Review: LYONESSE, Harold Pinter Theatre

Lily James and Kristin Scott Thomas were last seen together on screen in Ben Wheatley’s 2020 Daphne Du Maurier adaptation of Rebecca. They now reunite in Penelope Skinner’s brand new play Lyonesse about a reclusive actress who is planning a movie comeback. With the brilliant Ian Rickson directing, we should be in safe hands. Unfortunately, even with their collective talent and star power, it is hard to rescue this confused and untidy play.

The story is of Kate, a young film executive struggling to make home and work balance out, who has been tasked with teasing out the story of actress Elaine who disappeared for 30 years but is now apparently ready for a big comeback after the death of a director who allegedly threatened her life.

Skinner won acclaim for her 2011 Royal Court Play The Village Bike, but while that play cleverly overturned stereotypes about expectant mothers, here the writing feels amateurish and chaotic. We feel bombarded by issues, none of which are properly explored: #MeToo, coercive control, womens’ struggles with work/life balance, comedy, drama, trauma. It’s perfectly possible to combine all these themes, just not here.

An early scene where Kate gives her boss Sue (a sharply alpha female Doon Mackichan) the background to Elaine’s story is clunky with exposition. There is no balance, no nuance to be found; men are all bad eggs, women are victims and no resolution is to be had.

The cast of five do what they can with the script. Lily James is nice but dim as Kate, the development executive with a female-led film company who feels trapped by a smug husband who wants another baby, despite the fact she nearly died having their first. Compliant and apologetic, it is hard to feel any real sympathy for the character as she is just so wet, giving new meaning to the concept of being walked over. I doubt she would last five minutes in the film world.

Kristin Scott Thomas hams it up as lovey Elaine, handling a fairly excruciating monologue about her life and self-imposed exile after alleged abuse from a director as well as she can. Some of her more withering lines are delivered with a familiar sharpness, but as an actor she is so much better than this script allows.

Sara Powell is very likable as lesbian neighbour Chris, but vastly undrawn as a character. James Corrigan is suitably awful as Kate’s husband Chris with a Very Important Job, but is never given a chance to be anything more than horribly one-dimensional.

Georgia Lowe’s thoughtful design is one of romantic dereliction; we are taken to the heart of Elaine’s ramshackle house full of ragged rugs and damp furniture, but generally, the atmosphere of a decrepit house next to a harsh and wild ocean in Cornwall is a little lacking.

There are some darkly funny lines and a harrowing argument between Kate and Greg is shrill, but convincing. I’m sure many working mothers will nod in agreement at some of the points presented on stage, but the relentless suggestion that nothing at all has changed since #MeToo and that women are more compromised than ever is reductive to both sexes, whatever the playwright’s intentions might be.

Lyonesse is at the Harold Pinter Theatre until 23 December 

Photo Credits: Manuel Harlan