Lots of heart (From Basingstoke Gazette)

Lots of heart

10:10am Sunday 26th April 2009 in Theatre By Lucie Richards

Shirley Valentine

Central Studio

ACTING takes courage, but performing a full-length one-woman show to a crowd who have paid to see just you – now that really takes some gumption, and talent, to pull it off.

And yet Donna Marie Beeson, performing at Central Studio, made it look easy.

Willy Russell’s play follows the meandering thoughts of middle-aged housewife Shirley Bradshaw, née Valentine, as she talks to “wall” about her life, family and her unappreciative husband – who hits the roof if his dinner is not on the table the moment he walks in the door – while preparing his chips and egg.

As she weighs up whether to go on a spontaneous two-week holiday to Greece with a friend, the audience learns about the rebellious teenager and carefree young wife she once was, and the life and dreams that she never “used up”.

It is a staggering amount of lines to learn, which Beeson – formerly a drama student at Queen Mary’s College – delivered seamlessly and very naturally, milking the part equally for its humour and its pathos, as she despairs over where Shirley “Valentine” has gone.

She is also an adept mime artist, bring-ing to life a host of other characters and situations while sitting in her yellow kitchen in the first half, and on a Greek beach in the second.

Central Studio also proved to be a good venue for this intimate production, where a close actor/audience relationship is vital, and judging by the standing ovation Beeson received, she nailed the role.

The play was put on by Cancelled Slot Productions, a partnership between Shirley Valentine director Ross Harvie, who is also creative producer for Basingstoke’s touring Proteus Theatre Company, and Beeson, an original Protean.

I look forward to their next collaboration.