Hitchhiker’s
Guide to the Galaxy Radio Show – Live!
Theatre
Royal, Newcastle
10.6.2012
Far out
in the uncharted backwaters of England lies a city called Newcastle. It’s
possible that the ape-descended life forms of the city still think digital
watches are a pretty neat idea.
It was
in this particular part of our utterly insignificant blue green planet that we
saw something we never expected to see. It is not unnatural for people to make
this particular observation about Newcastle. However, little did I think when I
accidentally tuned my Sub-Etha radio into a certain radio show back in the very
early 1980s that I would eventually see (most of) the original cast perform –
live, on stage – the story of The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy.
The
Theatre Royal is steeped in history. Plays featuring the works of Dickens were
performed there while Dickens was still very much alive. I had been there once
before, sitting up amongst the gods, to see Elaine Paige. This time I was in a
central seat on Row 2 of the Stalls. So close I could almost reach out and
stick my finger down the throat of a Vogon.
 |
| The Theatre Royal |
With a
live band and Billy Boyd as the guest ‘Voice of the Book’ (the guest spot
changes frequently during the tour) we were all set for lift-off. Minutes
later, after a rousing and moving musical treat of One of These Days and
Journey of the Sorcerer played back to back, our first two heroes took to the
stage, looking dramatically skywards at the Vogon constructor fleet. Simon
Jones as Arthur Dent! Geoffrey McGivern as Ford Prefect! Two cool froods who
really know where their towels are.
Before
too long we got to see Mark Wing-Davey and Susan Sheridan as Zaphod Beeblebrox
and Trillian respectively, followed swiftly by an imaginative – and highly
effective – stage version of Marvin, the paranoid android.
The
first half of the show condensed the first five original episodes into a
package of ‘greatest hits’ moments. We experienced Arthur Dent’s distress at
seeing first his house being scheduled for demolition and then his entire
planet; we suffered the terrible punishment of listening to Vogon poetry
(frankly, I’ve heard worse verse from humans – and I will recite some of it to
you personally if you ever upset me); took a trip to Milliways (The Restaurant
at the End of the Universe) and found out the answer to Life, the Universe and
Everything (which ended up being redundant as we never discovered what the
actually question was).
The
material was very familiar; we have grown up listening to, reading and watching
all of the various Hitchhiker adventures in a myriad of different formats.
There
were occasional fluffs - which were impossible to successfully disguise in
front of an audience who could doubtless quote the original lines word for word
- and Simon Jones improvised a little bit of comedy business with the tea cups
dispensed by the Nutri-Matic machine on board The Heart of Gold.
Following
a short break, part two brought a much sketchier experience. Bits and pieces
from the subsequent radio shows and novels were re-enacted for our enjoyment,
although the narrative took a back seat at this point. Random (daughter of Arthur and Trillian) and Agrajag made notable appearances (the latter played by Dirk Maggs, armed with a huge umbrella)Time travel and
alternative existences were used to explain away various discrepancies in logic
but it didn’t really matter. A clever line about whole chapters missing from
Arthur’s life – delivered with a knowing look to the audience – emphasised that
we were all there as part of a celebration and not to discuss the finer points
of a serious text.
To top
it all, we were even treated to two songs from Marvin.
Will
there be another show to explore the missing bits and pieces? We didn’t get a
look at the B-Ark, for example, although there was a prominent rubber duck to
prompt our memories. It certainly seemed to be a sell out at the Theatre Royal,
so a sequel must be an option.
It is said
that nostalgia isn’t what it used to be. Yet I feel sure I wasn’t the only one
in the audience to feel the decades fall away and recapture one’s lost youth; a
time when men were real men, women were real women and small furry creatures from Alpha
Centauri were real small furry creatures from Alpha Centauri.
Meanwhile,
the tour goes on…catch it if you can.
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