This month’s archive document is a poster for Cirencester Operatic Society’s production of The Merry Widow, performed 38 years ago in 1987.
The Society has been regularly producing musical theatre shows since 1951. The Merry Widow was performed at The Phoenix Centre, which today is the Barn Theatre and still the venue for the Society, although they now go under a different name, just like the venue.
They became known as “COS productions” in 2017 as there were concerns that the word “operatic” did not reflect the modern musical theatre they also produced. In 2019 they combined with a comparatively new local theatre group, Theatre Ink and today the combined company is known as “TINKCO”.
The Bingham Archive also contains a programme for The Merry Widow and there was a praiseworthy write up in the Gloucestershire Echo:
“There was a certain style to the production of “The Merry Widow” by the Cirencester Operatic Society at the Phoenix Centre on Monday evening. The stage is tiny and room for manoeuvre limited. The sets were spare and uncluttered, clean, and effective and excellently lit. The emphasis was on bright colour, and there was plenty of that, uniforms, peasant costumes, evening dress and lavish gowns. The eye was well pleased.
The principals played and sang their stereotypes for all they were worth: Margaret Hallett a handsome Widow, interestingly mature; Peter Finch a debonair Danilo; Mike Scott a cheerfully dotty Baron Zeta; Jennifer Parnell his cheerfully unfaithful spouse; John Leicester a Camille of dog-like devotion; and not least, John Price a suavely humorous Njegus.”
The Echo continued:
“The ladies and gentlemen of the chorus were in good voice throughout, notably in the Act II garden scene. “Vilja” was beautiful. The choreography was sensibly simple, well-scaled to the diminutive stage. Even so, there was a most spirited leg-kicking performance from a shapely corps of “Grisettes” from Maxim’s (the Maureen Cockram Young Ladies), who drew some appreciative wolf-whistles from an audience unused to such exhibitions in Cirencester. The small orchestra, directed by Jack Henley, played enthusiastically all evening long.”
The Bingham Archive contains many records relating to Cirencester’s clubs and societies, and the wider Gloucestershire Archive has additional material. It provides a rich insight into society and leisure in the town in the 19th and 20th centuries, as well as telling the history of those societies. Items such as photographs and programmes containing casts lists or society members can also be a useful source in family history. The most useful and interesting information can be found in the most unlikely of documents. To explore and find out more about the treasures in the Foundation’s archive visit www.danielbinghamfoundation.org.uk/archives/
