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The Widowing of Mrs Holroyd

  • Theatre, Off-West End
  • 3 out of 5 stars
  • Recommended
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Time Out says

3 out of 5 stars

This production of DH Lawrence's play about a tight-knit mining community has a increasingly tortured melodramatic grimness.

And so a new era dawns at the venerable Orange Tree Theatre, as the first season by its second artistic director begins. But while the auditorium has a new lick of paint, it’s business as usual on stage. Paul Miller upholds the 40-year legacy of his predecessor Sam Walters by kicking off with a revival of a lesser-known work by a famous author.

It’s a smart way to ease any potential regime-change-related worries on the part of the theatre’s Richmond-based core audience. And DH Lawrence’s 1914 play – the only one of his forays into theatre to be performed within his lifetime – tackles some hefty issues.

The eponymous Mrs Holroyd (a perpetually tightly wound Ellie Piercy) is trapped in a loveless marriage in a tiny mining community. Her husband spends every minute he’s not down the pit drinking himself into oblivion and flirting with other women. But when electrician Blackmore suggests they run away together, will she accept?

The earthy realism of Lawrence’s dialogue is matched by his sophisticated insight into the complex cross-currents and motivations of relationships. Love is neither a start nor an end point here for any of his characters. However, the heightened tenor of his exaggerated British naturalism requires careful handling.

Sadly, Miller doesn’t quite pull this off, with the production starting strongly before sliding into a key of increasingly tortured melodramatic grimness. Lawrence needs to be played big, but there’s not enough nuance in the direction to prevent some moments – many of which are clustered in a dragging second act – from slipping into bathos.

But the in-the-round staging is done well, the sound design is atmospheric and some good performances still pack a punch, keeping the sharp human tragedy from being eclipsed. In particular, Gyuri Sarossy impresses as a furious, blustering Holroyd – stumbling, lost, in the wreckage of himself.

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£10-£20, £15 concs
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