★★★★

“Director David Esbjornson lures us into this world before slamming the doors and keeping us captive – and captivated – for the next two hours”

Stephen King’s short story, on which the stage adaptation of “The Shawshank Redemption” is based, was titled ‘Rita Hayworth and The Shawshank Redemption’. We only learn the significance of the reference to the star of the Golden Age of Hollywood in the final moments of the play, but it is an uplifting moment which epitomises the feelings of joy and hope that pop up in what is essentially a grim and desperate setting.

Set in the maximum-security wing of the Shawshank penitentiary, Owen O’Neill’s and Dave Johns’ epic interpretation spans a couple of decades with its tale of a man wrongfully imprisoned for a crime he didn’t commit. That man is Andy Dufresne, wonderfully played by Joe McFadden with a mixture of vulnerability and bravado, who uses his well-heeled banking background to ingratiate himself with the other inmates and the guards. It is a precarious tightrope he walks, and he frequently falls into the pit of violence and backstabbing that is prevalent – particularly among the warden and the guards who are just as crooked as the prisoners.

Director David Esbjornson lures us into this world before slamming the doors and keeping us captive – and captivated – for the next two hours. Gary McCann’s stark two-tiered set creates the prison day room with its balcony from which other prisoners – and prison guards – watch, heckle and interrupt the action below. The audience feel part of that assembly, encouraged by long-term jailbird Ellis ‘Red’ Redding who acts as narrator. Crossing the line between stage and auditorium, Ben Onwukwe gives a remarkable performance as ‘Red’, the prison ‘fixer’ who somehow manages to get whatever contraband his cell mates require. Onwukwe somehow manages to secure our sympathy too, which fills us with a guilty pleasure as we wonder how it is possible to warm to a man who is a self-confessed double murderer.

But then we wonder who the real villains of the piece are. Warden Stammas takes self-interest to extremes as he ignores justice, law and morality to serve his own agenda, willingly dispensing with others’ lives and freedoms. Owen Oldroyd (stepping in for Bill Ward who plays Stammas for the rest of the run) captures the cool menace as he wields his power with a deceptive stillness. The prison hierarchy is vividly illustrated with the peripheral characters establishing their own powerful personalities. Sean Kingsley’s intimidating ‘Bogs Diamond’ and sidekick ‘Rooster’ (a wonderful Ashley D Gale complete with a sinister hyena-like cackle) form the ‘sisters’ who attempt to hold sway through sexual violence. Meanwhile there is Kenneth Jay’s ‘Brooksie’, the librarian who cuts a tragic figure so institutionalised he can’t cope with his parole. Through all of this, the central figure of Andy Dufrense maintains his own innocence. McFadden never lets his character give up despite the odds, taking the knocks with understated defiance and an inbuilt sense of optimism. A vestige of hope comes in the form of Tommy (Kyle Harrison-Pope) who claims he knows the real culprit behind the murders for which Andy was accused. Tragedy soon dashes that hope.

The structure is episodic and time passes in fits and starts. Suddenly a decade can fly by without us noticing, but Onwukwe is on hand to give us context. Chris Davey’s lighting certainly gives us the sense of place with its cool washes – panoramic and moody but concentrated when necessary. Sepulchral spotlights surrounded by shadows evocatively display the isolation. Faultless performances highlight, when not in their solitary confinement, the precarious camaraderie that exists, although occasionally the bonhomie can eclipse the true sense of danger and brutality. But even if the physical savagery doesn’t quite come across, the potency is shocking. “The Shawshank Redemption” is an enthralling picture of this world, and how people adjust to it, whether they are placed there justifiably or not. ‘Redemption’ is a double-edged sword. I’m not going to tell you if it lives up to its title, but I’d strongly urge you to find out.

BOYS FROM THE BLACKSTUFF

Theatre Royal Windsor

★★★★

“Tragedy and farce link arms and are not afraid to share the same lines of dialogue.”

Although Alan Bleasdale wrote the original series of television plays before Margaret Thatcher came to power, it wasn’t first broadcast until 1982 and was consequently seen to be a specific critique of the Thatcher era. His writing, though, had a far more wide-ranging effect that guaranteed the success of the stories. The nostalgic and gritty realism still holds power nearly half a century later, as evidenced by James Graham’s stirring adaptation for the stage, currently on a nationwide tour.

The early nineteen-eighties were different things for different people. At one end of the scale there were the rich and ambitious, riding on progress and the jetstream of new money. But while Harry Enfield parodied this selfishness of the yuppie culture (we all remember the ‘Loadsamoney’ character?), Bleasdale was focusing on the underside; the high unemployment and collapse of the primary industries. “Boys form the Blackstuff” follows five working class men trying to keep afloat amid this recession, not helped by the suspicious and bullying hand of the Department of Employment.

Amy Jane Cook’s brutalist and severe set evokes the Liverpool docklands with its iron frameworks which close in on the more intimate scenes, lending an air of claustrophobia to the domestic bickering that runs parallel to the collective fight for survival that these characters are up against. Kate Wasserberg’s stylish direction weaves the short scenes together into a series of choreographed vignettes that flow, then clash like freshwater rapids coming up against the murkiness and remorselessness of the Mersey.

We get to know the principal characters early on (if we don’t know them already). Chrissie, Loggo, Yosser, George, Dixie and Snowy. Even if you are unfamiliar with the original, and once you’ve acclimatised to the authentic Liverpudlian accent, their stories are easy to follow. The performances of each cast member are strikingly individual and recognisable. Obviously, Jay Johnson’s ‘Yosser’ stands out from the crowd with his peppered catchphrases (‘gizza job’ and ‘I could do that’) and jittery, unpredictable energy. We realise that this could be a play about mental health – a sudden understanding that whisks the narrative into the present day but without the unease of having to tread carefully through contemporary fragility. Words of wisdom, particularly from Ged McKenna’s wonderfully uneducated yet perfectly erudite ‘George’, are never lost in the humour. We laugh through this show just as much as we gasp at the personal hardships endured.

The pace picks up in the second act, even as the scenes get longer and more introspective. The humour and pathos join forces in monologue. Tragedy and farce link arms and are not afraid to share the same lines of dialogue. A funeral scene, as poignant as they come, bleeds brilliantly into the comedy of a dole queue. An anguished wife (a superb Sian Polhill-Thomas) wondering how to feed her children is, in the next scene, an acerbically grim clerk at the jobcentre. But under the lights, each character casts shadow of hope. Even if the shades aren’t subtle, it is the contrast of light and dark that bring this show alive.

We might not have admitted this in the eighties, but these ‘boys’ feel emasculated, fragile and desperate for hope. The writing is sensitive beyond its years, and in Graham’s revival we can carouse in the period without having to make excuses for it. Despite being geographically and culturally specific, it is universal. And despite being rooted in a particular decade, it is timeless. The stories of ordinary people, told in an extraordinary production.

Tag Archives: Kyle Harrison-Pope

THE SHAWSHANK REDEMPTION

★★★★

UK Tour

THE SHAWSHANK REDEMPTION

Theatre Royal Windsor

★★★★

“Director David Esbjornson lures us into this world before slamming the doors and keeping us captive – and captivated – for the next two hours”

THE SHAWSHANK REDEMPTION

Theatre Royal Windsor then UK Tour continues

Reviewed on 18th February 2026

by Jonathan Evans

Photography by Jack Merriman

THE SHAWSHANK REDEMPTION

THE SHAWSHANK REDEMPTION

THE SHAWSHANK REDEMPTION

BOYS FROM THE BLACKSTUFF

★★★★

UK Tour

BOYS FROM THE BLACKSTUFF

Theatre Royal Windsor

★★★★

“Tragedy and farce link arms and are not afraid to share the same lines of dialogue.”