NB: To paraphrase Ernie Wise, “plays what I wrote”. Please be patient as the mp3s can take a little while to load. Each recording is approximately 25 minutes and each play is recorded in two sections. Both pieces were written as radio plays but could be adapted for theatrical performance, with a minimal requirement for sets and props – think National Theatre of Brent, or, in this case, Sydenham!
Your place is in the stalls, half-way along, three rows back from the orchestra pit. House lights down. Stage lights up. Here we go.
Egyptian Summer Performed by the Kirkdale Players, in Sydenham, south-east London, on 14th August, 2010, before a live audience.
The time – Coronation Year 1953. Harry Hawkins, a journalist on the Daily Express invites his reluctant friend Austin Endicott, a pilot, to his London apartment, on a Saturday evening. From there a story of romance and intrigue unfolds in London and Paris, with a backdrop of the growing storm in Britain's troubled colonial outpost, Egypt, which is about to declare itself as a Republic.
It's a comedy in the old-fashioned repertory theatre or “end of the pier” style of Coward and Rattigan, featuring the singing of the marvellous Andrea Hyma Pope, in the role of the jazz singer, Kitty Starr. The recording includes my grandson AJ shouting out “grandad” as he recognises me in my penguin suit!
The cast: Stuart Spear, Jon Heal, William Hatchett, Andrea Hyma Pope. Musicians: Alberto Vilela, Corin Williams.
The Horned God A somewhat darker piece – performed on Saturday 12 March by the same company.
London, June 1914. The eve of the First World War. Harry and Austin – their younger selves – become embroiled in a conspiracy involving supporters of Kaiser Willhelm.
The play is enhanced by music and atmospheric effects from the cello of fellow Honor Oak resident, the modest and brilliant Mats Lidstrom. For a famous person, Mats is surprisingly normal. The Players were privileged to have him on board. Two other professionals joined the cast, the lovely Andrea again and the prodigiously talented and versatile, Joseph Glynn, who is just beginning his career on the boards (or the carpet in this case). I play a comedy Austrian. Stu is Harry, because he is Harry but also does a turn as a bent policeman. Corin Williams twiddles the knobs – brilliantly! “A warm hand on your opening, dear boy”. Brid makes her remarkable acting debut, in Dame Maggie mode. I was unable to cajole my friend Jon to be in this one, to reprise his superb Austin, in which role he was brilliant in Egyptian Summer.
I announced this play as a comedy, mainly because I like the sound of laughter. But I am not sure that it is! The tone is provided by Webern's sparse atonal music and Wagner (not really comic territory) and a little music hall. God is dead. Is he really? Mmm not sure. In other words, this should have been a light, comedic piece, a “dark farce” perhaps, but it came out like a piece of experimental theatre, performed by people in boiler suits. Even the poster was scary! Oh well. I think it needs a re-tune, and a new name, which it will have if it re-emerges from the darkness into the world of light.
The cast: Joseph Glynn, Stuart Spear, Brid Spear, William Hatchett, Andrea Hyma Pope. Musical director and cello Mats Lidstrom, sound and light technician, Corin Williams.
For permission to perform either play, please email me through this website. Many thanks to all of my talented friends who made the productions possible. Both plays are based on my supernatural thrillers – Riding the Dragon and Dragon Rising, Honor Oak Publishing (available on Amazon).
William Hatchett
Your place is in the stalls, half-way along, three rows back from the orchestra pit. House lights down. Stage lights up. Here we go.
Egyptian Summer Performed by the Kirkdale Players, in Sydenham, south-east London, on 14th August, 2010, before a live audience.
The time – Coronation Year 1953. Harry Hawkins, a journalist on the Daily Express invites his reluctant friend Austin Endicott, a pilot, to his London apartment, on a Saturday evening. From there a story of romance and intrigue unfolds in London and Paris, with a backdrop of the growing storm in Britain's troubled colonial outpost, Egypt, which is about to declare itself as a Republic.
It's a comedy in the old-fashioned repertory theatre or “end of the pier” style of Coward and Rattigan, featuring the singing of the marvellous Andrea Hyma Pope, in the role of the jazz singer, Kitty Starr. The recording includes my grandson AJ shouting out “grandad” as he recognises me in my penguin suit!
The cast: Stuart Spear, Jon Heal, William Hatchett, Andrea Hyma Pope. Musicians: Alberto Vilela, Corin Williams.
The Horned God A somewhat darker piece – performed on Saturday 12 March by the same company.
London, June 1914. The eve of the First World War. Harry and Austin – their younger selves – become embroiled in a conspiracy involving supporters of Kaiser Willhelm.
The play is enhanced by music and atmospheric effects from the cello of fellow Honor Oak resident, the modest and brilliant Mats Lidstrom. For a famous person, Mats is surprisingly normal. The Players were privileged to have him on board. Two other professionals joined the cast, the lovely Andrea again and the prodigiously talented and versatile, Joseph Glynn, who is just beginning his career on the boards (or the carpet in this case). I play a comedy Austrian. Stu is Harry, because he is Harry but also does a turn as a bent policeman. Corin Williams twiddles the knobs – brilliantly! “A warm hand on your opening, dear boy”. Brid makes her remarkable acting debut, in Dame Maggie mode. I was unable to cajole my friend Jon to be in this one, to reprise his superb Austin, in which role he was brilliant in Egyptian Summer.
I announced this play as a comedy, mainly because I like the sound of laughter. But I am not sure that it is! The tone is provided by Webern's sparse atonal music and Wagner (not really comic territory) and a little music hall. God is dead. Is he really? Mmm not sure. In other words, this should have been a light, comedic piece, a “dark farce” perhaps, but it came out like a piece of experimental theatre, performed by people in boiler suits. Even the poster was scary! Oh well. I think it needs a re-tune, and a new name, which it will have if it re-emerges from the darkness into the world of light.
The cast: Joseph Glynn, Stuart Spear, Brid Spear, William Hatchett, Andrea Hyma Pope. Musical director and cello Mats Lidstrom, sound and light technician, Corin Williams.
For permission to perform either play, please email me through this website. Many thanks to all of my talented friends who made the productions possible. Both plays are based on my supernatural thrillers – Riding the Dragon and Dragon Rising, Honor Oak Publishing (available on Amazon).
William Hatchett
