Home Guard comedy well-staged

Dad’s Army, written by Jimmy Perry and David Croft, directed by Greg Hack for Hamilton Playbox.

Opening night, reviewed by GEOFF LEWIS

Dad’s Army is the latest of a series of stage-adaptations of popular British television comedies of the 1960s and ‘70s staged by Playbox and follows ‘Allo ‘Allo and Are You Being Served.

The Greg Stack-directed Dad’s Army is probably the best of them thanks to clever casting. The original comedy was based around simple plots and strong characterisation, and the Playbox production has the right person for every character.

The Home Guard were generally made up of men who were not fit for frontline military service. Sometimes because they were too old, medically unfit, or as it seems, so dim that they would be a greater risk to themselves than the enemy.

The Playbox production has placed them perfectly from the corpulent and bothered Peter Hollister as Captain Mainwaring to the sweating and grinning Private Godfrey and the greasy spiv Rob Connelly.

Dad’s Army is a send-up of a bumbling platoon of British home guardsmen in the fictional setting of Walmington on Sea. A popular British television sitcom between 1968 and 1977, it covered nine series and 80 episodes.

The show was adapted for stage by Roger Redfarn in 1975.

Playbox’s production of Dad’s Army is a generally entertaining evening and will bring back fond memories of he original show.

Playbox’s Dad’s Army can be experienced at the Riverlea Theatre from June 9 to June 30, 8pm, except for the matinee on June 16 at 2pm. Dinner and show are on Thursdays, Fridays and Saturdays. Tickets from iticket.co.nz or from the Riverlea Theatre, 07 856 5450, 0800 800 192 and playbox.org.nz.