By Peter Kemp
This week, Peter Kemp visited the Lilydale Athenaeum Theatre to watch their performance of Moving On:
LAT decided to close the year with Moving On, a play with words and music by Cenarth Fox.
A play that covers humour, nostalgia, songs, pathos and drama.
A one-woman play with a lady clearing up her mother’s home after the mother had passed away.
This is something most of the opening night audience could relate to judging by the comments heard across the theatre.
Angela Glennie was Maggie, the daughter trying to clean up by spending most of the time reminiscing over each item she found. One scene that did stand out was when she found her old teddy bear. She was very emotional in this scene and was talking to Teddy the rest of the evening.
Originally Maggie was talking to her deceased mother and then through Teddy.
A great performance by Angela Glennie who captured the essence of such a character with acting ranging from light comedy to when as Maggie she found a photo of her deceased son where she completely changed and sowed the tragic side of her life
Glennie also had a very pleasant singing voice which added to the enjoyment of the evening. There were several scenes off stage where Maggie was up in the attic or in the kitchen making a cup of tea. She didn’t stop talking to the audience in these scenes so being off stage does not interrupt the play. When in the kitchen there was a small trapdoor between the kitchen and lounge room through which she appeared whilst doing her kitchen duties.
LAT had a great set of the mother’s lounge room, stuck drawers that happens all the time,
There were doorways leading to the other rooms which one could see part of.
All in all a great finish to the year by Lilydale Athenaeum Theatre and a wonderful performance by Angela Glennie who was on stage the whole performance with a long script to remember. Excellently done.
