Fault in the Structure

‘Oh, but we must have some more suggestions, Mr Chairman,’ interpolated the scribe at the blackboard. ‘To my mind we have not heard one sensible voice so far.’

‘Why don’t we do three one-acts,?’ asked Geoffrey Channing. ‘We tried that at school in my last year and they went like a bomb.’

‘We tried it, too, four years ago,’ said the secretary. ‘It was hardly a success. The people in the first play felt that their evening was over much too soon, and those in the middle play complained that the first play hadn’t got the audience sufficiently warmed up, and as for the last play…’

‘Yes, I remember that last play,’ said Melanie bitterly. ‘I was the only woman in it and all the men had spent the first two plays in the pub and came on stage absolutely sloshed. I should think the people in the seventh row of the stalls could smell them and I had to be made love to by one of them. Ugh!’

‘Why not a revue?’ asked Stella Walker, giggling. ‘You know – take off the politicians and some of the people in this town. It would be a riot, I’ll bet.’

‘It probably would cause one,’ said the treasurer, ‘besides letting us in for several libel actions. I definitely think we must rule out that suggestion.’

‘I still think we ought to do a musical,’ said Sybil Gartner, sticking to her guns.

‘Porgy and Bess,’ suggested Geoffrey Channing. ‘I wouldn’t mind blacking up in a good cause.’

‘The audience would mistake us for the Black and White Minstrels,’ said Robert Eames. ‘They sing, too, you know.’

The chairman called the meeting to order again. Clarice Blaine wrote Porgy and Bess on the blackboard and added an even bigger and more offensive question mark against it than the one which already criticised Blithe Spirit.

‘I beg your pardon if I am out of order, Mr Chairman,’ said the newly-joined member, ‘but what is the object of holding a Caxton Festival? He had no connection with Hampshire, had he? I thought he set up his printing-press at Westminster.’

‘Ah, Dr Denbigh,’ said Mrs Blaine, before the chairman could reply, ‘thereby hangs a very interesting tale. We actually have a William Caxton living in our midst – well, very nearly in our midst – and as the printing-press is now five hundred years old – 1476 to 1976, you know – I decided that a festival must be held with our very own William Caxton as the principal figure. So far I have been unable to persuade him to take part, but I am determined that he can and shall be in the forefront.’

‘There aren’t those dreadful royalties on Gilbert and Sullivan nowadays,’ said Sybil, still hopeful of getting her way by sheer persistance. ‘Why don’t we do The Yeoman of the Guard?

There was a chorus made up in almost equal parts of approval, disapproval and suggestions for other Gilbert and Sullivan operas.

‘Gilbert and Sullivan? It’s been done to death on the telly.’

‘All the amateur operatic societies do it.’

‘You can’t beat Gilbert and Sullivan if you want to fill the house.’

‘The Yeoman of the Guard isn’t funny. What about The Mikado?

‘Iolanthe for my money. That policeman song always brings the house down, so what about that?’

‘You’re thinking of “A policeman’s lot is not a happy one”. That doesn’t come in Iolanthe. You mean the sentry. You know – “And every little boy and gal that’s born into this world alive”, but now there’s a Labour Party that song has lost its point, and that’s true of most of Gilbert’s jokes.’

‘What about The Gondoliers? Prettier music and more amusing clothes.’ So on and so forth amid pandemonium until the chairman, with more difficulty this time, once again called the meeting to order.

‘We’ve been given plenty of ideas,’ he said. ‘We will take them one by one for a show of hands.’

‘Excellent,’ said Clarice. ‘I will write up the number of votes for each one and then we can eliminate the least fancied titles and vote again upon the rest.’

‘Why can’t we do The Duenna?’ demanded Sybil rebelliously.

‘Your Gilbert and Sullivan suggestion is on the board, dear,’ Clarice pointed out. ‘Do you wish to change it? You cannot give us more than one suggestion.’

‘She can’t make a musical suggestion at all,’ said the treasurer desperately. ‘Apart from all the other expenses, the chorus, as well as the principals, would have to be costumed.’

‘They can make their own dresses. The women mostly do,’ retorted Sybil hotly.

‘There would have to be a paid orchestra.’

‘Oh, nonsense! Chamber music would be quite enough in the town hall which we use. What’s the matter with a violin or two, a ’cello and a piano? Surely we can rustle up those without paying them!’

‘A full orchestra is absolutely essential,’ persisted Ernest unhappily, ‘and that means a paid conductor. It’s all quite out of the question.’

‘Before we commit ourselves to ruling out a musical piece,’ said Dr Denbigh quietly, ‘I wonder whether I might be allowed to make a suggestion? As you may or may not know, I am in charge of the music at the Chardle College of Education, so if I supply extra choristers, the full college orchestra and myself as guest conductor – all, needless to say, free of charge – is there any reason why Miss Gartner should not have her way? To my mind, a festival definitely calls for music’