by Sarah Cope

Here is a play in which very little happens and very, very little is said. On that promising note I will attempt to review it.

Before the action (such as it is) begins, the small audience are ushered into a sideroom and issued with instructions. We will, it seems, be sitting on the set, and are required to take off our shoes. (This, I assume, is because the carpet and rug have to go back to Habitat and the Rug Warehouse when the run is complete).

We then find ourselves in a living room with seating around the edges. A woman (Sandy McDade) is sitting on one of the settees, wearing headphones. It is the early hours of the morning; she is alone, tense, and it becomes clear that she is mentally ill.

This being a play directed by Katie Mitchell, we are aware that something bad is going to happen. Then a baby cries from another room. Although the woman does go to tend to the baby twice – on one occasion returning with a dirty nappy – her main response is to drown out the noise with music, the vacuum cleaner and the television (showing an
incongruously chirpy Nigella re-run).

The play shows that when a mother has post-natal depression, or indeed any other mental illness, and she is isolated and unsupported, she is not the only one to suffer; the baby may be neglected, and suffer the consequences of that for life.

This baby won’t have a lifetime of suffering, however, because this is a Katie Mitchell-directed play. That’s all you need to know.

Small Hours has an extended run until 19th February.

Elsewhere: an interview with Mitchell, another view from There Ought to be Clowns.