Showing @ Royal Lyceum Theatre, Edinburgh until Sat 09 Mar
We live in a world where everything is fast, accessible and easy. Without mobile phones, microwaves or the internet the West would be vastly different. Is the speeding of things up another way of elongating time? This co-production between the Royal Lyceum Theatre and Dundee Repertory Ensemble of J. B. Priestley’s acclaimed ‘time play’ is a study of the Conway family and John William Dunne’s Theory of Time, which suggests that all moments of time are happening at once and it is human consciousness that perceives it at a fixed rate.
We begin with the Conways celebrating daughter Kay’s (Emily Winter) 21st birthday. We then skip forward 20 years where things haven’t quite played out as expected and the Conways’ estate is at risk. The second act returns to the party where we see the decisions and moments that determined the future.
Jemima Levick’s production is careful, considered and concise. The set is stark and (appropriately) timeless: a bare and grey canvas on which the characters brightly coloured costumes and personalities play, the cast of ten delivering strong and nuanced performances. There’s a sensitivity and sadness that underpins the second act; the dramatic irony robs the audience of the ability to share the Conways’ optimism. Priestley’s play, written in 1937, remains frightfully relevant. Once an exploration of academic theory, it is now a suggestion that we should pause and rethink our relationship with time. Kay’s glimpse – or experience – of the future is as harrowing as it is enlightening. The inevitability is the tragedy of Priestley’s drama: if all things happen at once, can we change the future or are our destinies predetermined? Priestley poses that question, but almost 80 years later, it remains unanswered.
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