Red Lizard Productions are back with a thrilling comedy called Brush With A Body, which will see 11 of Mullingar’s finest tread the boards in the Arts Centre this October.
Supported by Mullingar Credit Union and Westmeath County Council, the fledgling group launched themselves last year in June with three superb one act plays in the Annebrook House Hotel, playing to sold-out audiences and leaving them with a taste for more.
This time around, the group will show what they can do with the difficult timing of a farce, taking the audience with them to discover the comic scenarios in which a family can find themselves when a dark secret is uncovered.
The plot is based around an upper middle class family in London, the Wallings, made up of Henry - a psychiatrist to the rich a famous, Cynthia, his eldest sister - a stiff upper-lipped school teacher, and Sarah, the youngest - a somewhat bohemian, drama student. The action kicks off in their urban home when the sweep, Flaherty discovers a dead body up the chimney. This naturally throws the family into disarray. Who is the dead body up the flue? Who could have put him there? And if this were to get out, what scandal would it cause the Walling family? With their father dead, and a doting mother to look after, what will the consequences be?
When the police knock on the Wallings front door, to investigate the disappearance of one of Doctor Walling’s more colourful patients, Rosita Hernandez, the Aruguayan Ambassador’s step-daughter, the family’s panic is taken to even higher proportions with hilarious consequences.
This play has a variety of well known local actors including Colin Meade who plays the blundering Dr. Walling, Veronica Mac Donagh, who plays the somewhat “unbalanced” mother. The two sisters Cynthia and Sarah are played by Caroline Jennings and Siobhan Cahill. The sweep is played by Christy Cole, while the housekeeper, who has a face, or more to the point, a nose that would launch a thousand ships is played by Mary Hughes. Other colourful characters appear on the scene to further throw the Walling’s comfortable life off kilter, such as actor Paul Martel, played by Peter Finch, the honourable Pamela Colefax, played by Elaine Purdue, and the missing patient, Rosita Hernandez, played by Olga Aughey. The two policemen, Inspector Hardy and Sergeant Bray, who are full of their own self importance, are played by Stefan Strilciew and newcomer Damian Farrell from Tullamore.
Red Lizard Productions will take to the stage with this side-splitting comedy in the Arts Centre from Wednesday, October 15 to Saturday, October 18, curtain up at 8pm. Tickets are priced at €15 and €12 and can be booked from the Mullingar Arts Centre box office on (044 ) 9347777 or at reception.
