Moser Theatre, Wadham

Tuesday 9th March – Saturday 13th March, 7.30p.m.

“if there are any people out there who wouldn’t mind being ‘lightly entertained’ for an hour and forty minutes, this comedy certainly deserves its crowds.” Abhishek Bhattacharyya ★★★★★

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Villainy! ★★★★★

Review by Abhishek Bhattacharyya

‘So you don’t perform Serious Drama then?

No. You want OUDS for that. Everything we do is Lightly Entertaining. See?’

The Oxford Light Entertainment Society certainly keeps its word with its latest production, Villainy! Watching it I was reminded of my reconstructions of medieval mystery plays, based on last term’s performances at Worcester, where I imagined the acting to be much less professional, much more stylized, but attracting large crowds nonetheless. There weren’t any large crowds for the first show of Villainy!, but if there are any people out there who wouldn’t mind being ‘lightly entertained’ for an hour and forty minutes, this comedy certainly deserves its crowds.

The first half of the play, peopled by vampires, scheming scientists, anarchists, vigilantes, superheroes and a secret distributing barman, moves by staging disparate scenes involving varieties of stock characters entertainingly engaged. One would think a play boasting almost 40 actors, for they never turn away anyone who wants to act, would have great difficulty staging character – but that is hardly the case. The different characters emerge clearly right from the beginning and gradually help the narrative tie itself up with a string of relationships, shifting fortunes, and (carefully nuanced) disputes over ‘good’ and ‘evil’.

Special mention must be made of the musicians who performed live, of Fabienne Styles for the music and lyrics’ composition, and of all those who sang on stage. The singing, both sung and performed well, backed adeptly by the scores, added an entire dimension to the play, pulling it up by quite a few notches. Costume design and make up was also rather well done, strikingly illuminated by the transformation of a timid lab assistant into a vampire. And prop design was hilarious and consistently added to the play.

The directors Matt Williams and Mike Bagshaw must certainly be commended for managing so many actors without confusing the play. There were also a number of very well structured scenes – for example the one with an intoxicated scientist, where creative lighting, creative stage arrangement of several actors and creative delivery of dialogues are tightly brought together. However, having said that, the play does lack a number of things that take away from it. For one, actors not delivering dialogue need to know what they are supposed to be doing meanwhile, especially when they are participating in a dialogue and hearing out the other person, but also otherwise. This sometimes results in some good acting to be ruined by unsure gestures. Also, while the light designing betrayed creative flashes, they needed to be better integrated with the rest of the play. So for example, the large fan (or whatever that was supposed to represent) could have worked well for the scientists’ hall, but needed to be tied together with other connected efforts for it to not stand out awkwardly.

However, even though several attractive features of the play do not add up, several more of them do, supporting and supported by Styles’ strong script. Watching it was quite an entertaining experience. Unless you’re looking for only ‘serious drama’ this week, Villainy! might be well worth the try.