THE FACT a new play is on tour as opposed to a barrage of musical repeats, re-workings and jukebox honey pots is something to be celebrated in itself. Indeed a double celebration as this one looks like it aims to pay homage to an icon of the youth of those of us in our ‘elder statesman’ years, one Terrance Alan Milligan aka ‘Spike.’
Spike was the writer and intellect behind the ‘Goon Show’, which is acknowledged as the most groundbreaking radio show ever to grace the BBC Light Programme airways. This was back in 1951 and went on an outrageous romp for nine years.
I was a little too young to get the nuances but old enough to sing the ‘Ying-Tong song’.
Without doubt, Milligan was a genius and like many other of that ilk was borderline psychotic. He suffered from bipolar disorder and was subject to serious bouts of depression leading to several nervous breakdowns and suicide attempts. Despite all this he went on to marry three times, father six children and live until his early 80s.
Personally I found the title ‘Spike’ to be somewhat misleading as writers Ian Hislop and Nick Newman have chosen to limit the scale of their play to the Goon years and to make it more of a battle between Milligan and the BBC than a documentary on his life.
I also found Robert Wilfort somewhat unconvincing as Milligan – he lacked Spike’s charisma and his much loved command of black comedy – being more woeful than playful. In his defence, he has to battle with the shallowness of the text, which is too often joined up sound bites not punchy dialogue.
Patrick Warner and Jeremy Lloyd fare slightly better as Peter Sellers and Harry Secombe but again have little help going in the way of character development from the script.
What is left are three caricatures – which is a shame, as there is a great play to be written about these three tormented sound and screen idols but unfortunately for me, this isn’t it!
Director Paul Hart makes the most of moving the action at a frantic pace around the double decker set from designer Katie Lias.
There are two hilarious set piece sketches from Margaret Cabourn-Smith as Janet and her sound effects table, which open both acts. These cleverly display how the gadgets making the effects become more sophisticated alongside the maturity of the ‘Goon Shows’ themselves. From coconut shells to electronic sounds and from adlibbed mayhem to scripted structured mayhem.
My shout out is to Robert Mountford as the nameless BBC executive who captures everything we love to hate about narrow-minded businessmen in pinstriped suits delving in the stuff of artistic souls.
Finally we get to the walkdown where we are treated to a glorious singsong with the whole company pitching in with everything from washboards to penny whistles. Oh for more of this in the show itself – putting aside the lack of character substance there is a wealth of madcap Goon tunes that would have been a joyous addition.
Spike runs at Malvern Theatres until Saturday, September 17. Click here for times, tickets and more information.
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Review by Euan Rose
Euan Rose Reviews
