Olive Copperbottom: A New Musical by Charles Dickens and Penny Ashton

Penash Productions—WECC – Ventura Hall

What a romp! High melodrama, vaudeville, classic literature, and a bit of modern commentary, all rolled into one. Penny Ashton does it all.

It was so much fun to go to a show that really doesn’t take itself too seriously, and at the same time be able to appreciate all the hard work that went into it. Pure enjoyment. I was in awe of the talent that this woman possesses.

Yes, the script looked at the atrocities of Victorian life, with a liberal sprinkling of the Charles Dickens’ disapproval of the way things were, but the escapism that theatre is famous for was palpable. I haven’t seen that kind of surrender to escapism for a long time and did not realize how much I had missed it until the show was over.

Penny Ashton mastered it all – the singing (ala Gilbert and Sullivan), the dancing (ala the Follies) and characters too numerous to mention. Because of such a rapid delivery, some of the characters and their accents were hard to decipher, but overall, she made each person in the “cast” stand out when it mattered.

Thank you Penny Ashton for transporting me back to some historic, theatrical roots.

Michelle Cook