The International Mummers Festival (Dave Oldridge Photography)
Tess Tiquelle (Dave Oldridge Photography)
Since 2006 Christmas for me has been largely about Mumming and wassailing. By that I don’t mean the frenzied present buying for my son (though that goes on in-between), but performing with Penny Plain Theatre Company to help preserve some of the ancient folk traditions including Mummers plays.
A sort of cousin of the medieval ‘Mystery Plays’ with less Christian emphasis, Mummers plays have their origins in the dark ages and are continued in villages throughout the country. According to the experts, these folk plays were performed as “mischievous entertainment for kings at Christmas time. In later times they were performed by the servants for their masters, and then in the C19th performed by farm labourers around the villages to collect money much like carol singing.”
Mumming is just a small, though significant, part of what we do. Our Penny Plain ‘schtick’ is that we perform as a bunch of Victorian travelling players, Hardcastle’s Mighty Excelsior Theatre Company, who are broke, down at heel, boisterous, not very good and often cheeky. Members of our audiences are likely to be dragged in to participate and humour is the driving force of the show. We each have our own, very different, personae and we are as comfortable ad-libbing in these characters as we are working the scripted show. These are undoubtedly our own alter-egos at work. Donning Tess Tiquelle each season is, for me, like meeting an old friend. Whatever play, Mummers or otherwise, we perform, is therefore a ‘play within a play’.
The Mummers Calling On Song (Dave Oldridge Photography)
We sandwich our Mummers play (which has been researched and is genuinely from Grassington, like us) between a selection of old, lesser known carols in harmony and some snatches of folk dance including the Bacca pipes jig and a sword dance. Added to that, we sprinkle in some evocative lines of prose and poetry, and this year a farcical attempt at a nativity play.
The‘winter tour’ comprises a list of festivals, events and pub gigs that keep us busy throughout December. The highlight of which, this year, was the chance to perform alongside potentially purist peers at the International Mummers Festival in Gloucester, 13th – 15th December.
Our illustrious leaders Andrew Jackson (aka Sudbury Spoone) and the larger than life Mark Bamforth (Malvolio Hardcastle himself) delivered an academic paper (sort of) at the symposium on the Friday afternoon, together with professors and other experts in the history of mumming who had come from as far afield as Newfoundland.
Later we were ably guided round a series of pubs (such a hardship), alternating performances on an unsuspecting but wowed public with Lassington Oak Mummers and other troupes including a Commedia del Arte company. There was carousing late into the night at The Fountain.
Processing in Gloucester (Dave Oldridge Photography)
On the Saturday morning I am sorry to say I missed the workshop program (see above), but was bright eyed and bushy tailed to meet the Mayor of Gloucester at the City Hall for lunch prior to processing through the town along with 12 other troupes. We performed in the streets in the afternoon, grateful for fine weather, and enjoyed a magnificent carol service in the cathedral. Having mostly performed only excerpts of our full half hour show during the tours, on the Saturday night we played the full length which was well received.
Back in the Yorkshire Dales, Christmas Eve is always my favourite gig of our winter tour dates, playing in Appletreewick and Burnsall. Amidst the foolery there is something serious and a little bit special in what we are trying to do in keeping the old traditions alive, and with magic of Christmas Eve thrown in for extra spice, for me it makes Christmas.