Captain Moonlite, by Jye Roberts, directed by Ruhama Rowe at Melville Theatre

I am a shameless old folkie, and to walk into the auditorium at Melville Theatre and see and hear a full folk band playing - fiddle, accordion, flute, keyboards, percussion and double-bass - was a real pleasure. The band remain on stage throughout the performance, providing a joyful backing to the action and the songs. Following on from the full brass band that accompanied the recent Brassed Off, this kind of live musical accompaniment has become quite a feature of Melville’s performances.

The play, by Jye Bryant, tells the story of ‘Captain Moonlite’, George Scott, soldier turned lay-preacher turned alleged bank-robber turned barrack-room-lawyer turned convict turned prison-reform-activist turned vagrant turned bushranger, focussing on his romantic relationship with his young colleague James Nesbitt. The book and lyrics nicely catch the linguistic mannerisms of the era and the show is peppered with rousing songs that are a mixture of folk and Broadway.

Jamie Lea plays the main role with full-bearded charisma and full-throated delivery. He is on stage for the whole play and is rarely in the background. He powerfully establishes Moonlite’s extravagant, self-mythologising character, delivering speech after self-justifying speech in a fine Northern Irish brogue - one gets the impression that he is not an entirely reliable narrator of his own adventures, that his constant protestations of innocence may be a little forced, but the point is really the legend, not the man. He may have been a man forced to take on his own legend, but he seems to have done so with relish.

The play opens with Moonlite in his prison cell, railing against 'fake news' in the colonial press. The role of newspapers and crowds is an ongoing theme, as it was with the contemporary career of Ned Kelly. (Apparently Moonlite offered to join Kelly's gang, but was rudely rebuffed.) Moonlite's work as an activist for prison-reform seems to have been one of his most admirable actions in a life made up of many regrettable decisions.

Moonlite's relationship with James Nesbitt, which is the emotional centre of the story, is not explored in depth, in the sense of how such a relationship might have actually played out at the time, but it is a poignant interlude. Perhaps the more poignant for the fact that its 'transgressive' nature is not foregrounded. Corban Featon plays James with unassuming gentleness.

The rest of the cast assume a wide range of characters. Craig Menner has a number of amusing roles, including a judge who sings a cleverly pastiched Victorian patter-song with Gilbertian panache.

Ruhama Rowe’s fluid staging, using projections and a scrim, keeps the action moving, focussing on broad comedy in the earlier stages but rising to a degree of seriousness at the climax. In the end this is a popular musical, a crowd pleaser, with comic turns and catchy songs, splendidly accompanied by the band, and a main character whose extravagance is of the essence. 

Australian bushrangers of this era certainly were a loquacious bunch...

Photos by Alan Gill, Curtain Call Creatives

Breaking the Code, by Hugh Whitemore, directed by Barry Park at Melville Theatre

You've only got a few more nights to see the Melville Theatre production of Hugh Whitemore's Breaking the Code, directed by Barry Park. Don't miss it.

This really is a splendid production, beautifully directed, flawlessly cast and fluidly staged. 

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It tells the story of Alan Turing, the British cryptographer who (arguably) won the Second World War for the Allies but was subsequently pilloried and humiliated for his sexuality. In the lead role, Thomas Dimmick gives a remarkable and moving performance, conveying by way of his physicality and delivery a sense of passionate discomfort and social unease, along with an impossibly deep love of the mathematics which is the only part of life he has got together. He differentiates Turing at different ages with subtlety. This really is acting of the highest quality.

Anna Head is wonderfully warm as his well-meaning, uncomprehending mother, and shows how important hair-arrangement can be to a role. Her hair made me smile twice! Patrick Downes is the Northern English policeman who uncovers Turing's secret. He plays the role with a solidity and nuance and decency that is a pleasure to watch. 

Grace Edwards is lovely as a fellow cryptographer at Bletchley Park, the only one who really understands Turing and tolerates his foibles. Martin Forsey plays Turing's academic boss with a genial tweedy intelligence that covers up for a few secrets of his own.

Jack Riches, who has recently been seen in comic roles, delivers a strong performance as Turing's working-class lover, the catalyst for the play's crisis, moving convincingly from casual opportunism to self-serving anger. 

In smaller roles, Nate Tonkin plays Turing's university friend who died young with a charm that justifies Turing's lifelong memories; Nicholas Mountain plays a government minister (with a forgettable name) whose accent at first seems mannered - but that's how some men actually spoke at the time. Listen to recordings. Jamie Brooker is a Greek youth who drapes himself languidly across the stage like a young Saint Sebastian.

In my review of Barry Park's production of Hansard at Garrick Theatre I wrote:

This links the play to a remarkable sequence of plays that Barry has directed over the last five years. Taken together they represent a sort of informal historical pageant that covers the development of modern sexual attitudes - the early sixties (The York Realist); the late sixties (The Boys in the Band); the early eighties (The Normal Heart); the late eighties (Lisbon Traviata & Hansard); the nineties (Beautiful Thing). And that's not to mention adjacent plays from earlier periods by Coward and Rattigan. It has been a pleasure to watch this sequence play out, and I am sure more is to come. 

This play is certainly a worthy addition to that sequence...

A Song at Twilight, reviewed by Virginia Moore-Price

NOEL COWARD'S 'A SONG AT TWILIGHT', DIRECTED BY BARRY PARK AT THE OLD MILL THEATRE, MARCH 2026, REVIEWED BY VIRGINIA MOORE-PRICE

This is my first attempt at writing a review—offered with full consent (and what I can only assume is a brave sense of curiosity) by director Barry Park.

By all theatrical logic, Barry and I should be rivals. The kind who exchanges tight smiles in foyers while quietly drafting each other’s artistic demise. We ought to be sharpening our critiques like knives, ready to pounce on the smallest misstep—even, if necessary, condemning the very fact that the other continues to breathe within the same creative ecosystem. It would, undeniably, make for far more delicious reading.

But no.

Instead, we find ourselves in the far less convenient position of understanding one another. We walk in the same shoes—though where his are polished, deliberate, and sensibly paired, mine are something of a mismatched experiment: a slipper, a Croc, and an optimistic sock, somehow passing as intention.

Perhaps it is this difference—or reluctant kinship—that makes me all the more delighted to turn my gaze toward his work and offer a review of A Song at Twilight.

Walking into this production feels like stepping into a beautiful, expensive trap. George Boyd’s set: lush indigo blues, gold detailing, and that glorious bay window is opulent with a pulse - It draws you in before you realise you are not meant to get out. Elegance with intent, and just enough cruelty to make it interesting. Merri Ford’s costumes follow suit; Hugo’s dressing gown is so enviable you find yourself coveting it. And Mark Nicholson wraps it all in a warm, inviting glow which, of course, is part of the trap.

Neale Paterson is splendid as Hugo Latymer. Not showy, restrained, which is far more dangerous. He plays Hugo with precision: never loud, always lethal. This is a man who has spent a lifetime perfecting the art of hiding himself. Every line is placed with intent, every barb lands cleanly, and the fleeting cracks he allows through are handled with control. A masterclass in self-preservation, he does not ask for sympathy, he dares you to find it.

Jennifer van den Hoek’s Hilde is beautifully judged. She begins almost like a receptionist rather than a wife, efficient, contained, and present. It is only in the last moments that her true purpose becomes clear, and the shift is all the more powerful for its repression.

Jack Riches’ Felix is standout; I have never seen a champagne bottle wielded with such innuendo; the cork pop alone deserves a standing ovation. His timing is impeccable, and his suggestive glances are enough to leave the audience weak at the knees.

Emily Howe’s Carlotta brings clarity, wit, and force. She does not just match Hugo- she dismantles him. Cutting through his deflections with precision and intent, she delivers Coward’s language with bite and skillfulness. Wit with purpose, and a clarity that slices clean through pretence. She drives the play exactly where it needs to go.

Director Barry Park shows a deep understanding of Noël Coward. There is respect here for the text, for the rhythm, and for the discipline it demands. No flapping, no indulgence, just precision, pace, and expertise. 

The tension builds to a crescendo, and then Barry dares to pause……. A moment between Hugo and Carlotta so perfectly held it steals the air from the room.

The lines then snap:

“You’re bluffing.”


“So are you.”


“Vile seducer.”


“Musty, ancient soul- searching…”

This is a play of letters, regret, revenge, and that deeply human need for clarity. What follows is the slow, delicious unravelling of façade. Hugo’s comeuppance does not explode, it tightens.

And then—nothing left to hide.

Hugo, reduced. Pathetic. A man left with only the version of himself he can no longer sustain.

The final image: distance, stillness, no theatrics - just quiet heartbreak that lingers longer than it should.

A love story, perhaps, but one that never fully understood itself, and is all the more bitter for it.

Noël Coward would have approved.

Virginia Moore-Price

Who's Afraid of Maggie Thatcher? A review of the play Hansard, by Simon Wood, directed by Barry Park for Garrick Theatre

The title Hansard might suggest the dryasdust transcript of a parliamentary debate, but the debate in Simon Wood’s play is more intimate and explosive; the funny and angry record of a decaying marriage and a painful family secret set against the politics of late 1980s Britain.

This is an extraordinary play: ninety very funny but increasingly emotionally-charged minutes in which the actors are onstage the whole time; bickering, squabbling, criticizing, arguing, amongst the psychic ruins and coffee cups of a marriage - building up to an ending that is unexpected and overwhelmingly poignant, and which asks us to re-evaluate what has come before.

Barry Park's production for Garrick Theatre features the almost unrecognisably smooth-cheeked Grant Malcolm as a Tory minister in the later years of Margaret Thatcher's leadership (no member of the Iron Lady's all-male cabinet would have been permitted facial hair, nor is it likely that any of them would have chosen to cultivate such a leftist affectation even if allowed) and Suzannah Churchman as his disaffected wife, alone with her Mother's Ruin in a country house in the Cotswolds.

The play is a two-hander, and is often compared to Albee's Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf, as a dramatized domestic argument that swings between cutting humour and painful confrontation. Virginia Woolf meets Yes, Minister, perhaps?

Suzannah Churchman as Diana gives a powerful and combative performance, with everything on display. She is certainly not a victim in the conventional sense. When towards the end of the play mascara is running over her cheeks (from what I assume must be actual tears) the catharsis is real.

Grant Malcolm balances her as a constrained and entitled product of the English Public School system - but a man capable of standing up for himself and defending his principles. He is no glib Tory monster, and his motivations become more understandable as the play progresses. The few moments when his emotions break out are the more powerful for their abruptness and how quickly they are bottled up.

Barry Park's direction is seamless. It effortlessly brings out the play's contemporary resonances.

The play's plot turns on a notorious piece of 1988 UK legislation, Section 28, which was an attempt to make illegal any teaching that deviated from traditional conservative views of marriage and sexuality. This links the play to a remarkable sequence of plays that Barry has directed over the last five years. Taken together they represent a sort of informal historical pageant that covers the development of modern sexual attitudes - the early sixties (The York Realist); the late sixties (The Boys in the Band); the early eighties (The Normal Heart); the late eighties (Lisbon Traviata & Hansard); the nineties (Beautiful Thing). And that's not to mention adjacent plays from earlier periods by Coward and Rattigan. It has been a pleasure to watch this sequence play out, and I am sure more is to come. Garrick Theatre is to be commended for supporting challenging plays like these.

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