Mrs Dalloway is a classic novel written by Virginia Woolf. It tells the story of an upper-class woman, Clarissa Dalloway, set over a single day in June 1923, as she prepares for a party she's hosting that day. Across London in their house, war veteran Septimus Smith struggles with his worsening mental health, acting as a dark parallel to Clarissa. Bringing in themes of post-World War London, trauma, social class, and mental health, the story intertwines many lives in the entanglement of Mrs Dalloway's world.
This modern adaptation is co-created by Award-winning director Jen Heyes and Award-winning writer and performer Kit Green. Green also transforms into all the characters in the story, taking the lead role and hosting. The play starts with Green addressing us straight away, outside of the story. This slightly set us up with what to expect and created a witty atmosphere from the get-go. She brought in her humour and unserious nature to warm the audience up to the contrastingly dark philosophical story. After we had a few laughs and were ready to begin, she advised we would ‘plunge into the story together'.
And ‘plunge' we did. I am still unsure how I feel about this interesting blending of multilayered narration, live music, comedic sketches, and digital film. It was definitely a contemporary cinematic theatre experience, but I don't know if it worked well together. Green was impressive with taking on multiple roles, using accents, and being in certain places on the stage so we could tell who she was performing. But at times, it felt like the switch between characters wasn't as natural as it could be, and there would be weighty pauses as she moved around. In some scenes, she would be strolling behind the screen, then in front of it, while her voice-over played overhead. Other times, she was sitting on the chair at the centre right, narrating as Mrs Dalloway from a ‘book'.
The screen at the back was a good director's choice for incorporating imagery of the locations Mrs Dalloway and the characters encountered. However, for me, the digitalisation of this production was overused, and pre-recordings took away the prominence of the live acting. More could have been done instead by developing certain scenes with more dialogue, rather than random live music and pre-recorded screen character close-ups. And while I can't fault Green's excellent acting, the poeticness of Mrs Dalloway's internal monologue felt a bit over the top for me.
The clown scene must be mentioned, too. While I think it must have been incorporated to add to the humour and bring in some light-heartedness to a dark, sensitive topic, it felt so random and unsettling that it really didn't work well for me. It went on for too long and didn't add anything to the plot or move the story along in any way. If people weren't scared of clowns already, they may be after that.
Even with the strangeness of certain scenes and the over-the-top drama that didn't translate naturally for me, there is no denying that the story displayed a celebration of life, love, and survival. Kit Green performed brilliantly in transforming into so many roles, and the wit was entertaining. Yes, this production is certainly bold, but its boldness didn't come across in the right way for me. I just felt like the play didn't flow as naturally between scenes and characters as it could have, and the use of film was often distracting.
This adaptation of Mrs Dalloway is a co-production between Storyhouse, Harlow Playhouse, and CutToTheChase Productions. It ran for nine days in Chester and then a few days at Harlow Playhouse earlier this month. The show is now playing at Wilton's Music Hall in London until the 20th of June. The final date of the tour is HOME Manchester, where audiences can see the production from 24-26 September.
Review: Cara-Louise Scott-Lapish Photos: Andrew AB