Ding-Dong (A Bit of a Farce), A Play, a Pie and a Pint,Traverse

Just because you share a boundary wall with your neighbors doesn't mean you must share much else.

Susie has her hands full keeping her, and her family's, life together.  Work pressures, an awareness of how she and her husband are ageing, a house to manage, a teenage son and an incontinent dog.  Next door lives Jennifer, with the time, and the money, to stay fit, send her daughters to private school and raise pickiness to a middle class art form.  A Morningside Leadsom, and Susie's neighbour from hell.

Then there's Chrissie, Susie's younger sister, a new age devotee of the spiritual for whom everything can be solved if you master the art of breathing.  And Mikey, Susie's fifteen year old, sullen, uncommunicative, a hormonal turmoil.

When Jennifer comes through to complain forcefully to Susie about - well, nothing much really - the differences between them are put in sharp focus and the disagreement swiftly escalates.  Chrissie's intervention might help, but then again, it's not very likely.  Mikey doesn't need to be drawn in, but maybe he has something to say that will change things?

Ding-Dong (the doorbell rings a lot throughout) is laugh out loud hilarious from beginning to end with a regular sprinkling of excellent lines.  There's a clever introductory sequence with the four characters interweaving monologues to establish character, and cartoonish elements to some of the action - the 'search the house' sequence is like something from Tom and Jerry.  But mostly this is the dialogue of difference, of clashes between worldviews and generations, and of getting along with one another.

Hilary Lyons, who also wrote the piece, is a real world, down to earth Susie who provides the (sometimes) sensible centre.  Gail Watson clearly has a great time playing the uberbitch from next door, with one particularly memorable rant about her neighbour's perceived failings.  Buchan Lennon's teenager, and Clare Waugh's hippy, provide strongt support.  Waugh also delivers a cameo role that provides one of the funniest moments of the play.

Fifty minutes flew by watching one of the funniest contributions to the P, P & P series that I've seen.  With a reminder that getting on with the people around us may just be the most important thing we ever manage to do.

Highly recommended.