As Ye Sow - London 2011 & Edinburgh Fringe 2012
Written by : Stewart Pringle - Directed by : Tom Richards - Role: Clifford Broughton
"Written by Stewart Pringle, it is both a heart-wrenching exploration of old age, dementia and a care system that only cares when it’s being paid to do so, and a horror play with the kind of slow-build menace that leaves you quivering in your seat – a bit like its main character, Clifford, a resident of a tatty retirement home where nothing works properly and sinister demons lurk in the shadows. Jeffrey Mayhew and Scarlet Sweeney give excellent performances as Clifford, an
ex-farmer with a temper, and his well-spoken, well-presented and well-considered daughter, Susan.." ★ ★ ★ ★ HOT SHOW - 2012
"Jeffrey Mayhew’s portrayal of a man descending further into paranoia is powerful and believable" - 2013 Scare Awards : Best Stage Production
"Mayhew does a great job as vulnerable and threatened Clifford, and as his past literally comes back to haunt him, the audience really feel his claustrophobia.." ★★★★ 2012
"Jeffrey Mayhew and Scarlet Sweeney’s gentle, familiar and delicate performances establish a touching father/daughter relationship... the best scare of the night. "2011
"Jeffrey Mayhew and Scarlet Sweeney’s gentle, familiar and delicate performances establish a touching father/daughter relationship... the best scare of the night. "2011
"Jeffrey Mayhew's elderly Clifford is utterly engaging to watch, creating a frailty that encourages pathos simultaneously alongside a dark undercurrent you can never quite deny.." ★★★★ 2012
"As Ye Sow is a great little play, packed with brilliant performances from start to finish. Jeffrey Mayhew moulds a character that we like and feel sorry for, yet we question his past and his relationship with his then wife." ★★★★ 2012
"The unsettling tension is steadily ratcheted up in the assuredly-spooky production of As Ye Sow, which features a stand-out performance from Jeffrey Mayhew." 2012
"The success of this piece relies not on cheap thrills, but on the nuanced acting performances. In particular, Jeffrey Mayhew is utterly convincing as Clifford, the old man haunted by his past and his own fragmented mind." 2012
"Ultimately there are strong performances from everyone involved. Combined with the clever use of lighting and sound they build the tension, creating a world where darkness lurks beneath a veneer of civility." 2012
"The second play, Stewart Pringle’s As Ye Sow, is the most successful of the four. An elderly man (a well-pitched performance by Jeffrey Mayhew) is visited by his daughter in the care home where he now resides, having been in decline since his wife’s disappearance eight years ago. His daughter has a scheme to remedy their financial worries, but when she explains it to her father he becomes increasingly fretful and upset. Elegantly blending elements of J-Horror – technology offers no solace here, the television and the radio are not your friends – with domestic drama, the piece contains some proper jolts but it’s the small details, the things half-glimpsed and half-heard, which really unnerve. " 2011
"Jeffrey Mayhew is spot-on as the troubled pensioner with a terrible secret past who can’t remember what time it is but can’t forget what happened to his missing wife." 2011
"Here is a perfectly pitched atmosphere of the banality in horror which ends, we know, in thrillingly awful surprises. An old man waits at home, the Archers on the radio, a TV dinner. The picture cracks to reveal a deadly secret, involving a burial and a haunting memory. It’s the standout play of the night, in terms of acting and script, and the only completely original one." 2011
"The second As Ye Sow was a family drama about a man in a nursing home whose unsettling past begins to catch up with him, with just two performers it was the stand out piece of the night, Jeffrey Mayhew was the elderly father and did a fine job. ." 2011
"As Ye Sow’ is a play by Stewart Pringle and it starts rather harmless… concerning an elderly man in a care home whose boring routine is broken up only by regular visits from his daughter. They chat about this and about that and as to why he keeps the portrait of dead mum in the drawer instead on the bedside table. And so the time (and the play) passes, without much happening until the TV-set in his room gets switched on. Be warned: it’s the last 10 minutes of this play that will make you jolt, so unexpected is the twist and so sudden the shock! I’ve spotted at least six guests who screamed out loud, and I was one of them. " 2011
"As Ye Sow is in part a horrifying glimpse into the mind of a senile outcast (who essentially is succumbing to childhood paranoias: monsters under the bed, things that go bump in the night) and in part a creepy story about something that keeps coming back – something you thought you had buried a long time ago." 2011
"Mayhew’s Clifford is absorbing as a petrified old man who is visited by paranormal activity. As the picture of his wife falls from the shelf, and the lights go out, the sudden shrieks that stab out of the darkness will chill you to the bone. " 2011
"The first show was followed almost immediately by “As ye Sow,” which I approached with caution but found to be the strongest of the night, ultimately as satisfying as Lucy Kirkwood’s “Psychogeography.” The story is about a man in a nursing home, and the thing that I found made it so satisfying is that all of the little things that just didn’t quite seem to be going right seemed to be just as likely to be his mind playing tricks on him as anything else. I was reminded of how the ultimate horror in the new, Lovecraftian world, is not of the devil taking your soul; it’s of losing your mind. And on both levels, “As Ye Sow” and all of the ingredients of success. To top it off, it made me jump two feet straight up. Good job!" - Webcowgirl (Life in the Cheap Seats) 2011