Here’s your Arsenic, Dear……….

Of all the minerals dug wrenched out of from the ground beneath Cornwall, arsenic is the one with the most enthralling history. It is a metal whose deadly reputation runs like a dark thread through Victorian fact and fiction. Here is my favourite use of its name in literature, in the gem of a play by Dylan Thomas:

Under Milkwood
By Dylan Thomas

“Mr Pugh, in the School House opposite, takes up the morning tea to Mrs Pugh, and whispers on the stairs:

MR Pugh
Here’s your arsenic, dear.
And your weedkiller biscuit.
I’ve throttled your parakeet.
I’ve spat in the vases.
I’ve put cheese in the mouseholes.
Here’s your . . .
[Door creaks open]
. . . nice tea, dear.

MRS PUGH
Too much sugar.

MR PUGH
You haven’t tasted it yet, dear.”

If you have never listened to this play, I can recommend downloading the BBC version (Narrated by Richard Burton), sitting back, closing your eyes and drifting into the life of the Welsh Village created through the language of Dylan Thomas.

Tin- the Film

Here are some notes kindly provided by the Liskerrett Centre in Liskeard on the film ‘Tin’.  The film is being shown at the centre on Friday 2nd October  at  2.30pm & 7.30pm .                                                                     
Film notes
Tin (2015) 94 minutes Certificate U

Starring: Jenny Agutter, Dudley Sutton, Dean Nolan, Jason Squibb, Ben Luxon

Director: Bill Scott

West Cornwall, 1895. A once-glorious tin mine, on which the whole town has depended for generations, is on its last legs. A weather-beaten opera company arrives to give a performance of Beethoven’s “Fidelio” in the town hall and finds itself tangled up in a scam to offload worthless shares in the mine.

Review
There are numerous fine performances by the likes of Ben Dyson as the troubled Captain Rundle, Helen Bendell as his feisty maid Nell, Steve Jacobs as the mute old mother and Jason Squibb as a confused and love-struck vicar. They are joined by screen darling Jenny Agutter, opera giant Ben Luxon and Emmerdale star Dudley Sutton, along with members of English Touring Opera and local extras, who provide one of the funniest moments of the film as the Slaves’ Chorus. Tin is a film with real heart. At its core is a warmth and purpose that radiates from its creators and was clearly appreciated by all those attending the premiere in Newquay.

About Miracle Theatre and the making of Tin
Miracle has been touring original, inventive theatre across the UK since 1979. It is one of the South West’s most distinctive voices, and has come a long way since it began life, but it has also stayed put in Cornwall. It produces a rich mix of touring theatre from new writing to popular adaptions of classic plays. Its work is always entertaining, innovative and unpretentious.

The film was shot over15 days in a purpose built green screen studio in Redruth, using meticulously constructed model sets which give a quirky, heightened feel to the melodramatic story. It was a truly pioneering project, made for under £100,000 using the latest digital technology and with support from the Cornish Mining World Heritage Site Heritage Lottery Fund and the Esmee Fairbairn Foundation.
Bill Scott, writer and director of Tin and Artistic Director of Miracle Theatre said ‘The film brings a chapter of our mining heritage to life in a unique way which will have special appeal to lovers of Cornwall, while the human story at the heart of the film should charm audiences everywhere.’ Tin originally toured as a theatre production performing to sell out audiences and critical acclaim.

Trivia – Based on a 130 year old novel relating the story of a notorious swindle by a local bank in St Just. Though names were changed characters at the time were easily recognisable and the bankers were so incensed by the allegations they bought and burned as many copies of the first edition as they could find. Fortunately a few survived.

Eight schools in Cornwall have taken part in the production working with English Touring Opera and local community choirs. Miracle Theatre also had the highly complex post-production work carried out at small local facilities. The visual effects were done by animation company Spider Eye which in an extraordinary coincidence occupies the old Consolidated Bank building in St Just where the real life forgery took place.