“Like Beckett on acid” somebody was saying as I left the Bristol Old Vic at the end of the performance of Caryl Churchill’s Escaped Alone last night.
Churchill’s dark and poetic narratives were at their most potent here, especially when delivered in the unlikeliest contexts, slipped in alongside the humdrum of small talk, revealing the silent monkeys on these protagonists’ backs.
We follow Mrs Jarrett through an open door to a neighbour’s sunny back garden. Once inside this ‘Eden’ we are disarmed by the innocuous sounding chat – discussions crisscross between Vi, Lena, Sally and the newly arrived Mrs J, all seventy-somethings. Was Tesco a fish and chip shop before, or was it an antique shop? Do you hang your door keys on a nail or hide them in a teapot? Do you think everything is OK with Kevin and Mary? Churchill is playing with us.
Before long we learn that Sally has a pronounced phobia of cats, Lena suffers with agoraphobia and depression and Vi has a violent back-story that has resulted in a prison sentence. Mrs Jarrett meanwhile seems to be experiencing an internal personal vision of Hell. In a series of monologues delivered front of stage, she scatters dystopian ravings, Hieronymus Bosch-like visions of humanity reduced to mayhem in a chatty voice that could be discussing the colour of the curtains or what we’re going to have for tea. As a vehicle for getting off your chest what you least like about ‘society’, what a golden chance to let rip! Churchill makes the most of her chance here.
Escaped Alone, the title, is part of a repeated line from the Book of Job, in which Job is completely undone emotionally and materially by the loss of all he holds dear, yet remains resolute in his devotion to God’s justice, despite all manner of personal disasters reported to him by those who come with the line, ‘I only am escaped alone to tell thee,’ a line also used in Moby Dick by the survivor Ishmael.
Mrs Jarrett, then, is our messenger, harbinger of doom, consumed on the inside by “terrible rage, terrible rage,” yet able to converse politely from a deck chair with her contemporaries. Churchill can make us laugh, at the same time appall us with the visceral nature of her vision. Her writing will always make an audience question their perspectives. Her quest into the secret selves of these four elderly women makes this a fascinating work.
The very wonderful Linda Bassett, Deborah Findlay, Kika Markham and June Watson play Mrs Jarrett, Sally, Lena and Vi. Directed by James Macdonald this quartet come to life as an ensemble, hilariously so when singing their version of The Crystals’ De Doo Ron Ron, and with depth and sensitivity when exploring the shadowy side of these characters’ lives. Miriam Buether’s back garden scene was a triumph of styling, as was the use of a blackened stage framed by sizzling red light during Mrs Jarrett’s lurid tale tellings – every bit as electrifying as this short one-act jewel of a play. ★★★★★ Simon Bishop 23rd March 2017
