The Meeting - Charlotte Jones - Minerva Theatre, Chichester

Hard to predict what may transfer and in the case of Pressure, it took a couple of years (though that's unusual), so more like an early revival in that case. It also depends on your taste and the travel, etc - for me it's worth doing the double and I combined this with a matinee in the main house. A long day and trains are uncertain but cheaper than 2 trips or an overnight stay. If you haven't already, maybe read all the reviews and wait to see if anyone else here endorses my enthusiasm?

Back from our annual trip to Chichester to see friends and a play. For the stats there were 6 of us: me and 3 out of 4 offspring plus local friend and one of hers. Background research: I saw Humble Boy at the National in 2001 (might regret posting on this Board and finding stuff I did yesterday was 17 years ago) and The Lightening Play at the Almeida in 2006 (early Mike Attenborough days?). So 12 years since I last saw a Charlotte Jones play. I like the Minerva – generally more enjoyable space than the Festival Theatre which always makes me think of snooker at the Crucible which is odd as I have only ever been there in spirit on the TV.

The play is to some extent a faithful literal representation of a time in England in the Napoleonic Wars and of a space in a small Quaker community on the outskirts of town and, in many ways, reality. Lydia Leonard’s Rachel was not born into the faith and for a whole host of reasons – a lot related to being brought up signing for her deaf mother – she has an overwhelming desire to articulate in meetings questions about the life that the community lives and how effective passive resistance to war can ever be. She wants to engage in debate with her own community and even more troubling for them with “the town”. This is not well received! Themes of damage – Rachel but also the young deserter she befriends and latterly some surprising members of the religious community – pervade. The main characters all come with a veritable pantechnicon (sp?) of baggage. The play ends up being a combination of issue-based exposition and personal stories but is none the worse for that.

The final meeting that we see has an astonishing performance by one of the actors which is at first horribly painful and ultimately uplifting and addresses many of the issues Rachel had tried earlier to get the group and in particular her husband to confront.

The sparse set cleverly changes from meeting house, to family home to seashore and graveyard with a few pieces of furniture spirited out from under the stage and/or conjured up by sound and lighting design which as they should be are cleverly almost imperceptible. And lots of stones ……. metaphors here I am sure.

Two of the youngsters (one of mine/one of hers) thought there were too many plot twists in Act 2 but I thought a lot of what happens in Act 2 was signposted – in a good way – in Act 1. On a final personal note, we agreed on the train on the way back that if I continue to post here we need to see more things where I don’t start the discussion with “I remember when …..” Star rating across the 6 of us = 21*

I haven't seen this, but from what I hear it sounds interesting. Seems a good time for Jones with the Orange Tree having recently revived 'Humble Boy' as well.

I'm pleased to hear that you enjoyed it, smallperson, even if some members of your group were less keen.

For anyone interested, here's a link to another blog review (Alex Ramon, who writes as Boycotting Trends):

boycottingtrends.blogspot.com/2018/07/theatre-review-meeting-chichester.html