Carolyn Downing Archives - thespyinthestalls.com

★½

“Unfortunately, The Enfield Haunting is a very bad play”

Between 1977 and 1979, the story of the Enfield poltergeist gripped the British public. A ghostly spirit had allegedly taken up lodgings in a council house in the London Borough of Enfield, creating havoc for the working-class family who lived there. The Enfield Haunting, written by Paul Unwin and directed by Angus Jackson, is based on these supposedly paranormal events, providing some potential answers for the still unresolved case. To inform his theatrical retelling, Unwin spoke with Guy Lyon-Playfair, a member of the Society of Psychical Research, who visited the site of the Enfield poltergeist 180 times.

Catherine Tate stars as Peggy Hodgson, single parent and matriarch of the family. The middle child, Janet (Ella Schrey-Yeats), has begun displaying strange episodes of behaviour – she convulses violently and speaks in tongues but then seemingly remembers none of it. Elsewhere in the house, objects and furniture appear to move on their own accord, fuses go out suddenly, and a haunting male figure is spotted lurking in the shadows.

Much to the family’s dismay, Maurice Grosse (David Threlfall), a British paranormal investigator, takes up near-residence in the house, monitoring the goings-on with his special equipment night after night. Clashing with neighbour ‘Uncle’ Rey (Mo Sesay) who believes these spooky happenings are merely pranks in collaboration with the other children, Margaret (Grace Molony) and Jimmy (Noah Leggott), the Hodgsons try and navigate their newfound national notoriety.

All sounds rather exciting, right? The source material is interesting and there is great potential to explore a long history of ‘hysterical’ young women and the mayhem they can cause. Unfortunately, The Enfield Haunting is a very bad play. The script is painfully weak – conversations and dialogue drag on for far longer than they need to. Rey delivers monologues of no substance that espouse the same points over and over again. Tate, a brilliant actress on stage and the silver screen, is pretty much reduced to saying the same two lines on repeat – ‘Please go home, Rey!’ and ‘I don’t know, Mr Grosse!’ – which is a tremendous waste of her talent.

“the tension is completely lacking”

Within its short 75-minute run-time (cut down by over 30 minutes from the previews), the play simply tries to cover too much. We are treated to not one but TWO twists which do not meld together at all. It is almost as if the production thought they’d try out both, see which gets the best reaction, and run with that. Unfortunately, both fall a bit flat, eliciting notable giggles from the audience.

Schrey-Yeats does well to bring some creepiness to this bland production. Molony is a good support as the eldest child, sufficiently vexatious in manner. Threlfall is given the richest character to explore, and he does what he can to bring some eccentricity and humour to the tale.

The set – designed by Lee Newby – is rather wonderful, a two-storey interior of the infamous house. The sound design (Carolyn Downing) is also strong – the music is atmospheric, the tension built well in these moments. Overall, however, the tension is completely lacking. The pacing is off. The recreation of the most iconic photo from the case – Janet seemingly floating in mid-air in their bedroom – happens so flippantly in the first 15-minutes that it is easily missed.

The illusions – led by Paul Kieve – are OK – a figure appears suddenly in the house before a sudden blackout allows him ample time to move. But nothing is unexplainable – except why the production team thought this play was fit for stage.

It is a great shame that something so well-informed has been unable to hit the mark and join the ranks of other great horror theatre. It is also disappointing that even with such a strong leading duo, such a feeble show is the result. Unless you are a serious paranormal fan, it is definitely one to miss.

Life of Pi

Wyndham’s Theatre

Reviewed – 29th November 2021

★★★★★

“This is theatre at its most hallucinatory and wonderful, yet fundamentally simplistic; created by a collective vision that you forget is there.”

“Which story do you prefer?” asks Piscine “Pi” Patel of the two Japanese officials investigating the shipwreck from which he is the only survivor. We are approaching the end of this fantastical tale and it is a beautifully pertinent and intentional moment. It is a much more satisfying question rather than “which story they think is the true one”. ‘Life is a story’ and ‘You can choose your story’ are just two of the themes that wash up from the cruel sea of allegories that “Life of Pi” presents. Choosing what you believe and, in turn, controlling those beliefs is as treacherous as taming a Bengal tiger.

Transferring from Sheffield’s Crucible Theatre (delayed by the pandemic), Max Webster’s production, adapted by Lolita Chakrabarti from Yann Martel’s novel, has predictably been hailed the new “War Horse”. Yet it is a different beast entirely. As intricate and astonishing as the puppetry is, the magic is also created from the enthralling central performances and the jaw-dropping stage craft. Under Webster’s sabre-sharp direction, the entire team of designers and cast capture the imagination, not just of the author, but of the audience too. It melds them into one of the same, both feeding off each other. It is an almost miraculous feat that is achieved, not from high tech wizardry, but from sheer inventiveness and trust in the human mind.

While Finn Caldwell’s and Nick Barnes’ puppetry breathe life into the wild creatures that pace the stage, Hiran Abeysekera’s central performance as ‘Pi’ is the life-force that pulses through the piece. Abeysekera pulls us into his worlds; his childhood at his father’s zoo, the hospital recovery ward, and onto his lifeboat. We willingly share his perils as he survives over seven months adrift on the Pacific Ocean. Originally accompanied by a hyena, zebra, orangutan and Bengal tiger, he is eventually alone with just the tiger. ‘Pi’ survives in part by acting upon profound philosophical questions that come to him like ghosts; and by pulling shreds of advice from his memory. “Use everything you have and defy the odds”. This latter truism can definitely be applied to the design of the piece in which the minds of Tim Hatley (set), Tim Lutkin (lighting) and Andrzej Goulding (video) have merged to conjure a breath-taking backdrop to the tale. There is a spell-binding moment when ‘Pi’ leaps off his boat into the ocean, vanishing in front of our eyes only to reappear elsewhere from the waves. No high-tech wizardry. Just inventive trickery.

This is theatre at its most hallucinatory and wonderful, yet fundamentally simplistic; created by a collective vision that you forget is there. In the same way, we are aware that the puppets – most noticeably the tiger – are being controlled by four different puppeteers, yet we don’t see them in our minds. What we see is the personality of a sentient creature vividly conjured by the language of its movement. The beast becomes human.

‘Pi’ tells us more than one story. We have his story with animals – fantastical, spiritual and dreamlike. And we have the harsh, scientific realism. “Which story do you prefer?” Pi asks, while provoking our silent answer with “You want a story to confirm what you already know”. This production challenges what we might already know about theatre but also, without a shadow of a doubt, reinforces our belief in the power of theatre. Long after you leave the auditorium, you will be bound by its spell. Abeysekera’s witty, compelling, and poised performance depicts a solo voyage. Surrounded by an incredible, indispensable company of actors it manages to transcend a single life. This is life itself. A fantastic voyage. This is Theatre.

THE ENFIELD HAUNTING at the Ambassadors Theatre

★½

“Unfortunately, The Enfield Haunting is a very bad play”

“the tension is completely lacking”

THE ENFIELD HAUNTING at the Ambassadors Theatre

Reviewed on 10th January 2024

by Flora Doble

Photography by Marc Brenner

Previously reviewed at this venue:

THE ENFIELD HAUNTING

THE ENFIELD HAUNTING

Wyndham’s Theatre

Reviewed – 29th November 2021

★★★★★

“This is theatre at its most hallucinatory and wonderful, yet fundamentally simplistic; created by a collective vision that you forget is there.”

Reviewed by Jonathan Evans

Photography by Johan Persson

Life of Pi

Wyndham’s Theatre until 27th February

More shows reviewed by Jonathan this year: