Now this is the way to do it! The detail and acting in this production is simply exquisite. The attention to detail in the set design and staging is incredible and unlike any production that I have seen for a while. It really does make you feel as though you are in someone’s house: when someone goes to make a cup of tea, they actually make a cup of tea; there are individual light switches for the rooms that are flicked when people enter or leave rooms; there are stairs leading to upstairs which are used so that you believe that there really is an upstairs; and the kitchen seems to have everything you would need in your kitchen - I wouldn’t be surprised if the gas hob and oven had actually worked! You can see the wall between the living room and hallway, even though it is just an outline delineated with a skirting board. Words cannot do justice to just how incredible the detail was - you simply have to see the production for yourself to understand and appreciate it.
Finty Williams and Chris Larkin were phenomenal as Barbara and Bob Jackson. The detail and emotion in their performances made the characters seem so believable and real. They completely sweep you up into the story, making you forget that you are watching a play and making you believe that you are there in 1961 witnessing events as they unfold. You feel Barbara’s pain at the dilemma she is placed in, and you wonder how on earth anyone could have been as strong as she was. Williams’ portrayal is heart-breaking and inspires awe and admiration for the real-life Barbara (Ruth Search) - yes, this play is based on a true story!
Macy Nyman is brilliant as Julie, completely nailing every element of being a teenage schoolgirl. Tracy-Ann Oberman is fantastic as Helen Kroger and makes you wish that you had a friend like her. She is fun, sophisticated and caring, all of which makes the events even more painful and heart-rending. Alasdair Harvey is quite quiet and nondescript as Peter Kroger, but I think that that is the point.
The dynamics between the two couples make you look at your own friendships and relationships, and I think that everyone will be able to identify with one of the four characters.
Jasper Britton is great as Stewart, but the character he portrays is absolutely odious - a bulldozing, unsympathetic bully. He had absolutely no empathy for the Jacksons’ situation and, like a sociopath, even seemed to take a cruel pleasure in it. Barbara has a line about wanting to hit him in the face, and I completely agreed with that - I wanted to smack him in the face he was so awful! I only hope his real-life counterpart wasn’t that bad!
The pace and narrative might have been a bit slow at times, and when I saw it some of the lighting cues definitively didn’t go as planned, but neither of these things mattered. It is a brilliant production, apt for today’s political climate, and shows that nothing has changed in 50 years, which is slightly terrifying.
If you get a chance to see this show, grab it with both hands because there are few productions currently on that compare with it.