Morwenna and the Legend of Kit Hill, performed by Callington PrimRaf was a highly successful production spanning two weeks has created quite a stir.

Television cameras and VIPs were at the first night, all eight performances were sold out and all of Callington has been talking about Morwenna.

Edward Woodward was in the audience and Ian Stirling presented a bouquet of flowers to writer/director Alex Ward , an event which was filmed for his Friday lunchtime programme.

What was it about this play that left the audience feeling moved, uplifted and inspired?

It wasn't solely the performances, good as they were. Sandar Dignand as Penny Wadge, a slightly loony pillar of the community, was the embodiment of unflagging community spirit. This was a strong performance which kept our interest and sympathies throughout. Martin Ward played her brother, the absent hero, with moving intensity. In the title role, Sarah Moir brought a brightness and truth onto the stage that cut through the audience.

Her excellent, sonorous singing voice warmed the auditorium with its confidence.

Playing opposite her, Iain Davis (Tom) brought to a small role the same brightness, constantly injecting life into the action. Smithy - very sensitively played by Roger May - provided a solid, pure staff to the aid of our heroes.

Shelagh Skinnard gave a faultlessly machiavellian and focused performance asthe Quarry Queen. The strength of her singing voice communicated very effectively the power she had over humans. The Davey Family (Andrew Kerr, Julie Wheldon and Sally Vince) were the expertly timed comic relief.

Jeff Jeffery was very funny as the parson and as the proprietor of Doney & Hancocks, a certain Mr. Arthur Ritus. Paula Beswetherick and Margaret Lawrence were a particularly nasty pair of gossips, who nonetheless never completely lost our sympathy. Ian Baxter as the butcher gave an genuine edge to the nastiness caused by the town's ebbing community spirit, and Ray Memmott's PC Pearson oversaw the whole with appropriate and believable authority.

The life of the town that was so easy to believe in came from the various market sellers and customers (Jill Long, Lynda Dawe, Jean Cannon, Ken Pearson, Tony Isbell, Rosemarie Hill, Hazel Jones, Monica Pascoe, Brian Pascoe) and the members of the choruses (Lea-Ann Ansell, Jo Brow-ning, Laura Browning, Jennifer Cattell, Katy Dawe, Yasmin May, Abigail Ward, Katrina Ward, Lorraine Wheeler and Niamh White).

All solo songs were well delivered and the company singing was very good.

Some of the songs were top-notch musical numbers, the style being matched to the characters' personalities to great effect. The Quarry Queen's spell-weaving was to a sly, jazzy number. When the tide of opinion turns to

Penny Wadge's favour, the whole house is whisked away with 'The Benefit of the Doubt', an elbow-swinging romp worthy of the best British musicals. The final 'message' number, where the whole cast stand behind Morwenna shining lanterns out into the unknown, was truly moving. A sort of Les Misdedication march with a hint of world music. But the lyrics of some songs were very obvious, and the style of the music in some numbers seemed to default to a generic American pop ballad (and accents followed). It was a shame that the music didn't always stay faithful to the play's setting: a more folk-based orchestration, for instance, might have grounded the music in an authentic way.

The look of the production, from the beginning, transported us easily back to a place we know before we knew it. The quiet bustle of the audience finding their seats turns seamlessly into the opening scene; as the people of a beautifully depicted Callington of 1887 (Meg Baxter and Ian Pether's sets were immediately effective and delightfully detailed) gradually inhabit the stage, everybody has a certain look of the past about them. It is only when we notice that the bobby's uniform and the rector's shirt are not black, but sepia, that we realise that it is our vision which is tinted with the past. The costumes by Sally Vince (ably assisted by too many to mention

here) were masterfully conceived. The set and costumes together were a vital part of the recipe because they were particularly faithful to the detail and spirit of the community they represented.

And that, perhaps, is what guaranteed the success of the play: while what we were watching was about the town of Callington, its people, and their ability to pull together to achieve great things, that was also the result of what we were watching. There was such a strong link between the community strength needed to overcome the evils in the story, and the community strength needed to put together such a well-rounded production, that we left feeling proud of 'Callington, our Home'.

Joe West