012 Contemporary Comedy- Old

012 Contemporary Comedy – Old 

I adored Crazy Big Fish by Gill Adams. Granted, it was made almost 20 years ago, and hopefully things have gotten a little better for working class women in the North since then.  Be that as it may, it was still refreshing to hear working class northern accents on Radio 4 (as it would have been on original broadcast), and still more refreshing for them all to be women (with a marked emphasis on middle aged to older women).  Gill Adams clearly thought so, which is why her comedy-drama was made, to blow some fresh air into the normal schedule of contemporary British radio drama. It’s the story of five women who meet in order to audition for a part in contemporary, northern vernacular earthy stage drama Fish and Leather, written by Gill Adams.  Indeed, the unifying and expositional device that opens each episode is Gill’s answerphone message, after which the various women leave messages of various coherence throughout the serial. Rita (Deborah McAndrew) is a middle aged (and we are led to believe, dumpy and rather unattractive) housewife.  She’s never learned to read properly, and has spent the last twenty years raising children with her highly traditional husband, Billy (Terence Mann), who is now mostly out of work.  She has little money, few friends, and a fairly circumscribed existence, living with her mother, Gladys, who is fond of drinking (snowballs), betting, staying in bed, and antagonizing Billy—but Gladys, it turns out, is the only person who believes in Rita—more than Rita herself does.  Indeed, Rita would never have had the courage to audition for Fish and Leather had her mother not forced her to do so.  At the audition, Rita meets Pauline, and it’s hate at first sight.  The only creature in whom Pauline has any interest at the start of the drama is her dog, Diana, whom she babies and spoils.  To the rest of the world, she’s a right madam.  Like Rita, she is middle aged and not particularly attractive and is very loud-mouthed and sharp.  Eventually, when they are cast as Fish and Leather, Rita and Pauline come to appreciate each other.  Sandy is living with her bourgeois, upwardly mobile mother, with whom she really cannot get along, after having left her job as a dancer on a cruise ship.  She is too good for her town and can’t wait to get out.  Sandy becomes the costume designer and makeup artist for the production.  Part of what softens Pauline is Babs, a young woman who has spent most of her adult life taking care of her cantankerous, emotionally abusive, alcoholic father.  Babs has serious self-esteem issues, but the rest of the Fish and Leather group help her to become a more confident person.  Indeed, Rita and Babs have both been oppressed by the patriarchal structure (still, in 2000, clearly a force to be reckoned with in the traditional, conservative households of the northern working class); Sandy is struggling against the strictures of bourgeois society, and Pauline needs help relating to other people.  All of the women are very engaging, and it makes for a hilarious comedy and a moving story, in which you hope against all odds they succeed.  Adams is clearly writing from life, and the actors are all splendid and utterly believable.  Directed by Polly Thomas, Crazy Big Fish also starred Ruth Holden, Rachel Davies, Katy Cavanagh, and Sally Walsh.