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29 April 2025
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4**** 1/2
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One of the huge pleasures of the theatrical year last year was to witness some of the best storytelling I have seen for a long time. Nicolas Ridley’s biographical play about his Father, the playwright and actor Arnold Ridley, is revelatory, funny, touching, fascinating and deeply moving.
Following it’s run at Quay Arts in Newport – https://www.theatreplays.uk/were-you-anyone-before-dads-army-the-minghella-theatre-quay-arts-newport-isle-of-wight/ – it has been refined by writer and director, Graham Pountney for a production at the White Bear Theatre in Kennington, London. The net result of the work they have carried out is to have raised this piece of theatre up a number of notches.
The story is still the core – it is a most wonderful one – and through Nicolas’s writing, the episodic nature of the tale is one which moves easily from one incident to another. With his wide smile and often baleful look, Mansel David embodies Arnold as well as you could imagine. It is a monster of a role and the production is utterly reliant on the actor to ensure that the audience is with Arnold all the way – this David does with great skill.
Pountney has slimmed down the supporting cast to just four from the original nine and it works so much better as a result. Playing multiple roles, these actors are virtually on stage throughout with their props and token costumes (a hat here, a scarf there), changing before our eyes, but so discretely it is hardly noticeable. So huge praise goes to Laura Fitzpatrick, Karl Moffat, Samantha Parry and Joe Sargent who achieve what is asked of them with aplomb – incredibly difficult to pull off these kind of roles without drawing attention to yourself – especially in so intimate a setting as the White Bear – but pull it off they do.
It seemed the same excellent soundtrack to proceedings, but the lighting was markedly better and shows what can be achieved in a tiny space. The simple set, many props and furnishings were all spot on. The spare use of well-chosen costumes is all that is needed to suggest characters. The transference from one scene to another has been simplified perfectly and this must partly be reflected in the reduced running time from the original production.
Nicolas Ridley’s words shine through continually – the descriptive passages, especially to do with his Father’s experiences in war are compelling and ensures the audiences minds are taken to the locations of the terrible events Arnold went through. Reminiscences of ‘The Ghost Train’ and ‘Dad’s Army’ bring great joy to the audience and will continue to do so as they remain firm favourites on the stage and on television to this day. Though Arnold’s personal life is never looked at in a great deal of detail, you are left with an impression of the man which is so likeable that, even when the end of the play arrives, it seems a shock – it is simple, but devastatingly effective.
A few hiccups on opening night do not detract from the story or the production where the work of Ridley Senior and Junior shine very brightly. Directed with great sensitivity by Graham Pountney and with a central performance full of joy and a tremendous supporting cast, this is a rare theatrical treat – a play about someone so ordinary on the surface and, in that sense, hardly worth having a play written about them at all, but a play actually about someone extraordinary, that the play is a compelling must see. It deserves a wider and bigger audience without a shadow of a doubt!
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Cast
Arnold Ridley – Mansel David
Supporting cast – Laura Fitzpatrick, Karl Moffat, Samantha Parry, Joe Sargent
Creatives
Writer – Nicolas Ridley
Director – Graham Pountney
Set Design – Marcus Reddington
Company Stage Manager – Alexandra Kataigida
Lighting Associate – Edmund Sutton
Sound Associate –Stuart Ballingal
Costume and Props – Andy Robertshaw/Battlefield Partnership
Photo Credit – Paddy Gormley
