Review: MAKESHIFTS AND REALITIES, Finborough Theatre

Unearthed in the archival depths of the British Library and performed more than a hundred years after their premiere, could the Finborough Theatre’s new revival of Gertrude Robins’ 1908 Makeshifts and its 1911 sequel Realities, paired in a production with H.M Harwood’s Honour Thy Father, be anything more than pedestalised museum pieces?

In her lifetime, tragically cut short by tuberculosis, Robins was a highly respected playwright and actor. Makeshifts enjoyed critical acclaim and widespread popularity likely reflecting the paradigm shifts crumbling the foundations of British society. The modern social consciousness nestled at the heart of the narrative echoes loudly from within. It firmly aligns itself alongside writers like Bernard Shaw or Ibsen eruditely blurring the line between the personal and the political.

We are in a drawing room in a London suburb. Sisters Caroline and Dolly are concerned that their status as unmarried women will doom them to a life of financial instability. The caddish banker Mr Smythe arrives to disrupt the ennui, slimily wringing his hands like an Edwardian yuppie. Is he the path to salvation? his animalistic snarling suggests a darker future.

The four hander, tightly paced and sharply structured, points to a grim dilemma: financial freedom or independence. The price of emancipation becomes not just an economic one, but a spiritual one. Makeshifts and Realities are not just a clarion call for universal suffrage, but a sharp stab at patriarchal hierarchies that have kept women oppressed.

The production jolts to life when Robins sinks her teeth into these gender dynamics. She subtly paints a brutal picture the pleasantries of genteel society. Violence lingers just beneath the surfaces of middle-class life. Etiquette is a flimsy mask for moral brutality. Female suffrage is not a luxury to be bought but a moral necessity to be fought for in the face of a changing world.

Honour Thy Father brings these undercurrents to the surface. A daughter reunites with her expat father. Her scandalous personal history to brush against his archaic gender politics, inextricable from his middle class-based snobbishness despite his financial insecurity.

Her impassioned defence of independence melts his stoney temperament and the dynamics he stands for. Harwood’s conclusion is clear: economic freedom speaks louder than any patriarchal devotion to societal expectation.

What of them today? Theatrically speaking the three show their age. Some sequences lack electricity, not helped by passionate but occasionally uneven performances, even if their political force rings loud and clear thanks to Melissa Dunne’s faithful production.

The set is period accurate; lighting and sound are kept austere. Dunne unfussily presents the plays as a time capsule to the past. The result is certainly interesting but not as dramatically arresting as it could be.

Makeshifts and Realities plays at the Finborough Theatre until 2 September

Photo Credit: Carla Joy Evans

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