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French farce, the recipe as before. The programme blurb even sets out the ingredients: 2 husbands – 2 wives – 1 maid – 1 call girl – 1 apartment in Paris. It’s almost a challenge: do it yourself! Which I daresay would be easy enough if you thought it worthwhile, but why bother when the Fortune is whipping up the lascivious, I mean luscious concoction so effortlessly?

Certainly the opening night audience gobbled it all up with unaffected pleasure, and will have suffered no indigestion from so light a dish.

Director Amanda Rees has sensibly seen Ding Dong as a winter warmer, and has her cast playing for laughs without troubling about social commentary on the adultery, jealousy, revenge and betrayal on which the plot depends. I suppose it could be played as topical satire – the current Listener’s cover story examines the theory that monogamy is not natural – but this fast and furious classic farce has no intention but to amuse.

The action never falters, as husbands and wives dash about the stage, displaying quite extraordinary energy in their attempts to deceive one another.

All farce relies on the exploitation of improbable situations, the more ludicrous the better; an intricate plot with surprising twists; robust action and a cracking pace; disguise and misunderstanding; and an outrageous denouement. Ding Dong ticks all the boxes, though something is still lacking … Humanity perhaps.  

Bernard Marcellin has discovered his wife Jacqueline is having an affair with one Robert Regnier. Instead of confronting her with this, he terrifies Robert into facilitating a revenge affair between Bernard and Robert’s wife, Juliette. That will make everything quite fair. Robert cares enough for his wife to baulk at this, and instead hires a call-girl to pretend to be the wife, and allow herself to be seduced by Bernard. This plan is progressing smoothly until Robert’s actual wife arrives, discovers her husband’s infidelity, and punishes him by pretending to be someone else. 

The actors keep up the pace necessary to prevent awkward questions, like how could Robert possibly fail to recognise his wife, even without her earrings, and if he is so anxious to save his marriage, why was he having an affair in the first place? The characters, who would naturally have been speaking to each other in their own tongue, have been endowed with exaggerated French accents in the ’Allo ’Allo style, which definitely enhances both absurdity and enjoyment.

Tim Raby as Bernard and John Glass as Robert are a shade over-energetic at first, all flapping hands and thrusting pelvises, but they settle into a secure rhythm as the events spiral out of control. Despite fairly circumscribed roles they emerge as individuals. 

The women’s roles are still more stereotypical, but they are carried off with confidence; Anna Henare making a sophisticated Jacqueline and Sophia Elisabeth a suitably indignant Juliette. The call girl is dolly-bird rather than vamp, played with curiously endearing naivety by Elizabeth McGlinn, in the tiniest of sparkly minidresses. 

But the meatiest part is that of a character peripheral to the action, the Marcellin’s enormously resentful maid Marie-Louise, who must respond to the constant ‘ding-dong’ of the doorbell. She is acted with supreme panache by splendid local actor Clare Adams, looking decidedly Gallic with rolled hair and commanding bosom. Her barely suppressed fury, contorted movement and pungent delivery are hilarious, and her every entry is greeted with delighted mirth. 

The production is well supported by the Fortune’s own very competent design team. The set by Peter King has a nice French flavour: sophisticated grey with high ceiling and tall central windows to match, leading out onto an attractive balcony. Stage left there is a rather under-used staircase, but the swing door stage right provides wonderfully explosive entries for tempestuous Marie-Louise. (That there is only one chair, a sleek black number, is an indication of the frenetic rushing around of the cast.) 

Maryanne Wright-Smyth has created some intriguing outfits for the ladies, stylish and hard to categorise time-wise, although they are almost upstaged by the strappy shoes with such horrendously high heels that the ladies all teeter precariously.

Author Marc Camoletti (Swiss-French, Italian heritage but following in the footsteps of Moliere and Feydeau) is better known for writing Boeing-Boeing, about a man juggling three air hostess ‘fiancées’ in yes, a Paris apartment. It was a huge hit of the 1960s, running for years and years in Paris and London, though not, interestingly, succeeding in the USA. Americans apparently regarded being caught with your pants down as too serious for farce. (A recent revival on Broadway has been a hit however; interpret that as you will.)

Ding Dong or Sexe et Jalousie is written later and without the excuse of being ‘of its era’, and personally I question whether this is a play that is worth mounting.*

It lacks the inventive genius of the Fortune’s last production, The 39 Steps, and fails to provide the actors with the same rich material and scope to demonstrate their craft. The characters are shallow, the values are appalling and of course sexist in the extreme, without the irony that might be a saving grace. But because this is farce it would seem ridiculous to exhibit offence.  

Nevertheless, the sponsor’s night audience entered into the spirit of the play with real enthusiasm and responded with warm laughter. We are not, after all, expected to take this gleeful nonsense seriously. As the good old Oxford Companion asserts, ‘Farce has small literary merit, but great entertainment value.’ The Fortune certainly provides that with Ding Dong: ‘great entertainment’ to brighten any Dunedin winter’s night.
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*While I find it disappointing that the Fortune, Dunedin’s only fully professional company, is not presenting more challenging theatre, and in particular more indigenous New Zealand theatre, programming is a complex issue here as elsewhere.

In the 35-odd years since the Fortune was established, the pattern has tended to be the same each year: a popular classic, maybe Shakespeare, a neglected classic, a chance on something new and startling, a New Zealand play, one or two established Broadway or West-End hits, and a children’s play or pantomime.

But the Fortune, under the temporary guidance of courageous Karen Elliot, now has its financial situation to consider, with the shock of Creative New Zealand’s reluctance to fund professional theatres in more than three centres. Hence no doubt, the security blanket of productions of ‘safe’ plays that will attract group bookings by various commercial organisations. The theatre dare no longer take risks.

And this production is a winner, initially at least. The Opening Night audience of Ding Dong was sponsored by Mazda – imagine at least 100 Mazdas parked all around the theatre – and its charming head honcho assured me excitedly that the venture had already proved a most successful promotion.
“They loved the play, not to mention the free bubbly, oh, and the local Gourmet ice-cream, so they’ll think we’re great!”
“You mean they’ll all be popping in to say they’ve been reminded to upgrade their Mazda?” I asked.
“It’s happening already!” he beamed. And what could be wrong with that?

Dunedin, the size of Shakespeare’s London, and with nearly a quarter of its inhabitants being University staff or students, is blessed with several glorious theatres. These are obviously an enormous asset to the tourism industry as well as to our own citizens, especially now as we launch the Otago Festival of the Arts. Yet all are crying out for decent promotion and support. 

South Dunedin’s Mayfair, especially suited to musical offerings and hosting the annual Gilbert and Sullivan productions, has had its financial battles, as has the unique Globe Theatre, started by the Careys in the iconic house built and inhabited by Dunedin’s first mayor. The Playhouse, home of New Zealand’s pioneering Southern Comedy Players, and the University’s Allen Hall, busiest theatre venue in the country, also struggle, yet all valiantly continue to take the risks required to bring local playwrights and challenging theatre to the people.

The city has recently managed to raise two million dollars to save the beautiful Regent theatre. This is a pittance compared with what has been poured into the new Stadium. If Dunedin has any appreciation of the amazing benefits theatre brings to a society, it should surely strive to ensure that all our theatres need not pursue a purely commercial line, but can aspire to follow their own true vision. 
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