Classic tale returns to Warrandyte stage
by GRANT PURDY
4th November 2024
Photos: JAMES POYNER
In late November, Warrandyte Theatre Company is staging the much-loved Australian Classic, Hotel Sorrento.
The Company first presented this work shortly after it was written in 1990 — and its subjects and characterisations have really not aged.
The focus on the family and the tensions arising from love, responsibility, and guilt are as relevant today as they were 30 years ago.
Set in what was the sleepy seaside town, Sorrento, it concerns the reunion of three sisters and the effect on their relationship of a semi-autobiographical novel written by the expatriate Meg, who returns from London with her English husband to see if the Australia she has left 10 years before has moved on.
Many will have seen and remember the 1995 film, based closely on the play, that starred Joan Plowright, Ray Barrat, Caroline Goodall, and many other famous Australian actors.
While sister Pippa is now a hard-edged advertising executive in New York, within she is still a frightened little girl, competing for the attention of her other sisters.
The eldest sister, Hillary, “chose” to look after her father after her mother died and has brought up her son, Troy, single-handedly.
She is accused by her sisters of just marking time, but counters by saying, “You may as well get used to life and make the best of it”.
This production has attracted a cast of many Warrandyte Theatre Company regulars and some excellent new actors.
Dani Carey and Francesca Carl return to play sisters Meg and Pippa, and they are joined by newcomer Shivanii Cameron, who is playing Hillary.
Other regulars are Mason Frost playing Meg’s “steady” husband, Edwin, and Don Nicolson plays the argumentative journalist Dick, and Rosey Cullinan playing Marge, whose reading of Meg’s novel has “awakened her to feel again”.
Peter Smith returns to the Warrandyte stage after some years to play the chauvinist but now softening father, Wal.
And, in only his second stage appearance, Harry Gompertz joins the cast to play Troy in the demanding role of Meg’s son.
Jock Macneish has designed a wonderful set that cleverly provides many different scenes and acting areas on the one stage.
This show is about the characters, their passions and pasts, and how, through family ties or coincidence, their lives become intertwined.
This show is a warm and, at times, funny drama that develops into moments of great poignancy.
The show opens on November 22 with three weeks of Friday and Saturday night performances and two Sunday matinees.
Tickets are already selling well.
Buy your ticket at trybooking.com/CPXME.
Warrandyte Theatre Company’s final production of 2024 will have café seating, making for an intimate theatre experience.
