Rebecca Lenkiewicz is happy to take on a large well-thumbed subject and find it new and fresh. She can write a good character and place it comfortably in a historical context. The play is full of them, each one demanding attention, from a strong cast happily devoid of weak links. It is a well-made play in the best sense, having its own internal rhythm and emotional sweep, which leads to its disturbing climax.

Humour finds its way into the script: for example when the landline telephone rings she knows its her mother – for as we all know, only parents and nuisance calls don’t use out mobile numbers. The directing and performance are literally ‘off the wall’. Sarah Beaton’s clinical, shiny white set provides shelves and handles on the back wall onto which Miss Jackson leaps with all the sure footedness of a mountain goat. Standing or crouching she talks directly to the audience via the conceit of making a video.

“. . . Michael Vale’s set for Dead Dog in a Suitcase brings to mind a chef’s batterie de cuisine. This workmanlike set, not a backwash any more than Charles Hazelwood’s vigorous and eclectic score, gives the actors the tools for this reworking of John Gay’s eighteenth century ballad opera . . . Giles King perhaps being worth a mention for his wayward policeman, Lockit, who galloped around the stage with easily bought enthusiasm. The whole production is a triumph of theatrical creativity which is firmly in the best Kneehigh tradition – a must see. . . “