Songful love story

Times for this performance have been corrected. The correct time is 7:30 p.m. on Friday and Saturday performances.

The cast of the Musical Theatre Southwest production of the British musical comedy “Me and My Girl” has one member who has strong emotional and theatrical ties to the show. Colleen McClure was charmed by “Me and My Girl” since she first saw a revival of it in the West End of London in the 1980s. Then in 2002 she directed a production of it at the Bosque School where she teaches.

“It was the first musical I directed there. I chose to do it because I like it,” McClure said.

Now she gets to be on stage in the show. McClure portrays Maria, the Duchess of Dene in the MTS production of the musical comedy. It opens tonight at the African American Performing Arts Center for a three-weekend run.

	‘Me and My Girl’ WHEN: 8 tonight and Saturday, Dec. 15 and 2 p.m. Sunday, Dec. 16. Repeats at 7:30 p.m. Dec. 21-23  and Dec. 28-30 WHERE: African American Performing Arts Center, Expo New Mexico. Enter at corner of San Pedro and Copper NE HOW MUCH: $22 general public with $2 discount for students and seniors. To reserve tickets, call 265-9119 or available at the door.

And there’s been a bonus for the cast and the directors by having McClure in the cast. She was born in Kent, England, has been helping some of her fellow performers with dialect – the accent of the British upper crust and the accent of working-class East End Londoners, namely the Cockney.

“I’m recording their lines with different accents and emailing them and explaining how the words should be said,” McClure said. “And I’m keeping an ear open for any American accents that slip through.”

The premise of the musical comedy is a British noble family that has no heir to the late 13th Earl of Hareford. The family solicitor Parchester, portrayed by Ron Bronitsky, is sent to scour London to locate the lost son of the late earl.

“They bring him to the house, but he’s a Cockney man of the street. Very unpolished to put it mildly,” said Cy Hoffman, who is co-directing the production with his wife, Jane Hoffman.

“It’s a condition of the will that (the earl) be a gentleman. He’ has a Cockney girlfriend whom he loves. She’s not appropriate either. He’s fighting to have her included in the package but the family doesn’t want her.”

The Cockney character who is the presumed heir apparent is Bill Snibson, played by Tim MacAlpine.

“Bill is a costermonger, someone who sells fruits and vegetables from a cart in the streets. He’s working poor,” MacAlpine said.

“He’s very sure of himself. He’s able to survive. He also does some sparring, card tricks. … He doesn’t take anything seriously at all.”

Snibson is literally whisked off the streets and brought to the Hareford manor.

“He thinks it’s all a joke at first. They finally convince him that that’s his heritage,” McAlpine said.

The Duchess of Dene insists Snibson will be made the next lord of the Hareford manor. However, Sir John Tremayne, an old family friend, is sure it’s an impossible task, MacAlpine said.

Snibson, true to his happy-go-lucky personality, constantly makes wisecracks about the landed gentry.

MacAlpine said his portrayal of Snibson has given him an appreciation of the Cockney.

“They’re a self-sustaining proud community and he thumbs his nose at the posh types who have it easy,” he said.

A central theme of the musical, MacAlpine said, is defying class boundaries for love.

Reni Fitzgibbon plays Sally Smith, Snibson’s fishmonger-girlfriend.

Though she agreed that the show is fun, Fitzgibbon thinks it has unusual element – “that it’s OK to make fun of yourself. Bill and Sally, they enjoy life, love being who they are.”

Bill loves Sally so much that he’s willing to walk away from the opportunity as the next Earl of Hareford and Sally is willing to walk away from Bill so he can have the life he doesn’t have in Lambeth, Fitzgibbon said.

Lambeth is the area near London where they’re from.

In a subplot, the Hon. Gerald Bolingbroke is in love with Lady Jacqueline Carstone. But Carstone breaks off her engagement to Bolingbroke so she can pursue Snibson.

The show premiered in London in 1937 and a film version, titled “The Lambeth Walk,” came out several years later. The film title derives from a popular dance number in the stage show of the same name.

The stage production was revived in the West End in 1952 and 1984; the second revival garnered the Olivier Award for Musical of the Year.

The show came to Broadway in 1986 and ran for more than three years.

Co-director Jane Hoffman said MTS invited her and her husband to direct a family holiday show. They proposed “Me and My Girl” to MTS.

“I saw it in 1986 in Manhattan. That was me squealing with delight. It’s adorable. It’s funny. It’s poignant, and it’s rich,” she said. “Then a couple of years later we both saw it in San Francisco.”

Subsequently, the Hoffmans were in a Los Alamos Light Opera production of it.

The MTS production is apparently the first time “Me and My Girl” has been staged in Albuquerque, Jane Hoffman said.