Review: ESCAPED ALONE, Bristol Old Vic

Caryl Churchill has rightly claimed her spot as one of Britain's greatest living playwrights, but her latest work, Escaped Alone, falls short of her best.

The setting is a typically British one. Four ladies who are at least 70 (one of the few directives Churchill gives) sit in the back garden. There's a shed, there's a few pot plants and cups of tea. They talk in Churchill's typically rhythmic style, each little interjection handled with aplomb by a superb cast.

Then, without missing a beat, we're plunged into darkness, save a pulsating border of flashing lights. Mrs Jarrett (Linda Bassett) steps forward, detached, to deliver terrifying visions of a dystopian future. They vary from "eighty per cent of food diverted to TV programmes" to pesticides leaking through money. All are manmade disasters.

Thus the pattern for this short, one-act play is set. Garden, terrifying future disaster and then back to garden. It's a play that will invite individual interpretation, but Churchill gives so little to the audience that Escaped Alone becomes a frustrating experience.

We're afforded the merest hints of where the characters have come from and why they are there. The dystopian visions are unsettling but repetitive. There seems to be a vague idea that Mrs Jarrett is a survivor, here to deliver the news of these disasters. Ultimately, there is a bag of ideas of which none are really explored.

The cast does work incredibly hard to keep Churchill's rhythms intact (the performers reveal in post-show discussion that they counted and there's five full stops in the play). Nevertheless, each delivers a fully-rounded performance that feels grounded. It is equally refreshing to see a new play with four strong female leads and, on top of that, women of a certain age.

One could argue it's a play to go away and digest, but there's an equally strong argument that the play hasn't delivered enough meat on the bones to make digestion worthwhile.

Escaped Alone at Bristol Old Vic until 28 March

Photo Credit: Johan Persson

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