Advertised as ‘inimitable’ and ‘priceless’, Beckett’s play arrived at the Grand Theatre, Blackpool, on June 4 [1955], to find itself up against stiff competition: the Dave King Show at the Winter Gardens Pavilion, Albert Modley, supported by Mike and Bernie Winters starring in Summer Showboat at the Palace Theatre, and, twice nightly at the Central Pier, Let’s Have Fun, with Jimmy James, Ken Dodd, and Jimmy Clitheroe. It proved to be, according to the local newspaper, ‘one of the stormiest receptions in the theatrical history of Blackpool’...it did not help that the audience included a party of OAPs playing only a shilling each, but far from convinced by the second act that they were getting value for it.
From David Kynaston’s Family Britain, 1951-57. The cast had to be escorted from the theatre by the cops, apparently.
I went to see The Rivals at the Grand a few years ago, one evening when I was there for a chess tournament. I wish the audience had been of a similarly critical mind on that occasion, since - a couple of older actors exceptd - it was rubbish. But the punters applauded like seals nevertheless.
Posted by: ejh | December 30, 2009 at 08:14 AM