Sheffield theatre group gets into bubbles to create show on love and marriage

The plays by Arnold Bennett, George Bernard Shaw and Anton Chekhov each suggest that love and marriage might not always go together as naturally as a horse and carriage!

In common with other amateur theatre groups, the Midland Players have had to solve the puzzle of how to prepare a performance in the midst of pandemic restrictions.

The answer, following numerous online meetings, was to plan a show consisting of three one-act comedies, each small cast and director comprising a ‘bubble’, and then rely on British weather to rehearse in their gardens, so the neighbours have been treated to some real ‘drama’ from over the fence or hedge!

In Bennett’s The Stepmother, the woman writer of steamy hospital romance novels is plagued by a mysterious critic, while unaware her scheming, sharp-witted secretary is playing Cupid.

Read this: Sheffield Lyceum parties again at last with reopening show Hairspray

Shaw’s Overruled depicts two married couples who have their eyes on each other’s spouses, and have to figure out what’s to be done when you are respectable, English and made promises to ‘mother’!

Finally, from the pen of Chekhov comes an unromantic suitor with a hint of lunacy, and the long-suffering father of a grown-up daughter who might get wed if she would just stop talking, in The Proposal.

Chris Walker from the group said: “When it comes to the institution and conduct of marriage, this is a show which really does pose the question ‘What does love have to do with it?’. Is courtship and matrimony no more than a strange game we play?

“You may not get any answers but you are sure to have your ribs tickled when Midland Players return to the stage.”

The show can be caught in Sheffield on Friday, September 17 at 7.30 pm at Crookes Social Club, Mulehouse Road, S11, and also in Chapel-en-le-Frith at Chapel Playhouse on September 10 and 11. Tickets cost £10 (£8 concessions) and can be reserved or purchased online at www.midlandplayers.co.uk or by calling 07746 661508.

Read this: Music line-up for Sheffield Festival in the Square – here’s what you can see