Anti-war farce amusing, but time has dulled point

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 02/02/2012 (5302 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

GEORGE Bernard Shaw’s anti-war farce Augustus Does His Bit takes dead aim at the hypocrisy of British high society, whose members compel the lower classes to go off to battle while they never get near the front.

As presented by Winnipeg’s Merlyn Productions for ShawFest, the Irish playwright’s object of mockery is Lord Augustus Highcastle, a self-important but incompetent recruiter located in the aptly named irrelevant town of Little Pifflington. The 1916-set, one act drama today feels like a Shavian TV sitcom missing only a laugh track.

The playlet’s title is meant to be ironic and that is made clear the moment the lights at the Ellice Theatre come up on Augustus, immaculately turned out in his colonel’s uniform sitting with his feet up on his spotless desk reading about the war in the newspaper. He is not doing his bit, other than sitting on 37 royal commissions while badgering and bullying working stiffs to do their bit for the war effort.

And he even does that poorly. Recently the mustachioed Augustus gave a rousing recruiting speech in which not one man signed up. Apparently part of his selling pitch was the fact British soldiers were “falling a thousand a day… dying for Little Pifflington.”

Augustus Does His Bit, directed smartly by John Chase, is pleasantly funny but there is little bite left in the script. It’s fashioned around one joke, a few tee-hees about the Huns and a trio of stereotypical characters. Actor Mitch Krohn, in the title role, makes Augustus easy to loathe. He does a fine job stressing all his character’s worst qualities, that he is vain, oblivious, pompous and, above all, a buffoon.

Shaw is also out to lampoon the immense gulf between the social classes as represented by the bickering between Augustus and his do-it-all clerk, Horatio Floyd Beamish. Tim Beaudry portrays him with a distinctive stutter step shuffle that makes him heard long before he is seen on stage. Visually, he makes a wonderful juxtaposition with the so-called man of action, Augustus. The only complaint with Beaudry’s performance is that his raspy voice is not always audible.

Augustus and his underling argue over everything. The officer makes demands and Beamish shoots them down with a shot of reality the former is clueless about.

For some misguided reason Augustus has been entrusted with a list of British anti-aircraft emplacements. A mysterious lady (Elizabeth Whitbread) visits him and butters him up about his war exploits, including him being shot in the head by his own soldiers. “Fortunately we have strong heads, we Highcastles,” he says of the wound. “Nothing has ever penetrated to our brains.”

The lady, of course, outwits Augustus for the list, allowing Shaw to have the last laugh, that the British won the war in spite of its fool leaders.

kevin.prokosh@freepress.mb.ca

Theatre review

Augustus Does His Bit

Merlyn Productions

To Feb. 4 at Ellice Theatre

Tickets: $10, $7 for seniors at 415-2714

Three stars