How complicated, twisted and funny can a happy event like a pregnancy get? Very funny when Richard Everett writes and Jo Allenby directs this Tea Tree Players comedy!

 

It started off a bit slow, however once the cast warmed up the lines flowed well. British comedy always has more laughs than US, and the audience appreciated the many subtle puns throughout the show.

 

Cassandra Hart was outstanding as Jane, the secretly pregnant wife of long-suffering Peter, played by Samuel Creighton, whose communication skills became more tangled more as the play progressed. Charlotte Hale gave a delightful performance as the scatterbrained blonde Polly, as a drunk and delivering a range of emotions. Then Kyla Booth as Stella, Jane’s best friend, and Stephen Mulady as her hen-pecked husband Mike come in to complicate and confuse the story of who was really pregnant. In the end all the women either were or weren’t pregnant, and Stella firmly and ably takes control of the situation so that Jane and Peter can reconcile their confusion and differences of opinion to make up.

 

Mike Phillips and Leslie Brittan’s lighting and sounds and Damon Hill’s set were all suitably old fashioned, with wall telephones and scratchy cassette recordings reminding us of a past era.

 

There were lots of laughs as Timothy Cousins channeled Zorba the Greek as Grigore – gift of Greek perfume called ‘Aphrodite’s Wind’; dancing with the best dinner set and clever Greek/English mispronunciations like “we will drink and make love together” meaning “we will drink and make laughs together”!!

A very amusing and entertaining evening.