The good news is Michael Grandage, former artistic director of the Donmar Theatre, has formed his own company and is presenting a season of five plays with star names in the West End at affordable prices. (There are over 100,000 tickets at a bargain £10.) He kicks off with a revival of the play Peter Nichols wrote about his experiences when he was doing his national service in 1948 during the so-called state of emergency. Nichols was a member of SADUSEA (Song and Dance Unit South East Asia) which entertained troops and natives. Other members included Stanley Baxter, Kenneth Williams and John Schlesinger. The action is interspersed with pastiche songs of the period to music by Denis King and there’s an excellent parody of a Noel Coward lyric, “Can you please tell us how we came to lose the peace?”
The main plot concerns the military, political and sexual innocence of a new recruit. He loses his virginity to a Welsh-Asian girl, the only female in the troupe. The subplot concerns a sergeant-major who is supplying arms to the Chinese. Both plots play a secondary role to the concert party pieces and the performance of a certain acting captain, who never stops acting, either on-stage or off-stage. He is a screaming drag queen and his repertoire includes bad imitations of Marlene Dietrich, Carmen Miranda and Vera Lynn. The role, memorably created by Denis Quilley for the RSC in 1977, is now played by Simon Russell Beale who gives the sort of dreadful performance which got ENSA (Entertainments National Service Association) such a bad name, so bad, the acronym became an abbreviation for Every Night Something Awful. Grandage’s production, which contains gratuitous nudity, will appeal to all those who are nostalgic for national service and enjoy send-ups of tacky theatricals.