“Thanking you for coming back to me” - Kneehigh’s Brief Encounter returns to Birmingham REP
There may come a time in the future where we shan’t mind about it any more, but for now, Kneehigh Theatre’s spectacular stage adaptation of Brief Encounter continues to tour to international acclaim. Ten years after its 2008 premiere, the show returns to where it all started in a run at Birmingham REP that might mark the beginning of the end of its long life. But not quite yet.
“It’s been a phenomenal show for all of us involved and all of the audiences who have seen it,” says writer and director Emma Rice. “It’s one of those rare instances where if you could always make shows like this, you would, but in reality they don’t come along very often in a lifetime. Every time we’ve taken it out, we’ve made it a little bit better, a little bit deeper. It’s ten years old this year, and still retains this incredible magic, so it felt absolutely right to bring it back again.”
Those who saw the show in its original incarnation will notice a few changes this time round, the story having been tightened up and distilled down to a “perfect gem”:
“On a really practical level, it used to have an interval, but doesn’t now, so it runs more like a film. I remember re-watching the film after I’d made it and thinking there was something extraordinary about following this journey from beginning to end without getting off – a bit like being on a train.”
Attempts to recreate the atmosphere and energy of a visit to the cinema have been a feature of the play since its inception. Upon arrival, audiences are greeted by 1940s-style ushers and popcorn sellers as they find their seats. Meanwhile, the show itself incorporates pre-recorded film footage in which the stage cast recreate scenes from the David Lean original, combining them with live performance in clever effects that have wowed critics and audiences alike.
Much like its 1945 inspiration, in which the thrill of an illicit trip to the pictures is what kicks off the quiet romance between the separately married Alec and Laura, there’s an extent to which this production feels like a love letter to the strange magic of the cinema. With her reputation for breaking theatrical conventions, it’s perhaps no surprise that Emma Rice would love to see her work freed from the perceived rules for theatre audiences, and enjoyed in much the same way as a film.
“For one thing, cinema audiences tend to be younger and poorer. But also I think there’s a sort of freewheeling sense of a good night out at the cinema which I would love to be what people felt when they come to the theatre. One of the reasons for that, I think, is that in the cinema, you know that if you don’t like it you can nip out and get some popcorn or go to the loo and come back in – it just doesn’t feel as precious or claustrophobic. There’s something entrapping about knowing that you can’t get out without it seeming rude to the actors.”
Given that, one might well wonder what’s to be gained from presenting the story live on stage as opposed to simply hosting a film screening. Her answer is surprisingly straightforward.
“You can’t really do magic on film. I know that sounds silly when there are so many special effects nowadays, but as a medium it’s much more, ‘what you see is what you get’. If you go and see Harry Potter, they have to show you the witches and wizards flying around on broomsticks, whereas in the theatre, you only need to suggest it, and there’s a kind of magic to what happens in that moment. Also, there’s a humanity to live performance that I don’t think you can ever fully get on screen.”
Interestingly enough, the plot of Brief Encounter first appeared on stage, in Noel Coward’s short play Still Life. Set entirely in the station tea room where Alec and Laura have their first chance meeting, the original play harks back to a long theatrical tradition by making much more of the working class characters whose own romantic subplots reflect on the main action. Rice’s version is an amalgamation of the two, with songs and poems by Coward thrown in for good measure.
“There’s not a word in the show that isn’t Noel Coward. Well actually, that might not be true, but there aren’t many!” she laughs. “Really all I’ve done is taken his work, put it in a snowstorm and shaken it up.
“The original play is much more of a six-hander, and I loved that. There’s a beautiful Paula Rego painting called ‘The Dance of Life’ which shows love in all these different stages, and I think Brief Encounter’s a bit like that: you’ve got first love with the young kids in the tea room; you’ve got impossible love between these two middle-aged, married people in Alec and Laura; and you’ve got last-chance love or surprise love between the older couple that find their way to each other.
“It’s really important to me that you see the different layers of society, and that’s something that Noel Coward did beautifully. It’s no mistake that he set Still Life in the tea room – it’s a great leveller, isn’t it? Everyone who’s waiting for a train goes in there for a cup of tea, and I think it’s such a clever thing to put it in a neutral environment like that.”
It’s via those less privileged couples that many of the songs find their way into the show – some of them very familiar, popular numbers like ‘Mad About the Boy’ and ‘A Room with a View’, and others original settings of Coward’s poetry.
“When I started working on the show, I looked at a lot of Coward’s other work, and the songs were a delicious discovery because they’re so naughty! And then the poetry was a big surprise as well because of how truthful and revealing it was. Quite quickly I found myself thinking about who would sing what – originally every character was going to have a song, although it hasn’t quite worked out like that.”
For all its emphasis on magic, it’s in some ways quite stripped back, with actors doubling up for roles and all the music being played by two musicians. Some features of the film have obviously had to be ditched as well – most notably the voiceovers which provide us with a window into Laura’s private thoughts as she imagines how she might explain the story to her husband, Fred – though certain lines from this internal monologue have made their way into lyrics she sings.
Arguably, this helps to spread our sympathies between the characters: the film perhaps feels more like Laura’s story, and there’s a kind of ambiguity to Alec, whereby we’re never quite sure if his feelings and motives are as honest and genuine as hers.
“I’m very passionate about Alec Harvey, but it’s true that he’s not quite as well-drawn as Laura – I think mostly because Noel Coward had less empathy with the straight man than he did with the trapped housewife. There’s an interesting unanswered question there and you could certainly read him as a predator, but I’m a romantic so mine is quite a pure telling of the story.”
“I always felt like it was really important that they’re both in this together as two unhappy people – or to use the fairytale language I prefer, it’s like they’re both asleep. They’re sleepwalking through their lives and then they meet each other and awaken something in each other and have to decide what to do with it.
“One of the things I’ve brought to the story, drawing on when Laura describes growing up in Cornwall, is the idea of the silkie, which is a folk myth of seaside communities. It’s about sea creatures who are tempted away from their natural lives and live as human for a while, but then eventually dive back in at the end. I think what Laura and Alec experience is more than an affair – it’s a profound revelation. Both of them have to decide what to do when they wake up and think, ‘I’m not in my own skin’.”
One might read that sense of unreality as a symptom of the time in which the film was made – it’s certainly been pointed out before that short-lived romances were not uncommon during the Second World War, when couples were separated and so much seemed uncertain, like everything could end at any moment. For Rice, who has also previously adapted Powell and Pressburger’s A Matter of Life and Death, an interest in the period is certainly part of the allure.
“I don’t tend to like things that are historical per se, but I like to make work that has a relevance to me, and I was always fascinated by my grandparents’ generation, whom I felt very close to growing up. Of course they did fight in the war, and my grandmother did bring up her children while her husband was away fighting, so I suppose as I grew into adulthood I became interested in the effect that had on them and their relationship, and therefore on my mother, and therefore me. So I think it’s to do with me reaching back through my own history to the people who were important to me. As time goes on, that period drifts further away, but when I reach out, that’s still what I touch.”
Brief Encounter shows at Birmingham REP from Friday 2 to Saturday 17 February
“Thanking you for coming back to me” - Kneehigh’s Brief Encounter returns to Birmingham REP
There may come a time in the future where we shan’t mind about it any more, but for now, Kneehigh Theatre’s spectacular stage adaptation of Brief Encounter continues to tour to international acclaim. Ten years after its 2008 premiere, the show returns to where it all started in a run at Birmingham REP that might mark the beginning of the end of its long life. But not quite yet.
“It’s been a phenomenal show for all of us involved and all of the audiences who have seen it,” says writer and director Emma Rice. “It’s one of those rare instances where if you could always make shows like this, you would, but in reality they don’t come along very often in a lifetime. Every time we’ve taken it out, we’ve made it a little bit better, a little bit deeper. It’s ten years old this year, and still retains this incredible magic, so it felt absolutely right to bring it back again.”
Those who saw the show in its original incarnation will notice a few changes this time round, the story having been tightened up and distilled down to a “perfect gem”:
“On a really practical level, it used to have an interval, but doesn’t now, so it runs more like a film. I remember re-watching the film after I’d made it and thinking there was something extraordinary about following this journey from beginning to end without getting off – a bit like being on a train.”
Attempts to recreate the atmosphere and energy of a visit to the cinema have been a feature of the play since its inception. Upon arrival, audiences are greeted by 1940s-style ushers and popcorn sellers as they find their seats. Meanwhile, the show itself incorporates pre-recorded film footage in which the stage cast recreate scenes from the David Lean original, combining them with live performance in clever effects that have wowed critics and audiences alike.
Much like its 1945 inspiration, in which the thrill of an illicit trip to the pictures is what kicks off the quiet romance between the separately married Alec and Laura, there’s an extent to which this production feels like a love letter to the strange magic of the cinema. With her reputation for breaking theatrical conventions, it’s perhaps no surprise that Emma Rice would love to see her work freed from the perceived rules for theatre audiences, and enjoyed in much the same way as a film.
“For one thing, cinema audiences tend to be younger and poorer. But also I think there’s a sort of freewheeling sense of a good night out at the cinema which I would love to be what people felt when they come to the theatre. One of the reasons for that, I think, is that in the cinema, you know that if you don’t like it you can nip out and get some popcorn or go to the loo and come back in – it just doesn’t feel as precious or claustrophobic. There’s something entrapping about knowing that you can’t get out without it seeming rude to the actors.”
Given that, one might well wonder what’s to be gained from presenting the story live on stage as opposed to simply hosting a film screening. Her answer is surprisingly straightforward.
“You can’t really do magic on film. I know that sounds silly when there are so many special effects nowadays, but as a medium it’s much more, ‘what you see is what you get’. If you go and see Harry Potter, they have to show you the witches and wizards flying around on broomsticks, whereas in the theatre, you only need to suggest it, and there’s a kind of magic to what happens in that moment. Also, there’s a humanity to live performance that I don’t think you can ever fully get on screen.”
Interestingly enough, the plot of Brief Encounter first appeared on stage, in Noel Coward’s short play Still Life. Set entirely in the station tea room where Alec and Laura have their first chance meeting, the original play harks back to a long theatrical tradition by making much more of the working class characters whose own romantic subplots reflect on the main action. Rice’s version is an amalgamation of the two, with songs and poems by Coward thrown in for good measure.
“There’s not a word in the show that isn’t Noel Coward. Well actually, that might not be true, but there aren’t many!” she laughs. “Really all I’ve done is taken his work, put it in a snowstorm and shaken it up.
“The original play is much more of a six-hander, and I loved that. There’s a beautiful Paula Rego painting called ‘The Dance of Life’ which shows love in all these different stages, and I think Brief Encounter’s a bit like that: you’ve got first love with the young kids in the tea room; you’ve got impossible love between these two middle-aged, married people in Alec and Laura; and you’ve got last-chance love or surprise love between the older couple that find their way to each other.
“It’s really important to me that you see the different layers of society, and that’s something that Noel Coward did beautifully. It’s no mistake that he set Still Life in the tea room – it’s a great leveller, isn’t it? Everyone who’s waiting for a train goes in there for a cup of tea, and I think it’s such a clever thing to put it in a neutral environment like that.”
It’s via those less privileged couples that many of the songs find their way into the show – some of them very familiar, popular numbers like ‘Mad About the Boy’ and ‘A Room with a View’, and others original settings of Coward’s poetry.
“When I started working on the show, I looked at a lot of Coward’s other work, and the songs were a delicious discovery because they’re so naughty! And then the poetry was a big surprise as well because of how truthful and revealing it was. Quite quickly I found myself thinking about who would sing what – originally every character was going to have a song, although it hasn’t quite worked out like that.”
For all its emphasis on magic, it’s in some ways quite stripped back, with actors doubling up for roles and all the music being played by two musicians. Some features of the film have obviously had to be ditched as well – most notably the voiceovers which provide us with a window into Laura’s private thoughts as she imagines how she might explain the story to her husband, Fred – though certain lines from this internal monologue have made their way into lyrics she sings.
Arguably, this helps to spread our sympathies between the characters: the film perhaps feels more like Laura’s story, and there’s a kind of ambiguity to Alec, whereby we’re never quite sure if his feelings and motives are as honest and genuine as hers.
“I’m very passionate about Alec Harvey, but it’s true that he’s not quite as well-drawn as Laura – I think mostly because Noel Coward had less empathy with the straight man than he did with the trapped housewife. There’s an interesting unanswered question there and you could certainly read him as a predator, but I’m a romantic so mine is quite a pure telling of the story.”
“I always felt like it was really important that they’re both in this together as two unhappy people – or to use the fairytale language I prefer, it’s like they’re both asleep. They’re sleepwalking through their lives and then they meet each other and awaken something in each other and have to decide what to do with it.
“One of the things I’ve brought to the story, drawing on when Laura describes growing up in Cornwall, is the idea of the silkie, which is a folk myth of seaside communities. It’s about sea creatures who are tempted away from their natural lives and live as human for a while, but then eventually dive back in at the end. I think what Laura and Alec experience is more than an affair – it’s a profound revelation. Both of them have to decide what to do when they wake up and think, ‘I’m not in my own skin’.”
One might read that sense of unreality as a symptom of the time in which the film was made – it’s certainly been pointed out before that short-lived romances were not uncommon during the Second World War, when couples were separated and so much seemed uncertain, like everything could end at any moment. For Rice, who has also previously adapted Powell and Pressburger’s A Matter of Life and Death, an interest in the period is certainly part of the allure.
“I don’t tend to like things that are historical per se, but I like to make work that has a relevance to me, and I was always fascinated by my grandparents’ generation, whom I felt very close to growing up. Of course they did fight in the war, and my grandmother did bring up her children while her husband was away fighting, so I suppose as I grew into adulthood I became interested in the effect that had on them and their relationship, and therefore on my mother, and therefore me. So I think it’s to do with me reaching back through my own history to the people who were important to me. As time goes on, that period drifts further away, but when I reach out, that’s still what I touch.”
Brief Encounter shows at Birmingham REP from Friday 2 to Saturday 17 February
By Heather Kincaid