IN 1961, a year in which members of Keighley Little Theatre (now Keighley Playhouse) discussed offerings “of a more serious and adventurous nature” and gave plays by Ibsen and Anouilh, it was appropriate that they should rise to the challenge of Herman Wouk’s The Caine Mutiny Court Martial.

Originally staged in California in 1953 and filmed the following year starring Humphrey Bogart, this play, with its all-male cast and American accents, demanded “the cream of the Little Theatre’s acting talent”.

Here Trevor Mackwell as Lieutenant Stephen Maryk, an officer accused of unlawfully taking control of his neurotic captain’s ship, is questioned by Jack Hepworth as Lieutenant-Commander John Challe, the prosecutor.

The experienced Mr Hepworth had moved to Keighley in 1956 from Horbury, where as a member of Wakefield Little Theatre and the Horbury Pageant Players he had appeared in more than 30 plays besides producing half-a-dozen. His otherwise “immaculate performance” as Lieutenant-Commander Challe was marred only by his occasional lapses into a “semi-Scottish accent”!

A local playgoer who was afterwards overheard commenting “I still don’t know who was guilty!” probably spoke for a number of the audience. Sadly The Caine Mutiny Court Martial was not a box-office success, but the Keighley News of the time thought it “one of the Little Theatre’s best shows”.

The photograph has been supplied by Susan Hepworth, of Dunkirk Rise, Riddlesden.