Once again capacity audiences enjoyed the Milborne Players with this production of the amusing and delightful play Sandcastles. Quoted in the Blackmore Vale Magazine 25 May 2007 "Caroline Nobbs directed the play with a sure hand, and the cast including familiar faces, new comers and some making their first appearance on any stage, clearly enjoyed themselves as much as the packed audiences in the village hall".

Sand Castles is a timeless comedy that gently saterises the English class system and the way that even in the apparent classless ambiance of a sandy beach, social one-up-manship is lurking just below the surface - the beach-hutters sit in front of their colourful little "sheds" on a part of the beach looking down on the plebs below.
The play is set somewhere on the south coast where the Pattersons, the Billets and the Woodersons have spent many previous summer holidays in adjoining beach huts. But this year, oh horror, the Woodersons have let their hut for the season, and, perish the thought, a renter will be moving into the hut in the middle. To add to the problems their are people with kites running backwards and forwards across their "private" beach, a stroppy granny searching for a lost kite, a mother with two children who refuses to believe the huts don't have loos, and finally an overweight sunbather who is made to apologise for "trespassing"
Granny, militant mum and sun bather organise a wind-break sit-in. The three (Margaret Evens, Caroline Nobbs and Ann Guy) park themselves in front of the beach huts with all the glee of Macbeth's witches stirring eye of newt and toe of frog into the seething broth. There is a lot going on in this apparently simple story. Upmarket car salesman Stan Billet (Roy Sach) is not half as sure of himself as he thinks he is. So when the renter, fish and chip shop entrepreneur Doug (Andy Coetzee) turns out to be resourceful, wealthy AND attractive to Stan's hitherto insecure young sister in law, Stan is shaken to his core. Not even a wall of plastic flowers can protect his little world from the energetic incomer with his young nieces (Sally Potter and Emma Whiting). Doug just doesn't get it that there is a certain protocol to owning a beach hut - there are (unwritten) rules, lines that are drawn in the sand and should not be crossed. He can't tell "them" from "us" he and the sassy nymphets just want to have fun. Stan's wife Bernice (Jo South) is so used to protecting her sister Pauline (Caroline Richards) from bad clothes choices and potential heartbreak that she hasn't noticed Pauline has a mind of her own. And mother (Maggie Redmill) with her black hat and overcoat, bad legs and urgent bladder, isn't half as batty as everybody thinks she is. This is a gem of a part and Maggie played it to the hilt. The Patterson's are an elderly professional couple, William (Brian Parkinson) and Margaret (Mauree Lock) whose secret doesn't emerge until the final minutes of the play. William is wise and kind with a twinkle in his eye for the leggy young beauties who have arrived next door. Margaret (think Margo Leadbetter on a bench) joins Stan and Bernice in the resistance movement angainst the widbreakers, but it takes unbothered Doug to sort the situation out.
Blackmore Vale Magazine 25 May 2007 pp22.

The Performers
William Patterson............................Brian Parkinson
Margaret Patterson (William's wife)..Maureen Lock
Stan Billet......................................Roy Sach
Bernice Billet (Stan's wife).............Jo South
Mother (Stan's mother)...................Maggie Redmill
Pauline (Bernice's sister)................Caroline Richards
Doug.............................................Andy Coetzee
Debs (Doug's niece).......................Sally Potter
Becky (Doug's niece)......................Emma Whiting
Mrs Penfold....................................Margaret Evens
Mrs Newman..................................Caroline Nobbs
Ida................................................Ann Guy
A Beachcomber............................Gren Elphinestone Davis
Mr Kite...........................................Ian Karley
Mrs Kite.........................................Caroline Nobbs
Child 1...........................................Sian Pugh
Child 2...........................................Freya Pugh

Backstage
Stage Manager...............................Peter Foster
Lighting & sound.............................Ian & Ron Karley
Set.............................................Andy Coetzee & Jo South
Props............................................Marion Regan
Backstage Assistant.......................Kathryn Pochin
Box Office.....................................Colin Guy
Tickets & Programme.......................Sid Coe