4:35pm Thursday 5th November 2009
By Will Gore
Next week, Graham Greene’s comic novel Our Man in Havana, about a hapless vacuum-cleaner salesman who becomes embroiled in the world of espionage, will be brought to life on the Richmond Theatre stage, writes Will Gore.
Simon Shepherd, who is best known for starring in TV series Peak Practice, plays Wormold, the eponymous man in Havana and he says the production aims to capture the spirit of Greene’s book.
“It is a fun show of a wonderful book,” he says.
“Greene described it as an entertainment, not a novel or a satire, and that is what we’ve done with the production. It is inventive, quick and there are several laughs a minute.”
Our Man in Havana, which was turned into a successful film starring Alec Guinness in 1959, is set just before Castro came to power in Cuba and follows Wormold as he is cajoled into joining the British Secret Service.
The divorcee, who is desperately trying to make ends meet and provide for his daughter, agrees to send information back home. But he has no idea what he is doing and creates a fictitious network of agents and sends vacuum-cleaner blueprints to London to try to keep his paymasters happy.
Chaos inevitably ensues and Shepherd says the production reflects this with a small cast, featuring TV regulars Norman Pace, Philip Franks, and Beth Cordingly, playing plenty of characters.
“I stick to playing Wormold but the others play at least 10 parts each – there are about 45 costume changes,” he says.
“It is like Noises Off backstage. When I’m on stage I can see into the wings when I’m on stage and sometimes I have to slow bits down if the changes are not going quickly enough.
“Norman said Gareth Hale came to see the show and described it as being like tap-dancing in a minefield. That is a good analogy but, now we know where the mines are, we can probably avoid a lot of them.”
Our Man in Havana’s five-day run in Richmond is part of a short national tour and Shepherd has been delighted with the way audiences have reacted to it.
“To begin with, the audience is often thinking: ‘What on Earth is going on?’, but they soon get into the style of it,” he says.
“This book has a fantastic story but it also has a big heart. It is appropriate to today, with the fallibility of the British Government and MI5.
“There are laughs from the audience that you know has to do with current politics.”
Our Man in Havana, Richmond Theatre, November 9 to 14, to book, visit ambassador tickets. com
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