The Mystery of Edwin Drood

Pleasance Theatre 7.30pm

Shows running until Saturday 

Tickets £8 for students (£10 full price)

Last night saw the opening night of the Edinburgh University Savoy Opera Group’s production of ‘The Mystery of Edwin Drood’ at the Pleasance Theatre.

The cast performing “There You Are”

The theatrical production of Dickens’ final and unfinished novel invites the audience to an evening at the “Music Hall Royale” and takes us through the lives of the characters from the town of Cloisteram. Where Dickens puts down his pen, the audience takes it up and we are asked to choose the ending of the play in a series of voted questions such as “who killed Edwin Drood?”

The performance was far from perfect and although the errors were trivial, the unending run of technical problems made it difficult to pay attention to what was actually going on. The dancing was inconsistent in both costume and ability (however Samuel Burkett outshone the rest by far) and they had the audience questioning their purpose on the stage more than once. The sets were far from artistic and the ill-fitting costumes of half of the cast along with curtains not opening, microphones not working and a series of lighting disasters left an unfortunate tarnish on what was otherwise a good production.

Ari L’Heveder as the debauched Dame, The Princess Puffer

Taken through the play with the help of the heartwarming Chairman (Dominic Corbett in his EUSOG debut) we were introduce to babble of characters from the quaint English town. Star performances of the night come from the solid and reliable portrayal of Edwin Drood by Giselle Yonance; leaving the audience missing her stage presence in the second act. The show was made, however, by the comical characters of Ari L’Heveder and Joe McArdle who played the promiscuous Princess Puffer and the delightful drunk Durdles respectively and had the audience laughing and loving them both throughout.

Joe McArdle had the audience in fits portraying Durdles

The Tab gives this 3 stars (with potential). It’s worth the watch and promises to be successful production once the technical teething problems are assessed.