In the mid-19th century, the people of Rye made their own entertainment, born in the long tradition of festivals, street performances and mystery plays. By 1899, the time was right to launch a theatre group in the town. The Rye Dramatic and Operatic Society quickly became the chief entertainer, with Gilbert and Sullivan’s comic operas playing to packed houses at the Monastery. In 1928, the group relaunched as the Rye Players and apart from minor blips such as war, the emergence of TV, ‘creative differences’, name changes and loss of venues, the spirit survives to this day.
Against this background, it was indeed a historic day for Rye Players on Saturday when they performed Much Ado About Nothing in the courtyard of the Monastery gardens. Sandi Bain worked closely with Simon Parsons at the Rye Heritage Centre on supplying actors and costumes for the Rye Royal procession, most notably Queen Elizabeth I herself.
Simon was also instrumental in setting up the logistics for performing the play to round off such an action-packed day Sandi says, “We were very excited when Simon told us that Alex McCarthur had kindly given permission for us to perform in the courtyard. It represents a real homecoming and we absolutely loved the performance space. The 40 or so chairs we had, were filled very quickly. Others brought their own and some people were happy to stand under the enormous sycamore tree.
The play itself was mostly in the memory banks of the cast that performed it at St Mary’s in June. But there was still work for director Paul Thomas to do in order to refresh those memories and help the actors make the necessary change from an indoor to an outdoor setting. Another challenge was to replace two cast members who weren’t available last weekend. So we felt very fortunate to have been able to slot in two brand new members, Poppy Baldock and Ruth Gibson, who did so well as Hero and her attendant, Lady Ursula.
“It was a big step for us to attempt a Shakespeare but the response from the public and the boundless enthusiasm of members old and new, has us thinking about next year. Midsummer perhaps. A night maybe? We have a dream!”
Rye Players next production is Book Club, a new comedy directed by Patricia Driver. Tickets for the two performances on September 23 at the Mermaid Inn are available from the Rye Arts Festival website.
Image Credits: Kt bruce , Rye Players archives .