Reprehensible - pats 5 and 6

‘Reprehensible – parts 5 and 6’ by Luke Milton continues at the Blue Room, Northbridge until Saturday 28^th April.

We ended the first four parts wondering if Frank’s sister-in-law, Eloise, will live long enough to have his baby? What kind of delivery will the baby have and who will care for the mother and child? Will the others find out who the real father is? How will Perry spend his $32 million lotto win? All of these questions and more were satisfactorily answered.

In this the third set of two 40-minute chapters in the life of Frank. Although very experienced, the cast were most understandably starting to show slight strain after this 4-hour production over 3 consecutive weeks. The delivery was good, but there were many clever quips in the dialogue which went over the top of the audience’s head. The show certainly lifted when Perry’s long lost uncle, Pete Ricketts (Matt Penny) appeared on the scene. This obnoxious creature was larger than life and Matt’s performance was superb – he really had the audience squirming.

Frank’s wife’s other love, Deshawn (Sean Walsh) who was a fairly insignificant in the first episode, became a mad passionate lover in these final episodes, and he also lifted the flow of the show.

Jo Marsh and Steven Warren’s lighting was simple but most effective.

Luke Milton has retained his high reputation of being able to write, and blend, clever comedy (first week) with blatant visual comedy (second week) and ending with a sensitive finale. The whole cast are to be congratulated on what was a mammoth task of line-learning, and the necessity to keep these over-the-top, larger than life characters alive night after night.

I look forward to the next series.