A Holly from the novel for Malvern Theatres

WITH its sheen of bygone glamour, it is hard to forget that Breakfast at Tiffany's is both a comedy and a tragedy about class and ambition.

This was a stage production of Truman Capote's classic novella, and so it was not a re-telling of the film, which has a different plot and is a classic in its own right.

For this play to really work, Georgia May Foote in the role of the runaway starlet and good time girl, Holly Golightly, had to be both endearing and vulnerable, and she was.

Audrey Hepburn, in the film, always exuded a sense of inner strength; but this stage portrayal of the one time child bride was significantly different. Holly, as represented by Georgia, was a brave, selfish, scheming and naive creature, and she was someone ultimately destined to fall and fail. This was a moving aspect of her characterisation because, as fans of the novel will know, she doesn't only fail, she disappears, leaving only rumours in her wake.

The men she sets her ambitious cap at, including Rusty Trawler - played here most ably by Tim Frances, as a cross between Uncle Fester and Mussolini - lack the strength, selflessness and love to give Holly what she most needs and desires: a stable place in high society.

And the male lead, Fred, played by Matt Barber, is rightly portrayed as someone as confused and ultimately as immoral as Holly. He is in love with Holly but he is also willing to sleep with men to get on as a writer.

There is a darkness and poison at the heart of the novel, and this production, unlike the movie, did not seek to conceal those disturbing elements.

The sets were truly inspired, with scene changes whirling and lifting one into another: in a season which seemed always to be a rainy autumn, as if the city was weary and cold - an entity somehow exhausted with itself.

One note of criticism: while Georgia May Foote, who was a blond Holly, never missed a cadence with her American accent, this could not be said of any other actor on the stage. The accents for the rest were acceptable, yes, but British tones were detectable here and there.

That said, this was a fine stage production of a great and haunting novella.

Gary Bills-Geddes