Cult Movie

The danger in writing about a b-movie is that one might produce a b-play. One dark and stormy night Roger Gregg decided to take the risk. Cult Movie with the Gaiety School of Acting is the result.

The plot concerns the cast of a movie so bad there is no letter of the alphabet to describe it. An uncomfortable quartet is lured to a den of Satan-worshippers, led by a goat-masked dominatrix determined to correct the demonic inaccuracies of the film's ending, but with one bound a man searching for his missing wife sets them all free. The speed of the resolution is small recompense for the interminable journey towards it.

With its arbitrary references to the crime novels and films of America and Britain, the play is no more than an end-of-term romp in which everyone gets a chance to do something, most of it so over the top as to require mountaineers rather than actors. An extremely flexible approach to both acting areas and extension leads and a possibly popular line in sexual extravagance, epitomised by a can of shaving foam, all contribute to a theatrical unlucky dip. That the players have talent to throw away is quite obvious, although why they have to throw it away on this material is hard to understand. Gregg's sense of humour is lively and anarchic, but co-directors Tara Derrington and Patrick Sutton should have had the courage to insist on some acknowledgment of theatrical consistencies in terms of exits, entrances, locations and contexts. These are the really difficult aspects of writing a play, but this is the Gaiety School of Acting, for heaven's sake! They can be learned, can't they?

Cult Movie continues at the Granary (021-904275) until tonight and is at Project @ The Mint in Dublin from Tuesday June 16th until Saturday June 20th at 8 p.m. To book, phone: 01-8729977