(seen at the afternoon performance on 17th April 2024)
Sarah Gordon wrote this play in 2020. Unfortunately, she was not to know that there would be a surfeit, even glut of writers covering exactly the same ground in exactly the same style.
From “Austentatious” to “Pride and Prejudice (‘sort of’)” via “Bleak Expectations” to name just a few post-Covid examples, the concept of using minimal props, cross-dressing in period outfits and pretending to examine classic British literature in “tongue-in-cheek” manner has become as much a cliché as the mega-musical of the 1980s.
This lands as most of the others do, firmly in the middle of the West End stage play pack. Far from unwatchable, even quite entertaining for much of its length, but constrained by its own wit from really driving the sound message home as it potentially could have.
Set and costume designer Grace Smart puts the National Theatre’s full resources to use. Eschewing her trademark broken walls, she goes instead for garden roots to open, and a brilliant final sequence (the monkey will say no more for fear of spoilers) that lifts the show almost to 4-star quality by underlining visually what should have been clear far sooner from the text.
Three girls squabble in a parsonage as they dream of fame. Gemma Whelan’s exuberant Charlotte Bronte makes her first entrance to delight the front row and rarely stops effervescing for the next two hours.
Sister Anne is more solid and independent, Rhiannon Clements finding a determination and intellectual weight to delightfully counterbalance Whelan.
As third sister Emily, Adele James struggles a little to match her dialogue delivery with the other pair’s flowing approach. A little stiffer by comparison, though finding her forte in the later dramatic scenes.
Brother Branwell allows James Phoon as little latitude as any male in a female-dominated environment. Phoon contents himself as foil, gaining at least audience sympathy.
Playing (as is the way with this kind of play) a multitude of roles – mostly “female – man in dress speaking squeakily” – Nick Blakeley does sound service as an evil mother, Elizabeth Gaskell and shell operator.
Director Natalie Ibu makes good use of the talent and revolving set to keep Gordon’s writing moving even during the slightly rambling post-interval. Perhaps dropping the break and tightening scenes here would have been to advantage, as when it arrives the ending packs a sucker-punch which repays our attention.
Shorter and tighter, played with greater emphasis on the drama, we might have found something as intellectually satisfying as it is mostly entertaining. Still, a talented ensemble and production team deliver something which may not entirely grab your soul away, but is certainly no bad dream in the night either.
