Shady Business

‘Shady Business’ penned by playwright and TV actor, Robin Hawdon, has its Australian Premiere at the new Harbour Theatre, Port Cineaste Building, 70 Adelaide Street, Fremantle - opposite Woolworths. The season runs until May 29^th, shows commencing at 800pm.

          It is Sunday morning in an East End of London flat. Delectable Mandy (Eilannin Dhu) awakes to find her new love, respectable stockbroker, Gerry (Andy Markland) asleep next to her. Suddenly she realises that any minute Soho club owner, the overprotective Big Mack (Michael Dornan) who is a key character of London’s Underbelly, will be around to collect his protection money and takings. Unfortunately he is also Mandy's power-mad boyfriend so Mandy must get rid of Gerry quickly.

          The door bell rings and jinxed, gormless yob, Terry (Adam Alliss) is there delivering Big Mack's nightclub business takings, which are unfortunately is a thousand ‘smackers’ short.

          Soon shapely Tania (Sjaan Bosman, nominated for Best Actress in the 2010 Finley Awards), one of Mandy’s fellow nightclub dancers, arrives and totally misinterprets the situation. A few minutes later when Big Mack and his single brain-celled heavy, Dozer (David Champion) arrive, how will the girls hide lover-boy Gerry? Will Mack’s other ‘heavy’ the lecherous, sadistic brute, Harry the Hammer (Peter Kirkwood) be required to perform his services?

A very well selected cast, all of whom have a natural talent for comedy. The Cockney accents were excellent and unfaltering. The script has several tricky passages in the mode of Danny Kaye’s ‘Court Jester’’s ‘the vessel with the pestle’, which Eilannin and Sjaan tackled with aplomb, getting a strong spontaneous applause. Award winning director, Nicola Bond, wisely tackled the whole production by underplaying the drama, even Big Mack was deadpan threatening – and as a result more threatening. The only over-the-top character was Harry the Hammer, played hilariously by Peter.

The new Harbour stage demands a large set, but this was convincingly well constructed and decorated, well lit (Rob Tagliaferri and Aaron Skinner). Good sound operation by Jade Craig.

This was a great team of actors all with demanding parts, however they captured the feel of the comedy beautifully and kept the pace belting along. There is a wonderful ending to this professional production. Good to see a large audience on such a wet miserable night.