★★★★

“Liz Elvin doesn’t give us theatrical fireworks, but something much more subtle and involving”

What has been described as ‘the biggest miscarriage of justice in British legal history’ is the focus of this interesting new play by Zannah Kearns. It is drawn from Nick Wallis’ seminal 2021 exposé of the Post Office Horizon scandal. It tells the story up to 2019, when after a joint legal action, over 500 Postmasters and Postmistresses were granted a settlement of £58 million.

The play was commissioned by the University of Reading and was developed with help from their Law Department. It is performed by Reading’s RABBLE Theatre which has a special remit to ‘tell local stories of national significance’. Playwright Kearns based her story on her interviews with one Post Mistress called Pam Stubbs who modestly says she ‘got really cross’ when she first noticed false transactions on the screen of the branch she was running from a Portakabin near Reading.

A cast of four include seasoned performer Elizabeth Elvin as Pam Stubbs. Stubbs was unique amongst the other litigants in that she kept meticulous records which enabled the Horizon system to be directly challenged. Liz Elvin doesn’t give us theatrical fireworks, but something much more subtle and involving. We see a mild-mannered woman who is genuinely puzzled by the total and catastrophic upending of her life because the Post Office stubbornly refused to admit their software was faulty.

Laura Penneycard, Sabina Netherclift and Fayez Baksh deftly take multiple roles as customers, shop assistant, barrister, judge and other litigants. The play is performed in a ‘black box’ space for which Caitlin Abbott has designed a set of wheeled units which are moved around by the cast.

From ‘To Kill a Mockingbird’ to TV’s ‘Crown Court’, court room scenes are bread and butter drama. ‘Glitch’ features some gripping moments drawn directly from the legal transcript. For me, some of the other writing and direction by Gemma Colcough and Gareth Taylor still has a somewhat sketchy quality about it. I wanted a little more drama and less understatement, even if some of it (say) came in the form of techniques like projected graphics.

The founders of RABBLE describe this show as ‘stage one’ for the piece. They hope that with more financial support it will evolve more fully. This worthwhile and involving play certainly deserves a much wider showing.

THE GIANT KILLERS at Wilton’s Music Hall

★★★★

“This is a story of flat cap versus top hat, the salt of the earth against the posh and toffee-nosed and it’s firmly on the side of the underdog”

Falling firmly in the middle of the off-season with only the European Championships for football fans to keep an eye on, is a tour by The Long Lane Theatre Company of their own devised work all about the beautiful game. And it’s an excellent 90 minutes plus added time of entertainment.

This is the little-known story of Darwen FC from Lancashire and how they became the first team of working class lads to play in the FA Cup, then the prerogative of the privileged classes. Three memorable and bloody matches played at the Kensington Oval against the mighty Old Etonians are re-enacted and much is claimed for this little club including first use by the press of the term Giant Killers (100 years before Sutton United, this), first use of a substitute, and first involvement in a game by professional players (disputed!).

This is a story of flat cap versus top hat, the salt of the earth against the posh and toffee-nosed and it’s firmly on the side of the underdog.

Written in the style of narrative storytelling, the cast of four are equally excellent. Central to everything is Lucy (Eve Pearson-Wright), the beautiful, potty-mouthed publican who unofficially runs the football club and is in constant argument with her player brother and self-appointed Captain of the team Billy (Graham Butler). Robert Kirkham (Andrew Pearson-Wright) is a prodigal son returning to Darwin after a time away in Scotland where he has picked up controversial new ways of playing the game but is now looking to woo the love of his life. And posh-speaking James Ashton (Nicholas Shaw) is the son of the local mill owner, an old Harrovian who gets a say in the running of the team because he has bought them a set of shirts.

Designed for national tour (Designer Kevin Jenkins), the set is necessarily minimal: some cleverly designed cabinets boast hidden drawers, even a window, that open up to enhance different scenes, and ingenious use of moving benches provide a variety of options around the stage. But the actors’ movements are rather linear and at the stage edges sometimes are caught out of the light. Only when the football starts in earnest at the end of the first half and the forestage is brought into use is there any visual depth. But then things really work. Pearson-Wright and Butler especially excel in their high-octane match commentary and physical prowess. Slo-mo replays of an exhilarating dribble and shot on goal, or a goalkeeper’s save have the audience gasping and cheering (Movement Director Emily Holt).

This is a story with a lot of heart, superbly told. In a moment of tragedy Graham Butler beautifully sings a poignant Abide with Me, a funereal anthem with its own FA Cup connection. A couple of sub-plots involving rioting townsfolk and striking cotton mill workers could have been made more of but the premise that people that come together can achieve a common goal is uplifting and clearly made.

GLITCH at the Minghella Theatre

★★★★

“Liz Elvin doesn’t give us theatrical fireworks, but something much more subtle and involving”

GLITCH at the Minghella Theatre

Reviewed on 2nd July 2024

by David Woodward

Photography by Annabel Crichard

Recommended Show reviews from June:

GLITCH

GLITCH

THE GIANT KILLERS at Wilton’s Music Hall

★★★★

“This is a story of flat cap versus top hat, the salt of the earth against the posh and toffee-nosed and it’s firmly on the side of the underdog”

THE GIANT KILLERS at Wilton’s Music Hall

Reviewed on 27th June 2024

by Phillip Money

Click on image below for tour dates

Previously reviewed at this venue:

THE GIANT KILLERS

THE GIANT KILLERS