“The Children” is one of the most thought-provoking, humorous and heart-wrenching stories I’ve seen in quite a while. The writing is brilliant, and the story is timeless. This is a production to be savored, thought about and debated, and respected.
This is a show worth seeing; in fact, it’s worth seeing twice. Nearly flawlessly acted, precisely directed and carefully designed, it explodes out of the theatre space to reverberate long after the 95 minutes are up.
This is a play not afraid to ask the hard questions—the really hard questions. Such as, why is one life worth more than someone else’s? How much does each aging generation owe the younger generation? How responsible is each generation for cleaning up their own messes? In its own way, “The Children” is also a declaration of love.
Told over a taut 95 minutes, the story opens with a sense of dislocation and disruption. Theatre sections are abruptly plunged into darkness accompanied by a crashing thunk as if a huge power lever had been pulled. Then the noise starts—explosions, clattering, ominous wooshing, a thundering. Looking through a window, seemingly, there is a cacophony of color and then the sea looking murky and deadly.
Once the lights come up, the time is roughly five years past the disaster. About 10 miles from this English village is the start of the exclusion zone; there had been a nuclear power accident and it devastated lives and property. The clean-up is underway but not quickly enough. And people have adapted and become a bit blasé about the repercussions—timed blackouts, bottled water only to drink, routinely using radiation counters to check everything coming into one’s environment. In this reality, we are introduced to Hazel (Mary MacLeod) and Rose (Meg Venton), a nuclear engineer and physicist, respectively, who are meeting again after a number of years. Rose has dropped in unexpectedly and there is a definite tension in the air.
When Hazel’s husband Robin (Greg Jones) comes home (he’s also an engineer), things become more complicated. These colleagues/friends/lovers/frenemies have a complicated history, and Rose is the catalyst that will bring changes. These are not welcome changes, but there is a sense of rightness inherent in these challenges. And deep, devastating sadness.
Written by Lucy Kirkwood, ‘The Children’ won the U.K Writers’ Build award for best new play. Once it migrated to Broadway, it was one of five plays nominated for a 2018 Tony. The writing is sharp and clear, the questions are not. There is humor and not just gallows-humor—there is deflecting humor, sarcasm, mishearings, misstatements, malapropisms, lecherous humor, innocent humor—so many kinds. It provides a deflection against the underlying tension and also allows some initially unpalatable truths to be told. It’s a gifted writer that can pull that off and not make it preachy, but recognizable, and actually funny.
The plot might hinge on an eco-threat, but that’s only the fulcrum that kick-starts this show. The questions she poses have certainly been asked before but given the current capabilities of humanity to wreak havoc have even more urgency.
The cast assembled for this show—Mary MacLeod as Hazel, Meg Venton as Rose, and Greg Jones as Robin—are simply phenomenal. Their characters are older with the sags and wrinkles and aches and pains to prove it. They’re retired; they have fashioned new lives. In the case of Hazel and Robin, their four “children” are in their 30s and they have four grandchildren among them. They can be selfish and petty, but they can still grow and care about more than themselves and their immediate families. These three actors give us the complexity of these characters, and sometimes complexity is the hardest thing to accept.
“The Children” is directed by Mary Fawcett Watko; she has an excellent ear for the humor inherent in any endeavor involving humans without making a farce out of it, and the pacing is excellent. Sound designer Wes Bedsworth and lighting designer Jenn Smith work in flawless tandem to create a sense of foreboding in such cozy surroundings (all the action takes place in Hazel’s and Robin’s cottage). Set designer Laurie Nolan and properties designer/set decorator Constance Robinson have created a believable tidy English cottage look (without being twee); their attention to detail from the under-counter refrigerator so common in England and Europe to the Yorkshire tea offered as a refreshment is deserving of kudos. (Full disclosure—Yorkshire tea is my favorite.)
Where does the declaration of love come in? It evinces as the extent of sacrifice one is willing to make, not just for one’s own “children,” but for everyone’s children. The ultimate act of love is to gift love/hope/sacrifice for a future one may never know. In this case, it might also be an act of redemption.
This is a show worth seeing; in fact, it’s worth seeing twice. Nearly flawlessly acted, precisely directed and carefully designed, it explodes out of the theatre space to reverberate long after the 95 minutes are up.
Advisory: Some strong language, strobe lights, explosions.
Running Time: Ninety-five minutes with no intermission.
“The Children” runs through February 1, 2020, at The Colonial Players of Annapolis, Annapolis, MD. For more information, click here.
