There’s something freeing about getting to laugh at misogyny, xenophobia, fat shaming, stuttering and incest like we used to. We’re not supposed to take the proverbial out of the neurodivergent anymore and ever since Me Too we haven’t been allowed to objectify hot young things like we once did.
It’s amazing what’s changed in the thirty years since Vicar of Dibley had its first TV run.
Theatre Hawke’s Bay takes all of Dibley’s greatest hits and sticks them together into one long, laugh-out-loud, hoot-fest with all the familiar tropes and jokes. It’s a bit like being stuck inside at Nana’s on a wet weekend with nothing to binge but a box set of a mid-nineties Brit-com … and loving every minute of it.
Although Kim Wright embodies the Vicar so well (there are hints of Dawn French here but it really is all Wright’s own), it’s Esmeralda Jobbins as Alice Tinker who glues the story and the characters together. Her chemistry with Connor Hirst’s Hugo is sugary sweet, she makes a great foil for Wright and the perfect fall guy for Andrew Clibborn as pompous David Horton. Although we see vividly the original Alice of the late, great Emma Chambers, Jobbins manages to bring forth her own version, a little grittier and sassier but just as endearing.
Peter Wolstenholme, Phil Matcham and Gerard Cook as the threesome of Jim, Frank and Owen are well cast and manage all types of impediments, affectations and dithering while still delivering some prime comedic moments. A surprise star is Margaret Dempsey as Mrs C. Dempsey delivers well-timed punch lines that shock the guffaws out of the audience. Her coup de grace, circling the stage dressed as an ox, is a highlight.
Running gags keep the piece moving although scene changes and pace of delivery could both be tightened. The audience is in love already with the cast so short cuts could be taken to bring us into the action faster, and propel us to the interval sooner! Theatre HB is famous for its cuppa and cake at half time, and for this show — so British, so cosy and so soaked in endless pots of tea — it’s an especially fitting accompaniment.
Dibley is a crowd pleaser overall, an excellent way to spend a winter evening.
Vicar of Dibley
Theatre Hawke’s Bay, Hastings
On now until 19 July
