Reviews

The Mousetrap holds the record for the longest running professional play in England at over seventy years with a small COVID break. Here is a chance to see a good production in our own back yard. The play is set in a mansion house that the relatively new owners decided to rent on room-by-room basis. At the start there are five guests, unknown to each other and the owners but they seem relatively normal. Then how can you tell. When we learn that house is snowed in and there has been a recent murder in the relative region, the focus on the various characters intensified.

We’ve all been in social situations which slide out of control – but never one so enjoyable (and uncomfortable) to watch as this scathing, hilarious play.  Not that the show is about Abigail’s Party, which is being held noisily down the street from our scene. This is Beverly’s domain, a slice of 1970s suburbia over which she reigns like a queen, hosting her neighbours for drinks and nibbles. It’s the gathering from hell – but this damnation is burning with truth and laughter.

This was my first experience visiting the IO Performance space - an otherwise outwardly unassuming, but well-preserved 120-year-old heritage building in the Launceston CBD. In its first incarnation it was the location of the Tasmanian Woolgrowers agency. Immediately prior to the theatre taking residence, it was office space. Even so, the interior has also been well preserved, with great big ornate columns forming a rather perfect four-sided situation within which to create a partitioned theatre space.

Last night I spent the evening with my Mum. Sorry, I mean, Peggy Schofield. Mum (I mean, Peggy) is very concerned with her place in the world; her work hierarchy, the dinner room dynamics, what people wear and whether they have a ‘standard body size’. Peggy avers that she gets on with everyone and is a font of information on all her acquaintance. She enjoys sharing convoluted stories and can provide a witty (although hackneyed) quip for every interaction. She never fails to raise a laugh. Never.