| WEBLINKS |  | Day Star Theatre
The touring theatre company's own website with full details of their 2002 tour.
The BBC is not responsible for the content of external websites. | | | SEE ALSO | | Romeo and Juliet
A review of Heartbreak Productions performance at Shrewsbury Castle.
The Merchant of Venice
A review of the Shropshire County Drama Group's performance at the Much Wenlock Festival. Breathing new life into an old canalAs a new golden age of canals is heralded, we look at the past of the derelict Shrewsbury & Newport Canal - and the plans to restore it to its former glory. | | | DATES | | Thurs 11th July 2002
The Red Lion, Marsworth, Nr Tring. (By Road) 8pm (The Moon on the Water)
Wed 17th July 2002
The Talbot, Market Drayton, Shropshire. 8pm (The Moon on the Water)
Thurs 18th The Anchor, Peggs Lane, High Offley, Nr Mkt Drayton, Shropshire. 8pm
(The Hero of Sandy Edge)
Mon 22nd July 2002
The Junction Inn, Norbury Junction, Nr Market Drayton. Shropshire. 8pm (The Moon on the Water) | |
| REVIEWS | "....the performance was so full of character and detail that although seated indoors, one somehow felt as if the walls had been widened and a wharf had been built brick by brick...." Loughborough Echo
"....vividly brought to life by just two actors ........ like much on the canals, the storyline moves slowly, but Day-Star know how to keep your attention and involve you with their love of canals, past and present ..." Oxford Times
".....the performance quality of this tiny company improves with each new work. Today, the productions are slick, excellently acted and tightly written ........ they slip from character to character with accomplished ease, assuming dramatically different persona at the change of a coat ....... Waterways World
"....Their collective enthusiasm for their creations was infectious, with several scenes reminiscent of top-class situation comedies ....." Loughborough Echo | |
| | Watching a Day Star performance is to experience a unique style of theatre often performed in whatever available space there is at canal side pubs or at festivals.
With a few props and a mere suggestion of costume Day Star will take you, the pub and anything else that gets in the way on a very unusual theatrical journey.
This year's plays are The Hero of Sandy Edge Wharf and The Moon on the Water, which are both written and performed by the Day Star team, husband and wife, Pete "Duffy" Marshall and Jane Marshall.
Jane has appeared in the film Robin Hood and on T.V. in Brookside. As well as acting in Day Star's productions, Jane also paints and runs courses on traditional canal painting.
"Duffy" Marshall is the writer of all Day-Star plays, songs and music. He has appeared on T.V. in Watching, Coronation Street, Medics, Children's Ward and Brookside.
'Duffy' is his mum's maiden name, his real name being Pete. Pete and Jane moved on board an old wooden narrow boat called Day-Star in 1977 and by 1982 they were a touring theatre company.
They now live and tour on The Angry Bull and are based at The Old Stables at Audlem on the Shropshire Union Canal when not touring.
The Hero of Sandy Edge Wharf
A rural village in Middle England. A canal climbs down a flight of locks to the wharf and pub before continuing on it's way across an embankment.
Below the embankment lie the village allotments and the new executive houses. Along the main street can be found a church with a steeple, a general store and post office and an occasional bus service.
All in all, Sandy Edge is a pleasant over night stop for the holiday boater - stay a bit longer and you might meet the locals. There is the old gardener who is a prophet of doom with pathological weed and insect killing tendencies.
There is the self righteous chairman of the Parish Council who owns the shop. There is the vodka drinking, wickedly mischievous Freda from the Old Vicarage.
So when Josie Collins and her two boys decide to tie up their narrow boat in the 'long pound' and make Sandy Edge their home for a while they soon meet the locals and they soon get to hear about the war time legend of the hero of Sandy Edge Wharf.
This is the story of a rural village and the influence of the canal that runs through it. It is also a story of pride and prejudice, romance and heroism... and impending catastrophe. Its all built on sand.
The Moon on the Water
Dave & Doreen are farmers. They have a dairy herd, a flock of wandering sheep and two grown up sons who live abroad.
Isobel is a single woman who lives alone in a small cottage by the canal. She looks at the moon and the stars when the night sky is clear and wishes she was up there. She also keeps moonshine in a bottle!
Simon is a drifter on the water. A free spirit with a narrow boat, a guitar and a vague memory of the sixties. He writes songs and, up until now, has avoided commitment whenever he can.
They are all 53 years old and all had fine ambitions when they were 19. They were all 19 in the summer of 1969 when man first stepped on the moon and half a million young people went to the Woodstock music and arts festival in New York State.
During the course of one day and night around the sleepy canal side village of Sandy Edge in the heart of 'Middle England' their lives converge in a confusion of guilt, disillusionment and unfullfilled dreams and a scary iron aqueduct.
This is the second story set in the small village of Sandy Edge where the pub never shuts and the ducks turn out to be sheep but it is not a sequel. |
