The Bermuda Musical & Dramatic Society (BMDS) is launching its 2007 season with a fund-raising memorial production of ‘The Slippered Pantaloon’ at Daylesford theatre from tomorrow through Friday.

Described as “reflections on age in memory of a young life cut short”, the programme will feature a series of performances by Gavin Wilson, Nigel Kermode and Carol Birch in works which consider old age with all its humour, wisdom, longing and foibles.

Proceeds of the show will benefit the BMDS Charitable Trust established in the late Kate Huntington’s name. Miss Huntington, an active member of the BMDS, was killed at age 28 in a motorcycle accident in India.

Active in youth drama workshops at BMDS during her teens, she studied drama at university in Canada, and had already held principal roles in several BMDS productions.

At the request of her family, all funds raised on her behalf are used specifically for the promotion of theatre among Bermuda’s youth.

The evening will begin with Nigel Kermode and Carol Birch presenting selected verse from the works of Shakespeare, Ogden Nash, Dylan Thomas and others.

These will be followed by a series of reminiscences by Mark Twain (as portrayed by Gavin Wilson), in which the celebrated author considers such diverse issues as horseback riding, other people’s habits, the noisome interviewer, the fateful appearance of Halley’s comet, and offers advice on how best to be 70.

The event will conclude with a performance of British playwright David Conville’s one-act play, ‘Obituaries’ starring Gavin Wilson and Nigel Kermode as Bartholomew White and Timothy Edward Bertram Apcar — two aging residents of St. Felix Nursing Home, Beckenham, Kent, who play out their daily game in anticipation of the arrival of a royal visitor — a game which is played with hilarious and sometimes unexpected results.

This will mark the second time the two actors have presented this award-winning play and, in keeping with age as the overall theme, each shares his thoughts on doing it all again with his opposite number.

“I require an enormous amount of make-up to make myself look aged,” Mr. Wilson says. “Unfortunately, all Nigel has to do is look at the audience.”

“It is a real delight to be acting with my father once again, despite the fact that he is extremely old,” Mr. Kermode says.

Mr. Wilson describes the play as “a classic English black comedy which won rave reviews from all of the Fleet Street papers in 1990, as well as all kinds of drama awards”.

“It is a wonderful example of that genre of theatre,” he says.

Theatregoers with long memories will recall that ‘The Slippered Pantaloon’ was first performed to great success at the Bermuda National Gallery about ten years ago, directed by the late Elsbeth Gibson.

[bul] Performances of ‘The Slippered Pantaloon’ will begin at 8 p.m. and tickets ($20) are available as follows: from the BMDS box office at Daylesford this evening between 5.30 p.m. and 7 p.m. and on performance nights from 5.30 p.m. to 8 p.m. Alternatively, ( 292-0848 during box office hours. Tickets can also be booked on line at www.bmds.bm or www.boxoffice.bm outside box office hours.