"Daisy Pulls It Off" by Denise Deegan
Nottingham Lace Market Youth Theatre

If you've ever read any of Enid Blyton's "Mallory Towers" books or even "Harry Potter" to a certain extent, you will know that private boarding schools are a rich picking ground for some wonderful characters, and Denise Deegan has created a spiffing set of characters in her novel which transcends so well to the stage, especially when the young actors have the enthusiasm for this play as they have. Not to mention the energy they need for this pacy show.

Daisy Meredith is an outsider to the elite girls normally admitted to Grangewood School for Girls because she is the first ever scholarship pupil, and this means that to some of the girls already there, she is a target for bullying. Fortunately she befriends Trixie and between the pair they embark on an adventure to recover the Beaumont family's lost treasure and also other discoveries along the way. It's all absolutely spiffing, topping and jolly hockysticks – oh yes there's also a hockey match on stage as well! How do they do it? Do they find the missing treasure? Who is the mystery groundsman? Only one way to find out the answers to these questions!

Director Sarah Ogando has two lots of girls on alternate days, just to give all of the Youth Group a chance to perform in this lovely play.

Mary Kirwin (Daisy) and Adelaide Marshall (Trixie) have a great chemistry between them, on and off stage and between the pair the energy they exude would light up the whole theatre.

Roisin Kelly (Sybil) and Maddy Stevens (Monica) are the bully ring-leaders, who by the end of the play have a lot to thank Daisy for.

Nina Drury (Clare) plays one of those good friends you need in school, especially when you're a new starter.

Katherine Watts (Alice), Georgia Feghali (Belinda), Megan Murphy (Miss Gibson), Sasha Hylton (Miss Granville), Henry Vervoorts (Mr Scoblowski) - loved that accent, Henry, Lucia Lockley (Mademoiselle), Fred Stevenson (Mr Thompson), Keira Fletcher (Winnie Irving), Daisy Donoghue (Dora Johnstone) and Lauren Shelton (Mother) complete the cast that I saw.

There were only a couple of times that I missed hearing what was said on stage but this was opening night and having an audience can make a difference to the projection of an actor.

Loved the set, designed by Phil Makin.

Also enjoyed the classic boarding school choice of music (Luis Ogando), which helped set the whole feel of the era, and the whole sound was crystal clear (Jack Harris) and a lovely lighting design (Allan Green).

Denise Deegan's script provides the perfect vehicle for a predominantly female cast, and is just tremendously great fun - I may even say "topping". It's brilliant fun and I loved the way these young actors totally embraced the characterisation of their roles so spiffingly.

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DAISY PULLS IT OFF Lace Market Theatre

YOUNG Daisy Meredith (mother a retired opera singer, father a drowned naval doctor, four brothers all with names starting with D) wins a scholarship to a posh boarding school, where she's persecuted for being common. But she wins through in the end by saving the school from closure as well as being somehow reunited with the drowned father.

Set in 1927, this is a parody of the kind of inter-war schoolgirl yarn written by Angela Brazil and others.

There's the comically cliched plot: hidden treasure, sliding panels, jolly japes in the dorm, and dramatic cliff-top rescues are all properly in place. And so are the usual bunch of stock characters: the suspicious foreign teacher of course; the firm but fair headmistress, the baddies.

Roisin Kelly (press night) is excellent as Sybil Burlington, the school nasty, as is Maddie Stevens (press night) as her sycophantic henchperson, Monica Smothers.

Unusually for this play, director Sarah Ogando has her schoolgirls played by youngsters rather than adults, and by and large it works.

There are instances of wooden acting and line delivery, but the main problem is inadequate articulation and projection from a few actors. The best things about this production are, first and foremost, Mary Kirwin (press night) as Daisy, our heroine, and Adelaide Marshall (press night), as her madcap sidekick Trixie Marshall.

Marshall, in particular, seems to understand the kind of play this is, and with her gawkiness and bouncy enthusiasm she looks and sounds exactly right. Nina Drury, ideal as head girl Clare Beaumont, is also excellent casting.

A simple but effective school set and authentic costumes (green gymslips) are well done. And so is the background sound, which helps to establish period as well as adding to the considerable pleasure of the evening.

This is another successful LMT youth production.

Review: Daisy Pulls It Off. Lace Market Youth Theatre. Nottingham.

Daisy Pulls It Off was originally written by Denise Deegan in 1983 as a platform to provide new opportunities for actresses. Spoofing the wholesome Angela Brazil adventure books of the 1920s featuring jolly hard won games of hockey, crushes on the head girl and a plucky new girl at the posh boarding school who gallantly saves the day. The play has plenty of scope for tongue in cheek, larger than life, posh gel horseplay and lots of dashed fun daring do to do. I say!

Daisy Pulls It Off is often given a showing at the Edinburgh Festival and now it finds itself airing its gymslip and straw boater world at the Lace Market Theatre in Nottingham. Director Sarah Ogando and her Lace Market Youth Theatre cast and crew do a sterling job in a quality high energy show.

Fulfilling a need to give the prominent female teen sector of the youth theatre a chance to show off their acting skills this company are working with two casts on alternative nights. Rather!

So bring on soon to be best pals, bright scholarship girl Daisy Meredith (Mary Kirwin) and Trixie Martin (Adelaide Marshall) and let them loose to deal with school pressures and those dashed awful bullies in Grangewood School for Girls. And hopefully together they will find the missing Beaumont treasure. Hinc spes effulget!

This production sports an excellent functional set design by Phil Makin and the imagination takes us to other locations like the hockey field and the crumbling cliff face. Golly!

The cast are between twelve years old and eighteen and all of them work hard in a first class production. The piece requires exuberant acting and plenty of fizz to get across the comical parody nature of Deegan’s spoof. This teenage cast do well to keep up the energy and pace throughout and give us lots of laughs along the way.

This evening Mary Kirwin sparkles as Daisy and convinces us of her earnest desires to do well at school despite many a knockback. We really want to root for Kirwin’s plucky Daisy and she shows us her determination against all the odds. Life can be awfully beastly at times but our Daisy isn’t going to let that get her down. Adelaide Marshall as the very friendly and nutty Trixie Martin is a joy to watch and really lets herself go in her portrayal of the gushing girl who has plenty of pluck. Martin’s work is a benchmark for the whole cast in terms of being an ironically aware character in the style of this show.

There needs to be an obvious balance between caricature and realism and this is captured well in some of the other main roles of Sybil Burlington (Roisin Kelly), Monica Smithers (Maddy Stephens), Clare Beaumont (Nina Dury) and Alice Fitzpatrick (Katherine Watts).

In the main teacher roles of Miss Granville (Sasha Hilton), Miss Gibson (Megan Murphy), Mr Scoblowski (Henry Verroorts) we have some really mature stand out performances.

Daisy Pulls It Off by the Lace Market Youth Theatre is a well realised production and proves to be yet another high standard offering which gives us the delightful chance to witness today’s young people thoroughly enjoying presenting this difficult to get right piece. And get it right they jolly well do. It’s a spiffing lark and top marks LMT. Hip hip horray! By golly they’ve blinking well pulled it orf!

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