Picking a play to produce based on its humour and ability to make you laugh out loud sounds like a good plan, until reality sinks in.
For Globe director Brian Beresford that was when he looked at the practicalities of staging Ladykillers at the Dunedin theatre.
"It’s a challenge."
He chose the play thinking its black comedy would make for a great night out pre-Christmas.
"It’s a cracker of a play, very funny."
It is based on the William Rose-authored screenplay of the same name — it won the Bafta Award for Best British Screenplay — which was filmed in 1955 at Ealing Studios and directed by Alexander Mackendrick, and starred Alec Guinness, Peter Sellers, Jack Warner and Katie Johnson.
The film was then adapted for the stage by Graham Linehan, best known as the writer behind TV comedies Father Ted and The I.T. Crowd. It was first staged in 2011 at the London Gielgud Theatre.
"So many people will know the film, but the play itself hasn’t been done that often."
The Guardian reviewer Michael Billington described the original play as a very different animal to the movie, which worked "very well as a slapstick farce".
"What was once macabre comedy has acquired a madcap, Marx Brothers quality."
It is the tale of an elderly woman, Mrs Wilberforce (played by Yvonne Jessop), who lives with a parrot, General Gordon, and decides to rent out rooms in her home to a group of self-proclaimed musicians, who turn out to be crooks planning their next big job.
"She appears to be a bit dippy."
But when Beresford looked more closely at the London theatre production he realised they used a big revolving stage to pull it off.
"Ours is small and nothing revolves except us," Beresford said.
There are various sets in the play — for an outdoor scene at the front door, an old ladies’ sitting room, an upstairs room and even scenes in the toilet and on the roof.
So Beresford put his thinking cap on to work out how he could portray the different scenes without a revolving stage.
The Globe team devised a two-tier stage using lights that go on and off depending on whether the scene is upstairs or down.
The ‘‘upstairs’’ room has a window at the back through which the "musicians" escape or get pushed out of.
"It’s death by window; they all end up going out; being pushed or falling on to the train tracks."
The inclusion of the train meant Beresford had to find a way to make that come to life. In the original, the set shook as the train went by. In the Globe set, the pictures will be set on an angle.
"One of the fellas tries to straighten it out and it moves back."
To add to the mystery of the play, Beresford has added "a little bit at the end" that is not in the script.
It addresses the nature of Mrs Wilberforce: "Is she as dippy as she seems?"
He admits his choice has also been difficult for the amateur actors, who include Brooke Bray, as Constable MacDonald, Campbell Thomson, as Prof Marcus, and Sam Ogden, as Major Courtney.
"It’s a longish play, especially the first act, and complicated. There are lots of funny scenes and we bring the audience into the play."
A great example is when the "musicians" are backed into playing a concert on instruments they have no idea how to play, in front of a group of Wilberforce’s friends.
"Wilberforce says they’re dreadful. The cat is out of the bag, almost."
To see
• Ladykillers, The Globe, Dunedin, December 7-16.
