BWW Reviews: GMT Productions International - Inaugural Theatre Season: SPITFIRE SOLO Just Gets Better and Better with Time

Reviewed Tuesday 9th October 2013

Nicholas Collett, as Peter Walker, goes up into the wide blue yonder once again as his play, Spitfire Solo, seen here a while ago during the Adelaide Fringe to great critical and audience acclaim and back by popular demand, shines even brighter on the larger stage at The Forge, the well-equipped performing arts centre, at Marryatville High School.

[Literary quote - If you go into the wide blue yonder, you go somewhere far away that seems exciting because it is not known. I have a sudden desire to escape, to head off into the wide blue yonder and never return.]

Those who saw it the first time fell in love with this thoroughly riveting production, many seeing it twice, and who are no doubt planning on seeing it again but, if you haven't seen it before, now is the time to make amends for that serious oversight. If you ever read and enjoyed the many Biggles books, written by Captain W. E. Johns, then you will love hearing Peter Walker's recollections of dog fights over the English Channel, and the race for home when the ammunition runs out.

Due to the small stage for the Fringe production, the video sections that open the production were played on a television squeezed onto the set. This time, there is a large screen at the rear, so that the newsreels of the time now seem more like they would have been when shown in a British cinema. This, and music of the period, including Vera Lynn singing We'll Meet Again, brings the audience into an understanding of time and place very effectively before the appearance of Collett as Peter Walker, smartly dressed in his Pilot Officer's uniform and ready to tell us of his wartime experiences.

He tells of the big one, the Battle of Britain, when he flew with "the few". He also tells of the time that he was shot down, bullets hitting his right arm and, the reason for his walking problems in later life, his left leg. We even get a debriefing, as Peter uses the Salt and Pepper pots, sauce bottles, and slices of bread on his table to talk us through air to ground attacks.

This alone would all have made a great play, but Collett's script has far more than that to offer, as we are soon facing Peter Walker at 80 years of age in his room at the Silver Birches Retirement Home, moving slowly about with the aid of a walking stick. Before we know it we are meeting him again as a small boy with a fascination for aircraft, being treated to an aerobatic flight in the Tiger Moth owned by a friend of his father.

Typical of Collett's work is the obvious vast amount of research that has gone into achieving a very high level of technical accuracy and authenticity. Also typical is his superlative skill in portraying the same character at various ages with superb consistency, so that the audience never doubts for a moment that it is the very same man.

The Supermarine Spitfire, with its Rolls Royce Merlin engine and elliptical wings, had all the speed and manoeuvrability that a pilot could ask for, a state of the art aircraft and, with his armchair as his seat in the cockpit, and his walking stick as the joystick, Peter Walker flies again, taking the audience along for the ride. Collett brings it all to life brilliantly and you almost believe that he had actually been there.

Coincident with his vivid recreation of air battles, Walker tells of his personal life, his wife, his daughter who him alone and headed for Australia with the man she was to marry never to be heard from again, his flight to Adelaide to find her, without success, and the sudden appearance of a young girl claiming to be his granddaughter. Collett also portrays the Australian private detective, with an extremely credible accent, who attempts to locate his daughter for him.

Then there is the visit to the local school to talk to the children about his wartime experiences and to answer there questions, playing the teacher and the children as well as the octogenarian Peter. There are some touching moments in this section, as the innocents ask a few awkward questions, which Peter answers with simple honesty.

With many of his friends and companions dying all around him in the air, his wife dying of cancer, and his daughter running away, we see how the war affected him, changed him, as all wars affect those involved in them, and those at home who, to quote Milton, "also serve who only stand and wait". There is a sadness, a loneliness that is never spoken of, and that is hidden beneath his memories of great deeds done, but the school visit, and the child who asks if they might visit him from time to time, subtly but clearly has an effect on the old man.

This gem from Nicholas Collett has now been played many, many times, in many, many locations and, it is safe to say, will continue to be played for a long time to come. It is pure gold and the amazingly talented Nicholas Collett polishes it up with every performance. Don't miss this masterpiece of theatre, and the other great performances in Adelaide this month, brought to us by GMT Productions International.

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