Review: Emotional, hilarious and brilliant Calender Girls

What a fantastic privilege to witness such talent by the Loft team that put together this production.

And the efforts were all the more impressive because this team were taking the brave move to run a successful show for the second time in the same year.

I came close to tears at times and at others I was unable to suppress outbursts of loud laughter. Some characters were frustrating, others provoked pity - the play was an excellent representation of the ups and downs of real life in rural England.

Most of us know the story. Annie’s husband John is terribly ill with leukaemia. Even those of us who are familiar with the tale are devastated when he dies - the emotion created by Annie (Mary MacDonald) and John (Rod Wilkinson) is deserving of a standing ovation.

In memory of her beloved John, Annie and her best friend Chris (Rayner Wilson) decide to enlist the support of their friends in the tightly-knit (excuse the pun) Women’s Institute group to raise funds to buy a new sofa for the waiting room at the hospital ward where John spent his final days. No prizes for guessing how.

But even for the more confident ladies, baring all (with certain bits concealed of course) is by no means an easy undertaking. It is heart-warming to see how each woman overcomes her personal struggles to do something good for a friend.

While many in the audience will feel particularly moved due to being personally affected by cancer, the Loft team also brilliantly highlight the fact that we all have problems of our own - with money, a partner, a child, isolation, etc.

All of the six main Calender Girls were fantastic, but the deep friendship between Annie and Chris was represented so naturally by Mary MacDonald and Rayner Wilson that they deserve to be singled out.

Sundari Cleal