Season 31 Play 9 – When We Are Married by J.B. Priestley
Directed by
Cast
Gerald Forbes – Mervyn Button
Nancy Holmes – Lynne Colton
Alderman Joseph Helliwell – Walter Williams
Maria Helliwell – Audrey Milner
Councillor Albert Parker – Donald Clough
Annie Parker – Patricia Clough
Herbert Soppitt – James Ireland
Clara Soppitt – Eileen Stephenson
Mrs. Northrop – Connie Teale
Fred Dyson – Robin Martin
Henry Ormonroyd – Peter Heaton
Lottie Grady – Wendy Roberts
Rev. Clement Mercer – Roland Coombs
Mayor of Cleckleywyke – Jesse Scarfe
Synopsis
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Directors Notes
Perhaps It’s What We’re Here For.
To introduce either J. B. Priestley or ‘When We Are Married’ to a West Riding audience would be to argue an arrogance and presumption unthinkable even in an amateur theatre director. And don’t interrupt to tell me there is no West Riding – there is, and this play is set firmly in it; so firmly that one could almost believe that it sprung not from the teeming brain of an author, but from the soil in the cracks between the cobbles and flags. It is a classic, and like all classics is to be approached with love, respect, and something of holy dread. To whom much is given, from him is much expected, and we have hopes of not completely disappointing this expectation.
To work on this play has been a great and rewarding delight to all of us. If only some of that delight is communicated to audiences who know Cleckleywyke as they know their own backyard and who know its characters as they know their nearest and dearest, then the reward is doubled. If not, ‘we’ll all have to make the best of each other. But then, perhaps it’s what we’re here for’.
