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An Evening with Blowers: The Oxford Playhouse
9:12am Thursday 24th April 2008
The setting for Henry Blofeld's one-man-show was disconcerting: satin curtains, flowers, a golden bedspread, no less. Can an 18-carat toff like Blowers' really have demanded this kitsch?
Of course not: this was the set for Plaza Suite, which was running last week and would be needed an hour after the famous cricket commentator left the lectern he stood behind for 90 minutes. Yet that word kitsch' somehow lingers. Blofeld possesses one of the instantly recognisable voices on radio - the clubbable Etonian waxing lyrical on Test Match Special about buses, pigeons, cakes, "dear old things" and, occasionally, cricket. And behind the microphone, painting pictures in our minds, he should stay. On stage, before a fullish and undoubtedly friendly audience, he tried to be a debonair rascal but turned out more a purveyor of smarmy archness. Yes, there were brief memories of Brian Johnston and John Arlott in the commentary box, a few easy shots at Geoff Boycott, some fun about Delhi-belly and some potentially interesting name-dropping (Fleming, Coward and Her Majesty). But then came the odd f-word, mention of swinging balls and an extended story (true or not, who cared?) about his own antics one night in a hotel clad only in a doily. You could also see some punch lines at a distance of 22 yards.
This is clearly unsound advice to give an iconic figure who can earn thousands from after-dinner speeches: just stick to your cleverer thoughts on cricket, its characters and atmosphere, rather than drag yourself down what you believe to be fruity by-ways for cheap laughs. Use that wonderful voice to muse thus, as you did early on in the show: "The third age of the cricketer is senility - when your captain asks you to bat at No. 10 and you feel it might be a bit high . . . and when he asks to bowl, you take it as a serious and calculated insult!"
It is truly annoying when you want to enjoy something and don't quite. Blofeld looks like an amalgam of Robert Robinson and the late Anton Rogers; with the material he mostly chose, he was as clever and witty as neither.
Editor's choice
The Mole and Chicken, Easington, near Thame
One of the pictures on this page gives a good impression of the delights to be enjoyed at the Mole and Chicken on one of those sunny days that now seem as far as can be from our present situation.
Early taste of Christmas wine
Next week is The Oxford Times Wine Club Christmas Tasting and, with just four weeks to go until Christmas Day, it is an excellent opportunity to sample a specially-selected range of wines for the festive season.
Dylan Moran: New Theatre, Oxford
‘I was the first person to discover that if you infected a person with Marmite, he would stand up and bark at the moon.” “Everybody under the age of 35 has the intelligence of raspberry jam.” “Children can hear vegetables hiding.”
Sleeping Beauty, Chipping Norton Theatre
There’s nothing King Couer-de-Loup likes more than a good battle: “We’ll march on King Florizel’s wet and wicked army,” he proclaims. His Queen is not so sure, however. She would rather her husband stayed around: there’s the christening of their daughter Princess Aurora to arrange for a start. And he certainly can’t go out and fight looking like that: “Your chain mail’s got a ladder in it,” she wails.
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