My Three Angels

My Three Angels [1] is a comedy play by Samuel and Bella Spewack [2]. A delightful and entertaining comedy set on an island in French Guiana, it tells how three convicts, brought out to repair a roof, become the good angels of a badly harassed household. First produced in English on Broadway in 1953.

The original text

Based on a popular French play by Albert Husson called La Cuisine des Anges (“Cooking with Angels”).

Translations and adaptations

it was made into a very successful 1955 movie called We’re no Angels [3], starring Joan Bennett, Humphrey Bogart, Basil Rathbone, Aldo Ray and Peter Ustinov.

Translated into Afrikaans as Drie Engeltjies op Duiwelseiland by Mariechen Naudé.

Performance history in South Africa

A very popular play with amateur theatre groups.

1955: Produced by the Johannesburg Reps, directed by Anthony Farmer, and starring John Boulter.

196*: PACOFS did a production featuring Deon Joubert, Schalk Jacobsz?* and Johan Botha?*. Directed by ***.

1969: In June the Libertas Teaterklub presented My Three Angels, directed by Jane Turner, with Cynthia Lambrechts (Emilie), Nigel Thompson (Felix), Louise Brower (Madame Parole), Jenny Torr (Marie-Louise), Johann van Heerden (Alfred, 4707), Bryan Andrews (Joseph, 3011), John Davis (Jules, 6917), Fred Stephens (Gaston Lemare) and Tony Gild (Espoir).

1973: The Naudé translation Drie Engeltjies op Duiwelseiland was staged by (***) in Pretoria, directed by Danie Burger, featuring Enone van den Bergh (Emilie), Jelrich Koeleman (Felix), Linda Botha (Die Meisie), Esther Nasser (Madame Parole), Zaza Vorster (Marie-Louise), Deric Botha (Alfred), Sidney Rogers (Jules), Pieter Brand (Joseph), Lucas Maree (Gaston), David van Rensburg (Paul) and Etienne Ernst (Espoir).

1974: Johan Botha directed it for SWAPAC, the first play to be produced by that arts council entirely on its own.

Sources

(Pretoria) theatre programme, 1973.

Petru & Carel Trichardt theatre programme collection.

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