In Hattie Naylor’s stage adaptation of Sarah Waters’ Man Booker Prize-nominated novel of the same name, ambulance worker Kay (Phoebe Pryce) presents her lover-at-the-time Helen (Florence Roberts) with a pair of silk pyjamas. The subtle beauty of which extends to much of Alastair Whatley’s touring production for The Original Theatre Company (of which he is artistic director) and York Theatre Royal.

Mirroring Kay’s cinemagoing habit of watching the second half first on account of the fact that she finds some people’s past (and by extension her own) more exciting than their future, Naylor winds back the clock from 1947 to the middle of the second world war to chronicle the rise and demise of two love affairs.

Kay, who is accused by a previous partner Julia (Izabella Urbanowicz) of wanting a stay-at-home wife rather than a lover for prioritising the caring responsibilities of her job over her relationship, adding weight to Kay’s earlier remark that “we never seem to fall in love with the people we ought”; and the conscientious objector-turned-factory worker Duncan (Lewis MacKinnon) who remains a broken man after refusing to honour a pact with his “friend”.

And the state of being broken or trapped and the act of fixing or releasing are central to most of the secondary characters too. Whether that be the elderly prison officer Mr Mundy (Malcolm James) who turns to the “hocus pocus” of Mrs Leonard (Izabella Urbanowicz doubling up) to relieve him from arthritic pain, Kay’s war-time colleague Mickey (Mara Allen) who finds peace-time purpose in repairing motors or – the ultimate symbol – Helen who is literally and metaphorically pulled from the rubble.

As mentioned, there is a silk-like finesse to much of Alastair Whatley’s absorbing production. Particularly Nic Farman’s lighting design which is extraordinarily subtle in its use of shadow and shade; David Woodhead’s simple but effective set whose central feature of a shell of a terraced house mirrors the emptiness that lies at the heart of the two main protagonists; and Sophie Cotton’s light-touch score which envelopes the action with a softness to match Helen’s pyjamas.

Performance-wise, each member of the eight-strong ensemble is perfectly cast and perform with great restraint and depth. Especially Lewis MacKinnon as Duncan whose emotional knot is personified in a mass of writhing limbs and grimaces. And Phoebe Pryce as Kay whose hollow heart and distant persona is firmly established in the choreographed opening when she remains still amid a hubbub of activity.

That said, there is little to quicken the pulse or fire the imagination. Humour like hope is thin on the ground (unlike unintentional double entendres which are ten a penny: “You remind me of your brother: hard and then soft”, “I will take you in the back of my ambulance”). And the ending comes with a dot, dot, dot rather than a full stop. Still, a fine watch which more than accomplishes The Original Theatre Company’s aim of “bringing high quality touring theatre to the length and breadth of The British Isles.”

Peter Callaghan
Latest posts by Peter Callaghan (see all)