MICKLEOVER PLAYERS

And a Nightingale Sang 

by C. P. Taylor

April 2006

I suppose this is best described as a romantic comedy. It charts the lives of the Stott family in Newcastle from the 3^rd^ September 1939 until V.E. Day in 1945.

Each scene coincides with a significant event during the war, but focuses on the lives of the Stotts, rather than world events.

The play is narrated by Helen Stott, who is in her late 20s, early 30s and overly concerned about her appearance. Helen has a younger sister, Joyce, whose boyfriend, Eric, is in the army. Eric’s friend, Norman, also in the army, falls for Helen. Mr Stott is a shipbuilder, part-time fireman, pianist and member of the communist party. Mrs Stott is a devout catholic, and Grandad is more concerned about his dead whippet than the war.

We have staged And a Nightingale Sang before, back in 1995 – it was the second play I directed. This time round I would like to change the staging and use projected images and excerpts from news bulletins. I have discussed this with Stone Little Theatre who have used this technique in their recent productions.

Cast

Helen	Emma Edwards
George	Paul Mirkellian
Mam	Angela Wilson
Joyce	Natalie Cundy
Andie (Granda)	Roger Milligan
Eric	Rob Watts
Norman	Nick Barker

Directed by Andrew Gallear

Rehearsal photos

Technical details

This was first production in which we made extensive use of video.

We used a bare stage and projected a suitable image on to a screen at the back of the set. Between each we ran a short video depicting an event from the war that had a bearing on the scene that followed. For instance before the scene when Eric and Norman return from France, we played a video showing images of the evacuation from Dunkirk.

At the end of the show we rolled the credits…