Slice of life
By Charmian Smith on Thu, 18 Apr 2013
A new Roger Hall play opens at the Fortune Theatre next week, an insightful and humorous look at grandparenting and growing old together, Charmian Smith reports.
For Lynda Milligan, Roger Hall's new play, You can always hand them back, is just like her life.
The Christchurch-based actress is performing in the show, which opens at the Fortune Theatre on April 27. She played the role of Grandma in two former productions; the premiere at Centrepoint in Palmerston North and has just finished another at Circa in Wellington.
By New Zealand's most successful playwright, with music and lyrics by British musician Peter Skellern, the two-hander play which includes a pianist who sings and narrates, is about grandparents and their grandchildren and growing old.
''For me the show is my life. We talk about when the son and his wife take two of the grandchildren overseas and how heartbroken they are - in fact that's the beginning of Grandpa's decline,'' Milligan says.
''I've got two grandchildren over in London. I'm just this strange old lady on the other side of the world. I'm called Kiwi Grandma and it's heartbreaking. And on the other end of the scale I live with my other grandchildren when I'm not on the road being a gypsy actor. I'm actually living with my grandchildren, so a lot of this is literally my life.''
In the earlier two productions George Henare played Grandpa Maurice to her Cath, but in the Fortune's production Auckland actor Grant Bridger takes the role.
''It's refreshing to have another Grandpa and he doesn't play it the same way as George. That brings a freshness into it for me. And with Lara [Macgregor] being a different director, she brings her ideas into it - and Paul [Barrett, musical director] as well.''
Barrett was musical director in the Centrepoint production, so Bridger had a lot of work to do to get up to speed with the others, but he too, enjoys contributing his own ideas to the production, he says.
''It's nice working in this environment because you have the chance to put in ideas - that's why the director's called a director, not a dictator. When you work under those, the production loses out if the director has set ideas,'' he said.
Despite her extensive directorial experience, Fortune Theatre artistic director Macgregor says this is the first time she has worked with music in a play and it was important to cast actors who were also good singers.
''It's exciting for me to be working with music as I don't personally know a lot about it, except by instinct. I've worked with Paul and trusted him to guide me through the process.''
Barrett says Macgregor's organic instinct is obvious.
''The fact that she doesn't know about music means she is not caught up in technique and details. She can actually feel it and get the honesty out of it, so we can't fall back on musical theatre technique per se.''
Grandpa, Grandma and the pianist may be the only characters physically on stage, but they bathe imaginary grandchildren, put them in the highchair and feed them, change nappies, put them to bed and generally ''Goo-gaa'' at them, Macgregor says.
In contrast to Milligan who has four grandchildren and lives with two, Bridger has none.
''I know grandfatherness because there's so much stuff in this I can relate to. I have nieces and nephews and godchildren coming out my ears. It's the demographic of being that age, having a Gold Card, being a pensioner - and remembering my granddad,'' he says.
''My grandma always used to say to me when we went out for lunch at Glen Eden at 12 o'clock on Sunday - 'on the dot' - and Poppa was having his late morning nap, Nana would always say to me: 'Don't you wake Poppa up'.
''I would go right around the side of the dark villa on the veranda and open the narrow, long sunroom door and Poppa would be asleep. He was never angry. He'd always say: 'Hello, Snowball'. He was so lovely, my Poppa.
''Grandparents have time for their grandchildren. That's the lovely thing,'' he says.
However, his character Maurice is a ''grumpy old bugger - the way we men become with middle age''.
''You know how old buggers who have been a bit witty and probably young and handsome and a bit of a vagabond, they become a bit sadly cynical, but underneath that facade there's a great sense of humour but they are not actually really happy any more. They are getting old and they don't like it and they've been living with the same woman for so many years.''
The play not only deals with grandchildren, but also with ageing and how it affects life, health and relationships. Little things like dealing with new technology - instead of fixing the children's toys they are now fixing yours, Bridger says.
Over the 12 years the play covers, the couple move into ''a retirement village - not an old people's home''; that line always gets a laugh, says Milligan.
''The play's got a lot of heartbreak. A lot of audiences cry. After certain scenes you can hear nose-blowing going on so you think to yourself you've done a good job if you can make people laugh and cry.''
See it
You can always hand them back by Roger Hall, with music and lyrics by Peter Skellern and directed by Lara Macgregor, opens at the Fortune Theatre on April 27 and runs until May 25. It features Lynda Milligan, Grant Bridger and Paul Barrett on the piano.
