To Kill a Mockingbird

So LOGMAN had free tickets to go to the Christchurch Repertory Theatre's production of To Kill a Mockingbird.

Being quite familiar with the story, but not overly familiar (I read the book back in High School, and have the seen the movie twice) I felt this would be a bit of an interesting experience. Nothing could have prepared me for what I was about to witness.

So the show opened with slides of black slaves with an old gospel recording of We Shall Overcome playing. This might have been a great way of building an emotional response in the audience before the play began... except the sound system in the Repertory is awful. It is like a couple of speakers taken out of an old car have been put on the wall and mixed through a cardboard box. You are unlikely to even appreciate Queen Live at Wembley through those so you can imagine how much emotion this stirred in me.

Then we begin the show, and I am immediately drawn to my most biggest peeves of all peeves when it comes to acting: accents.

I've always had the opinion that if you can't do an accent, don't try. And if your whole cast are incapable of doing an accent, then you best just scrap the whole idea. Obviously the directors of this play do not share my disdain for such inconsistencies, as for the next 2 hours I got to listen one boy mush his words so bad that at times he just sounded like a cockney young boy from Oliver Twist, an old man that sounded like he had just come down from the Highlands, and old ladies that didn't know if they were American or New Zealanders. Apart from Atticus, NO ONE IN THE ENTIRE CAST was capable of doing a convincing southern accent for more than a few words, some even less. Fortunately, the worst of the accents was to come in the 2nd half of the play...

Next thing that impressed me was the women wearing shoe polish to look African-American. Classy.

Wait! Here comes a legitimate black man! Yes, the one Maori person to be cast in this play was - for some reason - placed in the role of the Reverend. At first I questioned why he wasn't automatically given the role of Tom Robinson (the black man accused of raping and beating Mayella Ewell), but once he too attempted to create a southern accent by speaking like Kermit the Frog with a blocked nose - and thus causing LOGMAN to suffer a bout of hysteria - I found the casting decision a bit more agreeable. But seriously, is Christchurch suffering from that much inherent 'white pride' that they can't even let Maori people be part of their theatre scene?

At this stage LOGMAN is asking himself 'How could this possibly get more enjoyable?'

And then the gods of theatre answered my question, when Atticus Finch walked on stage... looking like Colonel Sanders

Colonel
Mutha fucking
Sanders

I kid you not; the guy looked like he was wearing a Colonel Sanders outfit. And a cheap one at that.

To the actor's credit, his performance was the strongest and he handled his accent well. But the costume just left me waiting for him to say something like "Tom Robinson is an innocent man... just like my 13 secret herbs and spices"

ON TO THE TRIAL and bah gawd Alan Partridge is prosecuting! "I call to the stand Mayella Ewell.. A-HA!!!" Oh how I wish he had done that. Another Colonel Sanders lookalike serves as the judge - I believe he might have been Admiral Sanders or something because he had a nice grey suit instead of his counterpart's chicken frying outfit. And this brought about a superb performance of Bob Ewell. And by superb, I mean a man with massive padding to make him look fat who spoke in an accent I couldn't define and delivering brilliant dialogue like "You are tricking me with your trickery!" like he was an extra on Shortland St. LOGMAN laughed some more.

After the 1st act plodded along with all the grace of Johnny Rotten with Mad Cow disease, I found the intermission a great chance to regain my senses and ponder what might happen in the 2nd half: would Tom Robinson be sent to his death? Would Oliver Twist ask for more supper? Would the people of Maycomb run out of shoe polish? Was Rambo going to save the day? I just couldn't wait!

So the 2nd act continued the trial and that meant it was time for Tom Robinson to take the stand. Again, the shoe polish effect was strong, as was the actor's constant moving of his lips to make them look big. Because, you know - African-Americans have big lips.

I kid you not.

And even better, I believe he had been watching Malibu's Most Wanted to get inspiration for his accent. I don't think I ever imagined Tom Robinson to sound so gangster in 1932 - bravo to you, young sir!

Of course the trial ended, lights faded, something happened that I couldn't understand because the children were talking and their accents were all over the place. Then Bob attacked and Boo Radley made his entrance like Jason in Friday the 13th. And looking like Don Johnson. Then again, it might have actually been Don Johnson... I mean, does anyone even know where he is these days?

I should also point out here that Boo Radley has barely been mentioned until now, apart from one boring occassion at the start of the play where the children were playing outside his house. I'm pretty sure he was a rather big deal in the book which made his appearance at the end all the more important...

And that was the end. But not before we got another performance of We Shall Overcome through the cardboard speakers of doom. But this time with slides from the Million Man March, and Martin Luther King, Jr, and Malcolm X and... Obama? Yes - it ended with a picture of Obama in the White House.

I guess the moral of the story is a black man was wrongly convicted and put to death so the USA could have a black President

Either way, it was a fun night for the whole family.