No production of any play has such a stunningly theatrical opening.
Liam Brennan as Inspector Goole in An Inspector Calls | Photo © Mark Douet
During an air raid, the heavy stage curtain slowly rises to Bernard Herrmann’s disorienting nightmare music from Hitchcock’s Vertigo to reveal a displaced rain-lashed street, out of which grows a surreal teetering doll’s house on stilts, containing the smug and privileged Birling family loudly chattering nothingness at a dinner party.
Yet this is just one of the striking, highly theatrical moments in the National Theatre’s garlanded production of JB Priestley’s An Inspector Calls, which is now enjoying a sold-out week in Bath during its 30th-anniversary tour.
And at the moment the inspector finally leaves the family, there is an occurrence on stage which is likely to sear itself into your memory for a very long time.
Most of its incredible success is due to original director Stephen Daldry and designer Ian MacNeil, who create visuals and moods which are spellbinding, even if some of the touches are not clearly explained.
Why is Edna the maid always on stage watching? Who is the little boy sheltering from an air raid, in a war which has not yet begun? Elements like these are as surreal as the set, and leave much scope for analysis afterwards, but contribute to the whole mood of “is this really happening?”
As the Inspector, Liam Brennan is both angry and highly compassionate. The Birling family works well together as an ultimately dysfunctional unit, with Chloe Orrock as Sheila, George Rowlands as Eric and Simon Cotton as Gerald having highly effective moments during their interrogation scenes.
Perhaps the overly-theatrical flourishes of Christine Kavanagh as Sybil appear to be more in keeping with a Disney villain than the matriarch of an otherwise realistically-played family, but then this production has always been more about the design than individual performances.
It’s a stunning night at the theatre even 30 years on, breathing fresh angry life into a challenging and humane play.
An Inspector Calls runs at Theatre Royal Bath until 20th May. Box office: 01225 448844
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Reviewer: Steve Huggins
