Blind Eye offers humour and pathos with a twist on Amdram stage

Chris McKenzie rehearsing with Joan and Mike Street for Blind Eye which opens at Amdram Theatre next week. Photo / Liz Wylie

What is the price of true love?

Amdram Whanganui's new production 'Blind Eye' will explore the question when it opens next week.

Vera (Joan Street) has been blind since birth, but Wally (Mike Street) uses words to guide her on world travels to experience all its wonders.

Wally and Vera are soul mates and for 60 years they have existed in a cocoon of love and security that needed no outside influence. But when a random act of violence brings strangers into their midst, the real world begins to ask questions of their bond.

When nurse Alice Dempster (Annie Whitfield) and police sergeant Patrick Warburton (Chris McKenzie) enter their lives and invade their private world, uncomfortable truths are revealed as the play progresses to a jaw-dropping conclusion.

McKenzie is also directing the play - replacing Talia Annear who is taking a break after having surgery.

"It is really a collaborative effort as all four of us have directed before but I'm taking responsibility as the person who will wear the flak if it all turns to custard, which it won't of course.

"We first started rehearsing for 'Blind Eye' early last year," he says.

"Then Covid came along and we had to abandon them. We wanted to stage it now before we do 'Phantom of the Opera'."

McKenzie said 'Blind Eye' is written by one-time Whanganui resident April Phillips who also wrote 'Motel' performed at Amdram in 2017.

"People who saw that play will recall how the script skilfully combined humour with tragedy and this script also does that but there is a deep secret which will not be revealed until the very end."

"Joan and Mike have the lion's share of the lines so it is really on their shoulders."

Playing a character who is blind presents challenges for Joan as it goes against her training and experience as an actor she says.

"With every other role I've played, it was always important to direct my gaze at the person I was speaking to and now I have to remember to not do that," she says.

"It is a brilliant play and we're thrilled with how rehearsals are going."

English-born Phillips is also an actress, singer, director and producer of film and theatre who famously played opposite Prince Edward in a Whanganui Collegiate production of 'Charley's Aunt' in the 1980s.

Just 17 at the time, Phillips attended Whanganui Girls' College where Joan Street was her drama teacher. They later acted together in productions at the Four Seasons Theatre at Putiki.

Now based in Wellington, Phillips will be attending the final night of 'Blind Eye' at Amdram

The gala opening for 'Blind Eye' is on Thursday, February 4, at 7.30pm and there will be nightly performances on Thursday, Friday and Saturday for two weeks as well as a matinee performance at 2pm on Sunday, February 7, at 171 Guyton St, Whanganui.

Book at iTicket.co.nz or via the Amdram Whanganui Facebook page.