Post by Steve on Mar 9, 2017 13:19:10 GMT
Saw this last night. A lovely thoughtful play, beautifully realised.
I could pretend I saw this play on International Women's Day deliberately, as it is written by a woman, directed by a woman, and stars 5 women (and no men). As it happens, I didn't know any of that, nor even that it was International Women's Day until I read it on the train in the Standard on the way home.
It is, however, a triumph for all the women involved, a gem of a production that contains within it's smallness sparkles that radiate outwards to shed light on mighty issues regarding all our lives. Who are we? Are we where we are supposed to be? What do we owe our families? What do we owe strangers? What is a stranger?
Some spoilers follow. . .
The smallness of the play is reflected in it's brief 75 minute running time, it's single small rundown yet bucolic set, featuring the world's smallest "chapel," it's focus on a singular issue: is it ok for Scarlett (Kate Ashfield) to leave her mother (Joanna Bacon) and grown-up daughter (Bethan Cullinane) behind in London and move to rural Wales to get away from her stressful (and failing) life?
Scarlett sets her sights on buying said "chapel," and befriends two locals, a 14 year old girl, Billy (Gaby French) and her grandmother, Eira (Lynn Hunter). Eira owns the chapel, and is reluctant to sell it, as she hopes her own daughter (Billy's mother) will return to live there, but she must juggle her relectance to sell it with the fact that her grand-daughter adores Scarlett.
The tensions between all 5 characters that develop, when Scarlett's own mother and daughter come to Wales to get Scarlett to come back to London, are beautifully realised, a perfect blend of comedy, drama, connection, disconnection and some slight surrealism due to the ambiguity about how Scarlett intends to live and support herself in this alien setting. . .
"Ninety eight percent of our thoughts are repetitive," declares Scarlett, when explaining her need to escape London's rat race, and start again. It is the 2 percent of thoughts that are not repetitive that the play touchingly and humourously explores.
Kate Ashfield (who was in the Royal Court's original run of Sarah Kane's "Blasted") is suitably lost and mysterious as Scarlett, Bethan Cullinane (who was Innogen in the RSC's recent Cymbeline) is suitably confused as her daughter, and Gaby French makes an open and generous and loveable debut as the young girl who befriends Scarlett. Humour is mostly generated by the two wonderful older actresses, Joanna Bacon and Lynn Hunter, going to war with each other in their roles as protective mothers and grandmothers.
If there were more wonderful plays like this, you wouldn't need a women's day.
4 and a half stars
I could pretend I saw this play on International Women's Day deliberately, as it is written by a woman, directed by a woman, and stars 5 women (and no men). As it happens, I didn't know any of that, nor even that it was International Women's Day until I read it on the train in the Standard on the way home.
It is, however, a triumph for all the women involved, a gem of a production that contains within it's smallness sparkles that radiate outwards to shed light on mighty issues regarding all our lives. Who are we? Are we where we are supposed to be? What do we owe our families? What do we owe strangers? What is a stranger?
Some spoilers follow. . .
The smallness of the play is reflected in it's brief 75 minute running time, it's single small rundown yet bucolic set, featuring the world's smallest "chapel," it's focus on a singular issue: is it ok for Scarlett (Kate Ashfield) to leave her mother (Joanna Bacon) and grown-up daughter (Bethan Cullinane) behind in London and move to rural Wales to get away from her stressful (and failing) life?
Scarlett sets her sights on buying said "chapel," and befriends two locals, a 14 year old girl, Billy (Gaby French) and her grandmother, Eira (Lynn Hunter). Eira owns the chapel, and is reluctant to sell it, as she hopes her own daughter (Billy's mother) will return to live there, but she must juggle her relectance to sell it with the fact that her grand-daughter adores Scarlett.
The tensions between all 5 characters that develop, when Scarlett's own mother and daughter come to Wales to get Scarlett to come back to London, are beautifully realised, a perfect blend of comedy, drama, connection, disconnection and some slight surrealism due to the ambiguity about how Scarlett intends to live and support herself in this alien setting. . .
"Ninety eight percent of our thoughts are repetitive," declares Scarlett, when explaining her need to escape London's rat race, and start again. It is the 2 percent of thoughts that are not repetitive that the play touchingly and humourously explores.
Kate Ashfield (who was in the Royal Court's original run of Sarah Kane's "Blasted") is suitably lost and mysterious as Scarlett, Bethan Cullinane (who was Innogen in the RSC's recent Cymbeline) is suitably confused as her daughter, and Gaby French makes an open and generous and loveable debut as the young girl who befriends Scarlett. Humour is mostly generated by the two wonderful older actresses, Joanna Bacon and Lynn Hunter, going to war with each other in their roles as protective mothers and grandmothers.
If there were more wonderful plays like this, you wouldn't need a women's day.
4 and a half stars
