Delderfield in Exmouth 11-16 June 2012




Enthusiasts of the author R.F. Delderfield who've enjoyed visiting the Fairlynch exhibition about this much-loved East Devon author will be looking forward to seeing the Exmouth production of one of his most successful plays.



Ronald Delderfield, playwright, novelist and lover of East Devon

The Exmouth Players are celebrating Delderfield's 100th aniversary by staging a production of his wartime comedy, Worm’s Eye View, at the Blackmore Theatre in Bicton Street.

Worm’s Eye View is set in Albert House, the Bounty family's residence at Sandcombe, in the winter of 1942-43.

Sandcombe, the name that Delderfield used for his first novel All Over The Town, is clearly Exmouth, the town where he grew up. The plot centres on the family of Mr and Mrs Bounty, their daughter Bella and Mrs Bounty’s son Sydney from a previous marriage. Reluctantly, the Bountys have accepted that five RAF recruits are to be billeted with them.

Mr Bounty is more willing than his wife to befriend the new arrivals, and the family’s long suffering maid discovers that she would probably enjoy a life in the RAF as she gets to know the recruits.













But Mrs Bounty believes that none of them is suitable as a match for Bella. Her son Sydney Spooner has an inflated opinion of his own importance as a minor civil servant at the town hall.

In Worm’s Eye View Delderfield draws on many of the themes involving small-town snobbishness and hypocrisy that he later used in All Over The Town, published in 1947.














The two above images show part of the Fairlynch exhibition currently on display at the Museum  


Right: A programme for the original 1945 production of Worm's Eye View
Image kindly provided by http://www.arthurlloyd.co.uk/

The play, which opened at the Whitehall Theatre on 18 December 1945 was a highly successful production and ran for 500 performances. It returned in 1947 to run for another 1,745 performances. The Exmouth Players staged Worm's Eye View in 1946 while it was still running at the Whitehall Theatre. It was the first time that an amateur society had been allowed to present a play which was still enjoying a successful run in the West End. The Players produced the play again in 1981.

Worm’s Eye View will be showing at the Blackmore Theatre from Monday 11  June until Saturday 16 June, starting at 7.30pm.

Tickets £7 are available from the ticket line on 07905 761485 or from the kiosk in the Magnolia centre from June 4, 10am-2pm.

Pictured above:  

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