Theatre Now Review: The 39 Steps

“The play is pacy, funny, and highly entertaining. All in all two hours of total abandonment of reality for a fun night out.“
Julia Newbould
4 steps in the right direction

Wildfire Lounge
39Steps Press Release
6th of March – 15th of March, 2024

Entering the red velvet curtained space from the corner of Broadway and Glebe Point Road and stepping down the dark wood stairs leading to a stone-walled basement theatre with cocktail seating we are soon transported to London, in pre-WWII times.

The venue is perfect for the farcical, highly engaging drama of The 39 Steps. The John Buchan classic novel was adapted for the stage by Patrick Barlow more than 20 years ago. I caught it around 10 years ago in London where it was staged in the West-End and the theatre lent itself to climbing into boxes, running through the audience and the kind of shenanigans a large stage enables.

Here at Wildfire Cocktail Bar, the production was slick with the actors running through the audience in some scenes, sitting amongst us in others, asking for participation in the form of shouting questions, applauding the actors playing actors on stage.

There is also some shadow and light animation play with planes and bodies running across the stage. This was a similar conceit to the production of North by Northwest starring David Campbell at the Lyric a couple of years ago. Very, very funny.

The actors were superb and it was great to see Ellen Coote and Sophie Douglas play over 100 characters (or so it seemed) so adroitly. Often played by two men it was extremely pleasing to see these roles played by women. Their accents, their comic timing and their facial expressions were used perfectly. Moving from one character to another with the addition of a hat, a moustache, a skirt or other small modification left the audience laughing and often in stitches.

Even while standing in the middle of the audience not once did they lose their character or accents although they were juggling so many.

The premise of the story is that bored, public-school educated, Richard Hannay, is at the theatre where a young attractive woman asks if she can come home with him. She is killed in his apartment but before she dies reveals a plot by foreign spies to take classified secrets out of the country. Hannay finds himself accused of the murder and is forced to go on the run.

He escapes from his flat by disguising himself as the milkman and this is the beginning of the range of character changes made by Ellen Coote. And from there he catches trains, jumps off bridges, is chased by a small plane, makes his way to Scotland and finds the hideout of the spies.

There are only four actors in the play – and apart from Hannay they all inhabit many characters. Hannay, played by David Halgren, is in every scene and plays deadpan, bored, excited, frustrated and fearful all with great facial dexterity. He, like the rest of the cast, has excellent comedic timing.

The two actors playing the “clowns” start as a Vaudeville act to lingerie salesmen on a train to police officers, to fake police officers, to two rural Scottish couples, to the villains and more.

The script is tight and the lines are incredibly funny. There are Dad jokes a-plenty but they still get a laugh. And while the script is tight, the actors use their comic timing to the best effect. There are eye rolls particularly from the three women in the play – Coote, Douglas and Izabela Louk who plays Annabella, Pamela and Margaret.

The play is pacy, funny, and highly entertaining. All in all two hours of total abandonment of reality for a fun night out.

In addition, the play, which is produced by Blinking Light Theatre boasts it has followed the guidelines from The Theatre Green Book. Dumpster diving for wood, materials and props, and borrowing from friends and family the only new items were 12 screws, 2 false moustaches, 1 pair of handcuffs and one pair of stockings!

Julia Newbould, Theatre Now