IN THE SHADOW OF HER MAJESTY at the Jack Studio Theatre

★★★★★

“brilliantly kinetic and breezy”

This year, we’re all round Doreen’s for an absolute cracker of a Christmas.

It’s the best of times and the worst of times but this fractious and penniless Islington family have no choice but to see it through, squeezed together in their council flat like overcooked sprouts at the bottom of a bin bag.

So who’s on the guest list?

There’s world-weary matriarch Doreen (Alice Selwyn), boozing away bad memories, proud of her girls but they drive her nuts.

And sisters Gemma (wryly mordant Nancy Brabin-Platt) and single mum Riley (Lois Tallulah, more on her later). They’re at each other’s throats, one Spurs, one Arsenal, which seems to sum up their forever frenemy feuding.

And then there’s teenager Jorja (a lovely, affecting turn by Ella Harding). She’s the odd one out. She has a different father to her sisters and a secret boyfriend who is perhaps pushing a little too hard for Jorja to grow up.

Together, they are all as sparky and temperamental as Christmas lights.

Hang on. Where are all the men? Well, they are close by. That’s because this rogues gallery of feckless losers is in Pentonville prison which is just over the wall. So near and yet so far.

The wall casts a long shadow. Sometimes it’s an obstacle, especially for little lost Jorja who misses her dad. And sometimes the wall is a last line of defence against an onslaught of deadbeat drug-dealing do-nothings. Prison reform is a theme here but not so much as to be intrusive. Besides, with these men, more prison seems like the answer, not less.

Who else is coming? There’s flush Trish, an old friend (boisterous Jennifer Joseph), spreading good cheer. And pregnant stranger Jamila (Nadia Lamin showing formidable comic chops). The sisters encounter her shouting madly over that wall at incarcerated hubby Christian to keep him updated. Because Jamila is very, very pregnant. And it’s Christmas so, er, hello? How’s that going to end, we wonder.

As the sisters build up to Christmas there are secrets to be shared, some of them very uncomfortable, but in director Isla Jackson-Ritchie’s brilliantly kinetic and breezy production, the traumas are brushed past quickly, being more effective for their handling.

Enough of this doom and gloom, declares sozzled Doreen, let’s have a lovely Christmas.

The Jack Studio’s compact stage is packed and lively – three rooms in one, including a working kitchen, fridge, Christmas tree – and people are always coming and going. The whole thing is thrillingly unstagey and natural, the connections between the women – perpetually frayed, never broken – are a breath of fresh air.

The script feels less written than lived in. Lois Tallulah who plays struggling Riley with a hard face and a soft heart is the writer (and also co-director). Wow, what a talent.

Despite the friction, the endless man problems, the heartache and the cheap plonk, we could have stayed at Doreen’s a lot longer – perilous though it is – if only to find out how it all works out for the sisters. They feel like family now.

With this production, you buy a ticket, but you get an invitation: spend the festive season with the girls. They’re a raucous bunch – brutal, brittle, drunk and teetering. But you’re gonna love ’em.

Joyous. Utterly joyous.

IN THE SHADOW OF HER MAJESTY at the Jack Studio Theatre

Reviewed on 14th November 2024

by Giles Broadbent

Photography by Tim Stubbs Hughes @ Grey Swan

Previously reviewed at this venue:

CAN’T WAIT TO LEAVE | ★★★½ | November 2024

MARCELLA’S MINUTE TO MIDNIGHT | ★★ | September 2024

DEPTFORD BABY | ★★★ | July 2024

MUCH ADO ABOUT NOTHING | ★★★ | August 2022

RICHARD II | ★★★★★ | February 2022

HOLST: THE MUSIC IN THE SPHERES | ★★★★★ | January 2022

PAYNE: THE STARS ARE FIRE | ★★★ | January 2022

TRESTLE | ★★★ | June 2021

IN THE SHADOW OF HER MAJESTY

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★★★½

“grazes idly and widely on ideas it can never properly explore”

There’s something wrong with Ryan. You can tell by his haunted expression, his furious contempt and his presence at A&E. He’s having a bad night.

There’s an empty box on the form where he can write in his symptoms but, better still, why not tell us, take us right back to the beginning, or at least the beginning of the end.

The point being: he can’t wait to leave. A&E, London, which he hates, and his current life, which he hates even more.

Teenager Ryan is living a life on the margins. Cheap flat, cheap booze, cheap encounters, always poor, cadging off mates and strangers.

He’s not a Londoner by birth or inclination but his big brother Ben told him that, if he wanted to make it rich, he had to come to the capital. But Ben is an accountant, doing well for himself, with a set of boarish colleagues and an influencer girlfriend. Any minute now they’ll be settling down, having babies, hashtag living their best life, which seems to bother Ryan more than it should.

Ryan is living a very recognisable London life. He has two GCSEs so he cycles for Deliveroo, and work is interspersed with empty encounters thanks to Grindr and his good looks. He lives in Hounslow with three flatmates where he occupies his time having rainbow hangovers. Everything’s not quite right and now the 19-year-old is on the radar of predatory Richard who fancies some young flesh.

Ryan isn’t that bothered about Richard but he’s less bothered about himself so it all evens out in the end.

Zach Hawkins, who plays the raw and rudderless Ryan, is blessed with an open face and a blank expression on which to layer these experiences. He has the stage solo for 75 minutes to tell us Ryan’s story and is a powerful and captivating presence.

He brings the teenager to life with a blend of puzzlement and self-loathing but Ryan never has enough self-awareness to help us mine for answers. His bleak liaisons mean nothing, and he can’t even rouse himself to nihilism, so he just pinballs between hook-ups, sleazy bars and neon kerbsides where he slumps, drunk or high.

He never strikes it rich, never strikes it lucky. He’s too young to know what’s real and what’s just passing through. Because of this, the production – written and directed by Stephen Leach – grazes idly and widely on ideas it can never properly explore. That means the A&E trauma, when it comes, is just another numbing chapter in a formless and chaotic life.

Ryan is hollow, feckless and stroppy. That Hawkins manages to engage us, despite Ryan’s armour of wanton indifference, is a tribute to the actor’s earnest persistence, demanding we should care when moving on is much, much easier.

Tag Archives: Giles Broadbent

IN THE SHADOW OF HER MAJESTY

★★★★★

Jack Studio Theatre

IN THE SHADOW OF HER MAJESTY at the Jack Studio Theatre

★★★★★

“brilliantly kinetic and breezy”

IN THE SHADOW OF HER MAJESTY at the Jack Studio Theatre