The Audience has had mixed reviews, but Helen Mirren and the corgis have had raves. And the corgis may have come off best. Apparently they've got their own air-conditioned dressing room with dog beds. I would love to have seen the rider on their contract. Reports over the weekend suggested that one of the dogs contracted to play a royal corgi has been misbehaving and has had to be sacked. Perhaps it was a case of artistic differences with director Stephen Daldry?
We sure do love an animal on stage. Nobody ever goes "aah" at a human actor – unless perhaps you are that actor's mum. I've been to panto versions of Cinderella when the only fully verifiable thing alive on stage were the Shetland ponies taking Cinder's carriage to the ball. Even Shakespeare wrote animal scenes: Crab the dog is a major player in Two Gentlemen of Verona, and often out-performs the human actors. The Wizard of Oz would be dullsville without a winsome Toto. And a dog called Sunny made the headlines last year when she was plucked from a shelter – within hours of being put down – to play the dog Sandy in Annie on Broadway.
Even a chicken can liven things up. As I reported last year, performing poultry have been pretty big in theatre recently from Jerusalem to Michael Wynne's Canvas. I'm not sure the very dead chicken in Three Birds, currently at the Royal Exchange in Manchester, counts.
Of course our own delight at animals on stage is nothing compared to the 19th century. When Silvu Purcarete staged Gulliver's Travels in Edinburgh last summer, it featured a couple of real horses – but that was nothing compared to a 19th-century version that apparently boasted 52 horses as well as nine camels, 13 elephants and assorted emus, ostriches and lions. I'm surprised some of the cast didn't eat each other.
Apparently the corgis have gone down so well with audiences in The Audience that there are plans for a new scene featuring a Shetland pony called Emily. Dame Helen should be very afraid: when it comes to audience appreciation, four-footed actors are always going to have the edge both for cuteness and unpredictability.
What are the best and worst animal performances you've seen on stage? My best was the introduction of rabbits in the final act of Chris Goode's Sisters at the Gate in 2008, a device that certainly kept the human actors on their toes. The worst was the horse that defecated all the way through the burning of Atlanta during a performance at Drury Lane of the aptly titled Gone with the Wind.
