Mary Rose

Long overshadowed in popular culture by fellow J. M. Barrie creation, Peter Pan, Mary Rose is a later, darker work. Written shortly after the First World War, in which many of Barrie’s friends were lost, it again unlocks the notion of the ageless child, delving into the possible realm of fairies, elves, and ghosts. Tony Cownie’s production does its best stylistically to bring out the other-worldly depths of this play, yet there is a challenge set by the lengthy narrative that it ultimately fails to overcome in performance.

Returning to his ancestral home, child-runaway Harry Blake (Guy Fearon) sets out to discover the family secret surrounding his mother, Mary Rose. Harry’s framing scenes of finely judged comic tension and subtle brutality easily draw the audience along with him into the story of her double disappearance. Composer and musical director Philip Pinsky must take credit for this effect, and Neil Murray’s excellent design style—instantly recognisable from his work on the Lyceum’s Vanity Fair—cleverly contributes by creating an atmosphere evocative of a journey from aristocratic heaven into ghostly hell via the eerie island-limbo at the crux of the story.

A haunting play written by a haunted writer, the theme of a child spirited away and a simultaneous loss-of-innocence and entrapment in childhood is a captivating one. The cast performs with a vigour and sensitivity that is unfortunately undermined by the often lengthy scene expositions and denied a certain level of drama by the static action. For all that, Mary Rose is like a dusty, brilliant antique, full of the past and history and memorable sadness.