50. The Children's Hour - Comedy Theatre

My 50^th production of the year scarily and I’d say this was a bit of a departure from seeing The Tempest earlier in the day – but bleak, queer themes and with a manipulative character at it’s heart – maybe it really wasn’t. Given the high profile casting and high ticket prices, I thought I was going to have to give this one a miss but then I heard about the wonder of the restricted view seats. Sure your view is sometimes blocked by a pillar but there’s something ultimately satisfying in knowing that you paid £5 whilst the person next to you forked out £40 (it’s all about the small victories).


I found it especially satisfying this time as the man next to me was frankly a bit odd, and not in the good way. An autograph collector, he did that thing I’ve seen a lot of opening his programme to a particularly good set of autographs and tried casually to show it off to everyone around him, he even borrowed my programme because he wanted to read something and they’d “scribbled” all over his. Which I would have passed off as quirky but not that unusual if he hadn’t then admitted that he hadn’t seen the play yet and then didn’t come back for the second half. Which is just bizarre.

Particularly, as I thought the play had quite a lot going for it. The central idea, of the insidious destructive nature of lies, remains a fascinating one. Plus the writing throughout was excellent, with the scenes focused upon the girls particularly shining for me. I also loved the way Antony and Cleopatra had been woven into that first section, particularly because of the recent memories it was stirring for me and also because, with both plays themes of suicide, it colours the ending in an interesting way.

I was also impressed by the performances, with Bryony Hannah as Mary really standing out for me. Though I know others were less enamoured with her performance, particularly as she seemingly has done something very similarly before, I loved how she captured childhood – throwing her self across the room, squirming, curling up in chairs, clinging to people. The other performances were also very good, with Elisabeth Moss emerging as another favourite. It was also awesome to have almost the reverse of The Tempest earlier, where it was definitely a male dominated cast – here it was all about the women and absolutely crammed with great female parts.

The set design worked well, managing to be both cold and beautiful, particularly in the way the light spilled through the window and the simple way the room transformed with slow, elegant set changes. Though otherwise I am afraid I am drawing a bit of a blank on the rest of the lighting, sound – which perhaps implies it was doing its job well in creating the stark, quiet atmosphere of the play.

All of which makes it a shame that I couldn’t quite enjoy this. I didn’t find it emotionally satisfying. Mostly because I find this type of story very frustrating, the fact that again and again during this period of storytelling (and still today more often than I’d like) lesbians are shown as life-ruiners, almost inherently despicable and must be punished. Even though Martha is an entirely sympathetic character, it doesn’t change that as soon as she realised that she is gay she kills herself – reinforcing the cycle we see again and again in various mediums. I simply couldn’t shake the echoes of that or the weight of context surrounding it.