Break out the tinsel, top up the sherry, it's Christmas - again, writes Sharu Delilkan.
Stephen Papps needed little encouragement to agree to direct Yvette Parsons' play, Silent Night.
"She introduced herself at the Auckland Theatre Company's Next Stage saying, 'Ever since I was a young girl I've acted like an old lady'," he says. "I knew we had to work together."
Papps, an accomplished actor, tried his hand at directing a play in 2002. He says it has taken him a long time to find a script and a writer that interested him enough to direct again.
"Her piece is well-observed, detailed, hilarious and poignant all at the same time."
With her tea trolley polished, Cameo Cremes on the cakestand and sherry glasses at the ready, Yvette Parsons' intimate solo show is about an elderly woman, Irene McMunn, who demonstrates her unusual and innovative cooking, shopping and festive decorating techniques while awaiting her guests on Christmas Day.
Parsons says, having worked on Entertaining Mr Sloane with Papps, she's seen him create a character and knows he has great vision.
"I've seen heaps of his work and I love the way he inhabits a character. I've learnt a lot from Stephen, which has added to the creation of Irene."
For Kiwis who watched The End of the Golden Weather with wistful longing for summers past, Papps will be fixed forever in their memories as the lonely, fixated runner, Firpo.
He says Silent Night has gone through development and been workshopped extensively, but he has made a concerted effort to keep it fundamentally the same as Parsons' original script.
"It's essentially a great piece of writing which shouldn't be messed with too much." He says he has loved every minute of the process. "It's so refreshing and a pleasure to work with someone who's got such an individual take on life."
Silent Night, Musgrove Studio, Maidment Theatre, 8 Alfred St. City. Dec 13-18, 8pm, also Dec 18, 2pm. Tickets: ph 308 2383 or see: www.maidment.auckland.ac.nz
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