Over 150 people were entertained by the Slapton Amateur Productions Village Evening.

The evening, held on November 17 and 18, alternates with SAPs pantomime every other year. This year started with a ploughman’s supper and was made up of nine sketches linked by nine songs.

Proceeds from the show will be donated to Children in Need and to the village’s fund to establish a community shop when the existing shop closes early next year.

With this in mind all the sketches, including five specially written by David Murphy, had a “shop” theme, including a joke shop, Oriental supermarket and chip shop.

The finale was set in a Georgian coffee shop with Beau Brummel, played with extravagant flourish by Dan Mercer, learning the “mystery of coffee” and the “regime of the bean” served up by barista Ben Leach.

With each sketch lasting only a few minutes and interspersed with songs carefully chosen and arranged by Elaine Hitch and accompanied by Ed Welch, the show was a quick-fire production with lots of laughs.

This year’s cast included several newcomers to the SAPs stage including Jo Bird, out-Corbetting Ronnie; Tara Barton, who provided the linking titles between each sketch with great verve and swerve; Buzz Bird, soloing “On a Slow Boat to China”; and Anna Barton.

Anna, who joined Fen Field and Margaret Cudd for a suitably zesty rendering of “Big Spender”, was one of four members covering three generations of her family involved in the show – her daughter Tara, granddaughter Phoebe (a seasoned veteran now at the age of 12 who starred in the two handed “Chip Shop” sketch with nine year old Ellen McPetrie) and husband Tony Barton who joined the crew as lighting engineer!

Other performers included such stalwarts as Mandy Mitchelmore, Jane Ashby (perfectly cast as a sort of rural Ann Summers) and Lisa Johns all of whom both sang and acted in sketches, and Colin Staines, the perfect foil for Jo Bird’s hardware shop owner.

Last year’s debutants Julie Gough, Tony Coldwell and Zia Soothill-Ward also returned, and the show was opened by Dan Mercer, David Murphy and Ben Leach appropriately (and thinly!) disguised as clowns. Sebastian Lange directed, Shirley Sullock and Pat Edgecombe again did a magnificent spread with the food, and Sylvia Grant arranged the costumes.

Minimalist scenery was by Fen Field who also managed the far from minimalist props.

A raffle and the now standard SAPs “heads and tails” fund-raising game held during the interval raised over £250 for Children in Need, and once the final figures are worked out, it is planned that SAPs will be able to make a significant contribution to the Community Shop fund.

By David Murphy