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Arthur Spinks is a short
sighted ex boxer not only whose career ended on the ropes but whose life
appears to be heading in the same direction. With no money, no prospects
and only one loyal companion in the form of the drunken Kingsley with whom
he shares a stressful friendship, Spinks seeks to change his destiny by
pretending to win the National Lottery. Soon not only is he receiving free
handouts from people and companies hoping to share in his good fortune but
the attention of the media and more importantly to Spinks, the amorous
advances from a number of women. In particular he becomes deeply involved
with the attentions of twin sisters plain Dawn Pringle, who professes to
love Spinks for himself, not his money and who arrives on the scene to
warn him against her man eating, gold digging identical twin Donna who
promptly turns up and seduces him. Despite being completely unable to
resist Donna, Spinks makes a Will in favour of Dawn before discovering at
the eleventh hour that his new loves are at the heart of a plot of
intrigue which could very well be his undoing.
It is probably fair to say
that this production won through despite a number of problems early in its
short run not least with the sudden and unexpected loss of its leading
man. However this in no way detracted from either Ian Angus Wilkie’s
excellent Rigsby-esque performance as the drunken Kingsley or Vicki’s
starkly contrasting creations of Dawn and Donna. Indeed apart from the
obvious clues, she convinced to such a degree there were times when you
might have been forgiven in thinking that she too had an identical twin
playing the opposite role. As Dawn she portrayed a timid, agitated and
dowdy middle aged spinster whose issues around sex served to add to her
frustrations as well as those of her would be lover Spinks. Her portrayal
of Donna on the other hand simply oozed confidence and seductiveness while
attempting to hide a high level of plausibility which was only fully
revealed in the final scene.
Director Jay Marcus stepped
into the breech as Spinks at twenty four hours notice when the original
actor became suddenly unavailable. As they say ‘The show must go on!’ |
