Elephant in Old Buckenham

 Village Hall hosts great play

Touring theatre company fEast brought their new play ‘Elephant’ to a packed Old Buckenham Village Hall on Friday evening 14 June and, like the proverbial elephant in the room, there were a good many secrets the characters in the play were deliberately avoiding.

The play itself was a bit of a cliff-hanger, set in a house balanced on an eroding cliff in North Norfolk.  Local recluse Manny gets a surprise visit from his estranged sister, Jessie, whom he’s not seen for a year. She’s wildly unpredictable, searching for a long lost family secret, and has inexplicably brought along with her a petty criminal, Lee Farrier, trussed up in a sack. Jessie describes an unlucky series of events that have conspired to her making such a poor and rash decision, but Manny’s believing none of it. She’s done this kind of thing before.

As a rising tide eats away at the foundations, it’s the sudden appearance of a local girl, Cally, arriving with a damaged reputation and an uncanny ability to read minds, that forces all four of them to try and salvage something from the day before it’s too late. But as time runs out, and the uneasy truce turns towards possible violence, a hastily reckless plan begins to fall apart, exposing the bitter truths that have brought them together, the lies they’ve told each other, and against all expectation, the discovery of a strangely redemptive power that might just be buried beneath their feet. 

The acting throughout was superb, the story engaging (if a bit crazy at times!) and without giving a spoiler, the ending was pure gold.  Do go and see at it Diss Corn Hall this Thursday 20 June or later in its performances around Norfolk if you get the chance – you won’t be disappointed.