PROGRAMME NOTE WRITTEN BY RACHEL KEEGAN FOR HATTON OPERATIC SOCIETY'S PRODUCTION OF "HALF A SIXPENCE" IN JUNE 1996

PROGRAMME NOTE WRITTEN BY RACHEL KEEGAN FOR HATTON OPERATIC SOCIETY'S PRODUCTION OF "HALF A SIXPENCE" IN JUNE 1996

FLASH BANG WALLOP - WHAT A SHOW!

David Heneker is perhaps not one of the most well known names in the history of musical theatre, but he was nevertheless responsible for the music of two of the most successful British musicals of the 1960's - "Half A Sixpence" and the record-breaking "Charlie Girl". Although "Charlie Girl" enjoyed a greater success in its original run, "Half A Sixpence" is undoubtedly Heneker's finest work and is the one which has stood the test of time.

For over twenty years Heneker was a regular Army officer who started writing songs for his show business friends as a sideline and eventually resigned his commission to become a full-time composer. His first major success was "Expresso Bongo" (1958), the plot of which is coincidentally based on the rise to fame of Britain's first home-grown rock and roll star - Tommy Steele (although Steele himself did not perform in the show). Heneker's other shows include "Make Me An Offer" (1959), "Jorrocks" (1966), "The Biograph Girl" (1980) and the English adaptation of "Irma La Douce"

Following the success of "Expresso Bongo", it was suggested to Heneker that he write a musical as a vehicle for Tommy Steele, and Heneker's wife is said to have woken him up in the middle of the night with the suggestion of an adaptation of H G Wells' novel "Kipps". Heneker and the librettist Beverley Cross completed the adaptation by early 1962 and the first play-through of the show (for which the title "Half A Sixpence" was chosen to avoid confusion with two previously filmed versions of "Kipps") took place in the Cavern Club, Liverpool (birthplace of the Beatles). The reason for this unusual venue was that Steele was playing in pantomime and the night-club was the only place where a piano could be found late at night.

The try-out of "Half A Sixpence" took place at Wimbledon Theatre (a venue where a number of performers in tonight's production have trodden the boards) in March 1963 and transferred to the Cambridge Theatre where it ran for eighteen months (677 performances) which would undoubtedly have been longer had the show not been booked to transfer to America. The opening on Broadway was delayed by the authors' refusal to the producer's request to change the title to "Half A Dollar" and the first production in America took place in Boston where the cast included the young John Cleese (then working on an American news magazine) in the role of Young Walsingham.

The score of "Half A Sixpence" has undergone many revisions since the play-through in the Cavern Club. One of the reasons for the show's popularity with amateur companies is the relatively large amount of music for the chorus, but it appears that the original second act had very few musical numbers and no songs at all in the wedding scene. About a week before the Wimbledon opening, Steele expressed his reservations about the second act - he felt that something along the lines of "Any Old Iron" would liven things up. And so, just a few nights later, "Flash, Bang, Wallop!" stopped the show. Several numbers (including a song "Pure Coincidence" for Chitterlow) were cut prior to the London opening to reduce the length of the first act, but yet another chorus ("A Proper Gentleman" was added).

More changes took place when the show transferred to America. The original second Act contained a pair of songs "I'll Build A Palace For My Girl" and "I Only Want A Little House" which can be heard on the original London cast recording of the show. This complex musical sequence was accompanied by spectacular scenic effects. Unfortunately this scenery was destroyed en route for America and the song "The Party's On The House" (which appears in the published vocal score) was quickly written as a replacement. The 1966 film version contained yet another song ("This Is My World") at this point in the show. Helen Walsingham's only song ("The Oak And Ash") was cut from the American production, and does not appear in the published vocal score, but we have reinstated it in tonight's production.

I think that the reasons for the show's success and its continuing popularity have been summed up by Kurt Ganzl in his book "The British Musical Theatre"

"The lyrics stood comparison with Lerner's work in "My Fair Lady" for the skill and accuracy with which they had been drawn from the original text; the music was everywhere in keeping with both the words and the subject"

After seeing our performance tonight, I hope that you will agree with him.