The Neverland Singularity (Sussex Playwrights Short Plays)
Writer/Director: Thomas Everchild
Performers: Philippa Hammond, Thomas Everchild

You know I had that Bertrand Russell in the back of my cab once, and I asked him well what’s it all about, and you know he couldn’t tell me.’ Maybe it’s urban myth out of stand-up; it probably happened.

There’s a couple of 2005 radio plays by poet Sean O’Brien exploring that perennial British fantasy: a working cabby or labourer confronted with a philosopher who then doesn’t just out-argue them, but shows a thorough knowledge and grounding in their works.

Whilst the mythical cabby pops the question our common sense wants to ask of inductive reasoning, and trounce it, O’Brien takes his cues from historical events. Everchild delights in that perennial the cabby bit does something else again: brings a sexual dynamic: man-in-the-street put-down meets chat-up.

Philippa Hammond is beautifully priggish, asking directions to the conference. Everchild works this out, the science one. He begins questioning Hammond simply, and Hammond does a fine job of registering off-hand impatience gradually assaulted by Everchild’s gift of chirpy petulance, nagging and irritating Hammond into losing her temper but not her reason: she can’t shut down the cabby’s maddening rationality. Each question builds up questions of stellar singularities and astro-physics, which Everchild increasingly shows he understands well in outline. Hammond’s character drops hauteur for mild outrage, but is hooked; her training, initially dismissive of stupid questions, can’t cope with left-field informed ones. This sparring reaches a catharsis and an unexpected (hoped-for) conclusion.

It’s a perfect ten-minute play, ideal for radio like Lancefield’s. Lighter by far in tone, it’s packed with clever interrogatives and leaves us a bit more enlightened on astral physics as well as cultural sexual politics.

Sussex Playwrights Reviews
Simon Jenner

Glimpse part two: – (one act plays)
Little Girls Like To Kiss & Backstage Whispers
(Edinburgh Festival Fringe)
Writer/Director: Thomas Everchild
Performer: Philippa Hammond

Glimpse is a collection of four solo shows presented by Philippa Hammond, two at a time on alternate evenings. In this case it’s a smoke-filled 1940s private dick yarn and a take on life at the shallow end of the theatrical talent pool. And very good they are too.

The first, Little Girls Like to Kiss, shows the gumshoe’s ubiquitous breathy secretary in her own right. Marcia Blouse is long-suffering, pouting and wisecracking. She is also fragile – lost without the defining influence of her absent boss? Not likely – more afraid that others are about to discover her guilty secret.

Cracks in the cool, sassy facade grow and meet, forming a portrait of paranoia. Hammond herself twists with the plot her character reports; first manipulative and catty, then desperate and cornered. Ultimately Marcia survives, and takes control again. Fittingly, this brings out Hammond’s best – understated and impressively controlled.

The second vignette, Backstage Whispers, has the same sense of command in script and acting. Hammond excels as the aspiring actor and skirts around the pitfalls of self-indulgence with admirable restraint. Even the “behind the curtain” jokes are sharp and entertaining.

Again the writing is taut, wry and understated. At best reminiscent of Alan Bennet’s Talking Heads, this is a touching tale of a call-box tart who lives and dies in 18 lines. Glimpse is impressive, and well-named; fleeting moments of subtle theatrical insight.

The Scotsman
James Kirkup

Glimpse (one act plays):
An Honorary Man & Turning The Handle (Edinburgh Festival Fringe)
Writer/Director: Thomas Everchild
Performer: Philippa Hammond

Philippa Hammond delivers two glimpses in this show, separated by 1,500 years but linked by a theme of women bowing to the will and needs of men. In the first she is Hypatia of Alexandria, a director of the library there. Or a pagan whore, if you believe the Christian hierarchy. Hypatia is, however, a full-blooded and beautiful woman, aware of the pleasures of her body and the delights of her mind. So much so that her students have voted her “an honorary man”. She accepts this dubious accolade with gentle irony. As she accepts her murder and mutilation with the inevitability of the conflict between pure intellect and religious dogma.

In the second piece, we are in Edwardian England and she is married, against her parents’ will, to a prototype film maker whom she supports in everything, even stripping for his “what the butler saw” movies. After losing her husband, she continues her career to support her children, having stoically traded her home life of Hampshire parties and Home Counties ease.

Hammond is served well by two three-dimensional, literate and dramatic scripts written by Thomas Everchild and she displays brilliant talent in interpreting them for us. It is spellbinding and entertaining, heart rending and humorous. An hour was all too short.

The Scotsman
Roderick Graham

Glimpse (Marlborough, Brighton)
An Honorary Man, Turning the Handle, Little Girls Like to Kiss, Backstage Whispers
Writer/Director: Thomas Everchild
Performer: Philippa Hammond

Glimpse Women Through the Ages

A hit from the Edinburgh Fringe festival was staged at the Marlborough Theatre last week, filling it with drama, suspense and genuine laughs. Glimpse is a collection of four one-act plays by Thomas Everchild, all performed by Philippa Hammond. Each monologue delves into a different character and spins a tale which reels the audience in as the dimensions unfold. Hammond expertly places her audience in the scene, deftly moving across centuries and cultures as she embodies the mind and motivations of four women.

First she is Hypatia, a fifth century scientist and philosopher who has been virtually erased from history. Her questioning curiosity and fascination with physics and philosophy leaves her unwilling to fall in line behind other women. But by opposing political dogma in her quest for knowledge, she poses a threat only to herself.

Transforming in character, Hammond next plays a very proper Edwardian lady, drawn into the seedier side of the emerging motion picture business. Hammond makes real the young girl dazzled by love and impelled by necessity. Her performance is subtle and evades sensation, while Everchild’s writing doesn’t blind us with its intentions.

While the settings may be historical, the themes translate easily into modern concerns. These women have stories which demonstrate a survival of spirit even when the odds are stacked against them.

The third play switches to a cinematic scene, set in Forties New York, behind the frosted glass window of a private eye’s office. Hammond senses her character in every movement, her gait falling into louche photographic poses …. What begins as comic book cliché becomes a plot of love, jealousy, paranoia and missing persons befitting a pulp detective paperback, with its deadly twist on the last page.

Finally, we are snapped back closer to home. Everchild’s understated writing becomes increasingly comic in a deadpan scene of amateur theatre, the confessions of a bit-part in a hopeless fringe production.

Glimpse is graspable, engrossing and very entertaining; channel-flicking glances at scenes you won’t want to switch over.

The Argus
Lyndsey Winship