Rubery Drama Group's terror tale 'The Ghost Train' was just the ticket

THERE was a frightfully fun evening at Beacon Church Centre when Rubery Drama Group staged Arnold Ridley’s classic comedy thriller The Ghost Train.
You could tell the audience were thoroughly enjoying the mix of laughs and scares and, as the action unfolded, you would have struggled to have sat in a jumpier auditorium.
As with all good comedy, there was a cast of colourful characters – from newlyweds Charles and Peggy and long-suffering pair Richard and Elsie to station master Sam Hodgkin and the eccentric Teddy Deakin.
All were well played by the actors and there were some real stand out showings on the stage.
Ian Kimberley-Ryan was superb as the station master, bringing bagfuls of dramatic tension as he set the scene by telling the terror tale of what had historically happened at the remote Cornish station.
Equally good was Vicky Routh as seemingly obsessed and almost possessed Julia. She gave a real haunting performance with her vivid visions of the ‘ghost train’.
But the outstanding depiction of the evening was by Paul Harris as the eccentric and nonchalant Teddy who had the audience in hysterics with his flippant attitude to the problematic predicament the group found themselves in.
The set was suitably spooky and provided ample opportunities for the cast to shoe-horn as many hair-raising crashes and bangs as they could get into the evening.
It seemed at times those on the stage were in competition to see who could get the audience members to jump out of their skins the highest.
The journey you were taken on was not just about a ghost train, it had striking similarities to actually being on one.
And it was these many moments which made for a magnificent evening.