It takes two!

TEACHERS Rory Adamson and Julia Doorne are tackling their toughest acting assignment to date portraying a university professor and a working class adult student in the latest Manama Theatre Club production to be staged at the British Club of Bahrain.

They will be starring in the Willy Russell drama/comedy Educating Rita which was made into a film in 1983 starring Michael Caine and Julie Walters and won multiple major awards for best actor and best actress and was nominated for three Oscars.

Rory, 46, who teaches economics at The British School of Bahrain, is relishing the challenge as rehearsals intensify before the show opens on February 25. “There are only two of us on stage and I do not leave the stage so there are a lot of lines for my tired old brain to remember! 

“Our relationship is what the play is about and so it is important that we really feel what we are saying. It is very cleverly written and so is very real. We need to get the audience to believe us.

“It has to be one of the best two-hander plays ever written. Anything Michael Caine can do on screen I can do on stage; well almost!”

Rory first came to Bahrain in 1994 to work with what is now PricewaterhouseCoopers, transferring from its London office. During a sabbatical of four years back in London he married Bahraini Marina Tadayon, the play’s producer, and returned to the kingdom in 2000. They now have two children, Zaki, nine, and Hannah, six.

Rory’s first production for Manama Theatre Club was playing Jack in The Importance of Being Earnest back in March 1995 and he has since acted, directed, produced or built sets for almost every production and has been the theatre group’s chairman for the last seven years.

He can use his entire scholarly prowess playing his latest part which tells the tale of a working-class young woman Rita (Walters) who wants to better herself by studying literature. She signs up for an Open University (OU) course – the OU is a popular British institution based in Milton Keynes which helps people achieve extraordinary things, with affordable qualifications delivered in a way that lets students study flexibly in and around any family and work commitments.

Her assigned professor, Frank Bryant, however, has long since openly taken to the bottle, and soon develops misgivings about Rita’s ability to adapt to academia. Bryant describes his occupational ability as ‘appalling but good enough for his appalling students’. But his passion for literature is reignited by Rita, whose technical ability for the subject is limited by her lack of education but whose enthusiasm he finds refreshing.

Rory said: “Frank is a disillusioned academic and has-been poet. He realises that he has wasted most of his life in the slightly false world of academia where you cannot express your own views but must only refer to respected literary critiques. He sees Rita as being real and untarnished by the falseness of academia. She can still say what she wants.

“I understand exactly where Frank is coming from and agree with him when he talks about academia. He is a very believable character and I hope the audiences will allow themselves to feel what Frank and Rita are actually feeling as I believe they are really genuine feelings.”

The play focuses on Rita’s unhappiness with her life in her blue-collar, working-class environment including with her husband who wants to have a family, as well as her struggles to fit into a new educated middle-class existence in academia, while seeking a ‘better song to sing’.

Rita’s original preconceptions that the educated classes have better lives and are happier people are brought into question throughout as she grows as a person.

In the movie Rita was a Liverpudlian but Julia will be giving the part a touch of Yorkshire sassiness.

A maths teacher at BSB, she didn’t start university until she was 21 deciding to get a taste of the real world to start with as a hotel receptionist in Leeds.

She is also a professional physical theatre practitioner, has run her own company and appeared in community and Shakespeare productions but almost missed out on the role of Rita she so covets until the actress originally cast for it left the island.

Julia, 46, moved to Bahrain nearly five years ago and married Aikido Japanese martial art instructor Jeffrey Babasa after meeting him in his dojo and falling in love, explained: “I’ve been involved in prior productions, went to the audition, didn’t get the role and felt gutted …. but c’est la vie. Then the original actress dropped out for personal reasons, I was offered it and was over the moon, wehey!

“I have gone with a Yorkshire girl who I completely identify with as there’s so much of my wonderful Nana in her. Rita is a complete mix of myself and my granny – the language she uses, the typical northern phrases, the plain-speaking, telling it as it is, cutting through the superficial, and her ideals are all my Nana.

“This makes me so happy to play the role as I miss my Nana – she died a decade ago but she’s still very much in my heart. This play really brings her alive for me, daily – as it’s a real daily ritual getting through all those lines!

“The other parts of Rita, the light-hearted, jokey, lost in the student world aspects of her character as she develops have a lot of me in them, from the past, of course! By the end of the play Rita’s humble nature is truly revealed and that’s the crux for me. It really brings her character round full circle to truly appreciate how lovely she is.

A big challenge for me is learning all those lines – come on – how many? Since the art I’m most recently from is physical theatre, I was done with line-learning a long time ago, therefore I was well out of practice.

“I find muscle memory much quicker and more efficient than brain memory! As a physical theatre practitioner we are taught to keep the brain out of the performance and let the body do its thing. Great advice, as it works! Getting back into the wordier art form is not only a big challenge, but far scarier on stage … and more exciting too!

“The other great challenge has been marrying the time I need to work on this massive role with my demanding job as a teacher. Luck has been on my side regarding this, though, timing has been very fortunate regarding work commitments and play commitments. Phew!”

The play’s veteran director Mike Franklin, pictured right, is confident the pair will pull off the 52-page script with aplomb. Civil engineer Mike, 72, has been in Bahrain for nine years and his previous theatrical experience covers 84 amateur plays, as actor, director or stage manager.

His message to the theatre-goers of Bahrain is simple. “Enjoy this period piece (late 1970s) of excellent English comedic drama.”

The show runs until February 28, curtains up at 8pm with a special dinner theatre production on the evening of February 27, curtains up at 8.30pm. Tickets for the show priced BD5 (BD7 for non-members) and dinner priced BD11 (BD13 for non-members) are available from the British Club reception and The Great Deli Café, Najibi Centre, Saar. A donation from the proceeds will be made to charity.