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| Daisy (Ashleigh Butler) - Antonia Kitzel (Miss Granville) & girls. |
Written by Denise Deegan – Directed by Kate Blackhurst
Designed by Annie Kay – Lighting design by Nathan Sciberras
Sound Design by Nev Pye – Stage Manager: Ann-Maree Padarin
Rep Theatre 10-26th September 2026.
Opening night performance on 11th September
reviewed by BILL STEPHENS.
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| The Library at Grangewood School for Girls - seated Daisy (Ashleigh Butler) - Trixie (Helen Noon) |
In 1927 the staff and pupils of the exclusive Grangewood School for Girls are rocked by the arrival of its first ever scholarship pupil, the resourceful budding-adventuress, Daisy Merideth, played by Ashleigh Butler.
Daisy quickly finds a new best friend in Trixie Martin
(Elaine Noon), who educates her in the secrets and traditions of Grangewood.
But before she can be fully accepted into Grangewood, Daisy discovers she must
overcome several challenges.
Can she outwit the diabolical machinations of the school’s arch-snob
and general meanie, Sybil Burlington (Alex McPherson) and Sybil’s adoring acolyte,
Monica Smithers (Kara Taylor)?
Can she discover the secret of the mysterious Russian music
teacher, Mr Scoblowski (Sue Gore Phillips), or find the long-lost secret
treasure of Grangewood and save the school?
Or most importantly of all, can Daisy help the school to
victory in the all-important Hockey Club Final, given that she’s only learned
to play hockey by reading a book?
If you know you won’t sleep until you find the answers to
these pressing questions, your solution is to head to the Rep Theatre where all
is revealed in its ripping production of Denise Deegan’s enticingly silly
parody of the wholesome adventure stories of life in a 1920’s girl’s English
boarding school.
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| Trixie (Helen Noon) - Claire Beaumont (Lily Welling) - Daisy (Ashleigh Butler) |
This very British farce premiered in Southhampton in 1983, before moving to the Gielgud Theatre in London where it ran for 1,180 performances, following which it toured for another two years. Since then, it has become a popular choice for school productions.
Kate Blackhurst has taken her cue from this fact by staging
her production as a school play introduced by the very proper headmistress,
Miss Gibson (Azerie Cromhout), and performed by an all-female ensemble of 13
actors of widely varying ages who play all the roles.
In addition to those already mentioned, these include Ariana
Barzinour, Alice Fitzpatrick, Rachel Howard, Antonia Kitzel, Jane O’Sullivan,
Lily Welling and Jill Young.
Blackhurst keeps her cast busy with quirky stagings for key
moments including Daisy’s train journey, the School Art Gallery, a cliff
rescue, and the all-important hockey match, for which the cast bring with them any
furniture and props necessary to indicate a sense of place on Annie Kay’s
evocative but sparse static setting. All of which works a treat.
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| Miss Gibson (Azerie Cromhout) and the Grangewood School for Girls choir. |
But despite the excellent production standards, the laugh-out-loud moments, and the witty sight gags, there appeared to be a disconnect as to the intention of the production.
In her director’s notes in the printed program, Blackhurst suggests
the play has a political intent beyond its entertainment value. Yet her casting
with a mixed-age cast, and her witty staging of many scenes seemed to work
against that notion.
Several delightful comedic creations, especially Elaine Noon’s
Trixie Martin, Antonia Kitzel’s Winnie Irving, Alex McPherson’s Sybil
Burlington, and Azerie Cromhout’s very proper school mistress Miss Gibson, lean
into the farcical elements of the play, as do the comic bellringer and the intentionally
obvious beards for the two male characters, allowing outrageous plot twists to
seem perfectly sensible.
Elsewhere, characters are played naturalistically, including
Ashleigh Butler’s Daisy Meredith, setting up a stylistic confusion that flattens
episodes that might have been funnier had the play been treated simply as a farce,
rather than a political statement.