An English Comedy Club production.
By Pam Valentine.
Directed by Christine Marchand.
Performed 25th May 2012 at the Arensburg Schouwberg, Antwerp.
An English Comedy Club production for FEATS.
FEATS Stage management winner: the Marcel Huhn/Bruno Boeye Memorial Award – Stage Manager, Sue Bottrell
All pet owners have a natural tendency to attribute human thoughts and emotions to their four-legged companions. When I hear my dog sigh, I believe he feels he is carrying the weight of the world on his shoulders. When he understands he is about to be brought to the park his joy is so vivid nothing else seems to count. And yet who knows what they would want to say to us if they could speak? In this lovely short piece, set in an animal shelter, Pam Valentine tries her hand at giving dogs a voice and the result is both hilariously funny and extremely moving.
Even though I’ve done this one before, in 2003, there were still a few surprises.
In this lovely short piece, set in an animal shelter, Pam Valentine tries her hand at giving dogs a voice and the result is both hilariously funny and extremely moving.
Review by Annie Daws
We meet and get to know four abandoned dogs who live in an animal shelter, awaiting re-housing. Their breeds and characters are immediately recognisable, thanks to faithful portrayals from the cast, playing on all- fours. We are introduced to a dear old mongrel (Ben) previously owned by a tramp, an ex-military German shepherd (Fritz), an overweight French poodle (Fifi) who was the spoiled pet of an old lady, and a lucky puppy (Ginger) who had escaped drowning.
The conversations between the dogs are very revealing and cover a myriad of topics from human babies to germ warfare! We also learn their stories and feel for them in their desperation to be re- homed and, through them, we start to understand something of a dog’s relationship with man. Although totally dependent upon their human masters, the dogs resent that fact and find it hard to accept humans’ treatment of them.
The only ‘humans’ in the cast are the kindly but overworked Warden – although he has the time to teach the dogs tricks, much to their disdain – and a woman visitor who, although we learn she is looking for a dog to adopt, we find out that she is not committed enough to take on the needs of a puppy or to walk a dog sufficiently. She almost decides upon the old mongrel but, in a moment of hurt loyalty to his old owner, the dog bites the woman’s hand and puts paid to that possibility.
The yappy, excitable puppy delighted us with his enthusiastic antics, and the gruff and belligerent German shepherd sparred constantly with the eager-to-please coquettish French poodle, but it was the old mongrel with his baleful dark eyes, who broke our hearts with his recounting of his wonderful life with his old master, a tramp.
The design for this play gave only a suggestion of cage bars in between each dog, but that was enough to conjure up the sparse comfort and close quarters of a charity-run dogs’ home.
For Ben it’s too late, but let’s hope that all the Gingers, Fritzes and Fifis of this world find the homes they so crave and deserve.