“Bittersweet … and heartbreaking”
Kate Stratford
4.5 letters
Venue: Ensemble Theatre
Kirrabilli
Dates: Until 13th June
For those of us who love books, there is a deeply satisfying pleasure in browsing the intimate sanctuaries that are old second-hand bookshops. Handling the pre-loved cloth bound covers, inspecting the speckled pages, unearthing precious surprises and inhaling the literature of the ages. Such a space is what one enters immediately at Ensemble Theatre’s version of 84 Charing Cross Road. Nick Fry’s set is quite perfect, evoking all those (my) happy hours spent wandering around the Dickensian bookstores of London. Matt Cox’s gentle, amber lighting enhances the ambiance whilst Madeleine Picard’s plaintive score drifts around us, much like London fog outside the store.
Helene Hanff had to wait twenty years to visit her particular bookshop at 84 Charing Cross Road, but despite the wait, the store became integral to her life she and formed bonds of friendship with its staff – relationships she celebrated in her epistolary memoir of letters between herself and particularly Frank Doel, lead buyer for Marks & Co, booksellers located at the eponymous address in London. Over time they came to share the small joys and sorrows of ordinary lives as well as a love of books.
Mark Kilmurry has directed this charming adaptation by James Roose-Evans sensitively and gracefully – and I would expect nothing less of such an experienced and talented artist. The humour is allowed to run but never take over. Pacing and staging make the most of a script which leans into people rather than story. The overall vision is realised in a myriad of minute, subtle ways. Time crosses over and both Frank and Helene hold the same book. Choreographed movement sequences cover passages of time. Air mail envelopes carry dollar bills. Old ledgers are entered for book-keeping. Scuffed floorboards. A customer door-bell which rings invitingly. American seamed stockings vs. English lisle stockings. Such attention to detail in all aspects of production creates an enveloping, authentic sense of time and space (props to the props person!)
Kilmurry has surrounded himself with a team of equal stature in his creatives and cast. Blazey Best is a fiery, open, generous Helene; moving impatiently in her tiny New York apartment. Books are her lifeblood. And it is the yearning, bantering prose which thaws Erik Thomson’s Frank, the quintessential English gentleman. Vocally grounded, his humour emerges slowly, his letters become more confidential. He is the calm centre of the bookstore, whilst the staff twirl around him in various roles. Katie Fitchett, Angela Mahlatjie and Brian Meegan evenly match the quality of production. There are no weak links here.
It seems recently we have been inundated with “challenging” theatre and the unrelenting nature of it can be a little tiring. Here is an offering which reminds us about the importance of curiosity, of the love of learning for learning’s sake, of kindness and sharing. There is a bittersweet feel to this production. A sense of something given up unthinkingly. It is not mawkish nostalgia. It is a heartbreaking realisation of what we relinquished when we traded emotions for emojis. Letters for SMS. The chance to form real bonds though time and care for the quick hit of an algorithm. This head-hearted cynic had a tear – or two – at the end and suspect I shall find time in the next few days to visit Glebe’s bookstores and unearth from the back of a bedroom drawer, letters tied up with ribbon.
photos by Prudence Upton
Kate Stratford, Theatre Now
