CONTEMPORARY ARTS
THE THEATRE
Mountain Air." By Ronald Wilkinson. (Comedy.)
THIS play is described as " a Comedy of a Swiss Holiday." The " comedy " consists of the frequent mispronunciation of English words and phrases by Herr Doktor Hubermann, the owner of a pink villa in Switzerland which also houses the Herr Doktor's wife, her pretty niece, two comic Englishmen demobilised from the R.A.F., a Scotsman who turns out to be Frau Hubermann's first husband and an English woman doctor. Mountain Air is, in fact, a perfectly vulgar, tedious and banal little play, lacking any hint of originality and without one spark of genuine humour. With the exception of Mr. Martin Miller, who deals very valiantly and skilfully with the part of the comic foreigner trying to learn Air Force slang, the acting is on much the same level as the,play itself. An outstandingly bad performance is given by Mr. Michael Evans, a young actor who apes the nonchalance and sophistication of Rex Harrison in French Without Tears (a play which seems to have had an undue, but unprofitable influence upon the author of this piece) and who acts chiefly with his teeth. This is the sort of play which makes you look apprehensively round the audience to see that no foreigners
Previous page
