School Nativity play review: Dull, cliched, and lacking in any intellectual substance

A small child sang Away in a Manger alone and lit by a single light. It was a perfunctory performance, too obviously influenced by the Anne Hathaway I Dreamed a Dream performance in Tom Hooper’s 2012 film of Les Miserables, but she got the words in the right order and managed to keep to the tune.

It says a lot that such an average moment could be the highlight of ‘Nativity Play,’ St. Berthwick’s production of the traditional Christmas story.

Mary was played by a bland looking child with no charisma or charm, at no point did I feel she understood the character of the Mary. There was no sense of her dislocation, of her profound loneliness.

Joseph was even worse. The character of Joseph is one of the most interesting in theatre. Such conflict, the seeming betrayal of his wife but the inherent decency to stand with her. We got none of that from a boring little boy who seemed to have spent no time learning his lines and spent the entire performance with his hand down his trousers.

However bad the performers were, they were not helped by non-existent production values. The donkey was clearly a small boy in a costume. They couldn’t have stretched to a real donkey? Some shepherds appeared briefly, all wearing modern dressing gowns. Had the shepherds just got out of the shower before setting off on their pilgrimage? There was no effort or imagination in the stage design, just an old sheet with some stars painted on and what appeared to be a cheap wicker basket for a manger.

 All in all, a dreadful evening, and certainly my own son, who ‘played’ Herod will receive a stern talking-to this evening, because if he wants to make any sort of impact as an actor, that was not the way to do so.

Star-rating

*