack and Charley, the comedy comes from his attempts to be a spirited elderly woman.

The trouble is that Gomm doesn’t have the physical comedy skills Murray seems to think he has – which is why in act three, he is allowed to make such an unfunny meal (five minutes’ worth) of playing the piano that the audience’s laughter is largely the nervous “how much longer?” variety.

That’s quite apart from the extremely forced nature of some of the knockabout laughs and Gomm’s wildly fluctuating vocal style, which moves from deep throated male to Clanger impersonation, often in the same sentence.

Though the foregoing might suggest Gomm is miscast, this isn’t the case. If more tightly directed he would no doubt be very good in the role, as are Jack Farthing (Chesney), Brodie Ross (Charley), the excellent Michael Elwyn as Jack’s father, and Bryony McRoberts as the real Donna Lucia — not to mention the delightful young women, Sarah Ovens and Annabel Scholey as Amy and Kitty, and Elizabeth Crarer as Lucia’s ward.

So not quite the resounding comic hit of the summer the theatre was no doubt hoping to achieve, but perhaps someone could give Mr Gomm a tranquilliser...