Imagine if you turned on your TV and found a programme that was like Eastenders meets Hebburn, meets The Hangover 1, 2 and 3.
Imagine if you turned on your TV and found a programme that was like Eastenders meets Hebburn, meets The Hangover 1, 2 and 3. Well, I didn’t have to imagine it, as that is exactly what I experienced at The Customs House in South Shields whilst watching Perfect Wedding.
Written by Robin Hawdon, the Perfect Wedding is far from perfect. When the groom, Bill, (Craig Richardson) wakes up from his sleep to find that he is not with the woman he loves, he starts to panic. Coping with a post stag-do hangover, he has no idea who she is or how the heck she got there in the first place.
To make things worse, his wife to be, Rachel (Rosie Winter) arrives while this woman is still in the room. As we sit and watch the chaos unfold, it is just under two hours before the wedding, and a ‘will-they-won’t-they’ situation begins to develop.
A Geordie Farce
A North East based production, this show is full of farce, slapstick comedy and Geordie humour from start to finish. There’s enough physical comedy, in fact, to rival the late, great Charlie Chaplin.
A fast-paced performance with a cast of only six, I thought Perfect Wedding highlighted the true ins and outs of how a relationship works, whilst eloquently pointing out that what every bride-to-be dreams of, doesn’t always come to pass.
As we see through the character of Bill’s Best Man, Tom (Craig Fairbarin), he is the one who is most affected by the whole misunderstanding. He was the fly on the wall in this complicated web of lies, and by the end of the performance he looked like an escaped convict from the asylum.
Emotive Characterisation
Fairbarin made us feel sorry for this character as he ran around like a headless chicken, whilst frantically searching for the missing seating plans. Meanwhile, he was also ingattempt to discover who this mysterious girl was, and even Sherlock would be hard-pressed to solve that particular puzzle, I assure you.
Acting as our eyes and ears, however, chambermaid Julie (Kylie Ann Ford) had the whole story sussed, and she knew exactly what was going on.
As the stereotypical nosy chambermaid everyone can relate to, Julie, unlike the so-called happily married couple to-be, knew what was going to happen as a result of this tangled love web.
This was even the case in those moments when she found herself caught up in the mess, and became confused as to who she was meant to be when set against who she really was.
Reminiscent of Father Ted’s Mrs Doyle, she provided a lot of the most raucous laughs of the piece. Alongside Viktoria Kay playing Rachel’s mother – poking a canny look towards Mrs Hyacinth Bucket – these two women are a recipe not only for disaster, but also for comedy gold.
This may not be the show to see with your Mother in Law. It may also not be the show to see after you have just been married. But in my opinion, it is certainly a show to see if you are a loved up couple, and enjoying the relationship well before you get to have that “perfect” wedding you always dreamed of.
What do you think? Have your say in the comments section below.
