2024 - Nice Work If You Can Get It

2024 – Nice Work If You Can Get It

The third show for 2024 was Nice Work If You Can Get It, staged at The Q - Queanbeyan Performing Arts Centre.

Dates: 1 - 10 November 2024

A hilarious screwball comedy, originally opening on Broadway in 2012 and utilising songs from the brilliant George and Ira Gershwin, Nice Work If You Can Get It is the tale of Jimmy Winter, a wealthy and carefree playboy living the good life in the midst of Prohibition. Jimmy, who has been married three (or is it four?) times before, is preparing to marry Eileen Evergreen, the self-proclaimed finest interpreter of modern dance in the world. It is the weekend of their nuptials when Jimmy meets Billie Bendix, a tough-as-nails bootlegger who, with her gang, hides a (literal) boat load of alcohol in the basement of Jimmy's Long Island mansion.

But when Jimmy, his wife-to-be and her prohibitionist family show up at the mansion for the wedding, Billie and her cohorts pose as servants, causing hijinks galore. Knocked out by this one-of-a-kind woman, Jimmy must deal with his high-strung fiancée, the bootleggers, an assortment of prohibitionists, and chorus girls, as well as one very moralistic senator.

Highlights from the score include Gershwin classics such as Fascinating Rhythm, Let’s Call The Whole Thing Off, Someone To Watch Over Me, Sweet and Low Down, Delishious, and the title track, Nice Work If You Can Get It.

Director - David Smith

Musical Director - Brigid Cummins

Choreographer - Kirsten Smith

Cast

Jimmy - Luke Ferdinands

Billie - Sienna Curnow

Duke - John Whinfield

Cookie - Anthony Swadling

Jeannie - Kay Liddiard

Eileen - Anna Tully

Duchess - Lillee Keating

Chief Berry - Steve O'Mara