It Runs in the Family – The Mill at Sonning

Writer: Ray Cooney

Director: Ron Aldridge

When it comes to British farce, Ray Cooney’s name is synonymous with the genre. There is a belief that this genre is outdated and old-fashioned, but while it’s true that some of Cooney’s works are of their time and have aged accordingly, It Runs in the Family remains fresh. The Mill at Sonning may have attempted to update Cooney’s political comedy Out of Order in 2023, flipping the central MP character’s gender and renaming it It’s Her Turn Now – but this latest of the playwright’s works requires no such fiddling.

As with so many Cooney works, everything revolves around one man’s attempts to cover up his embarrassing mistakes. Here, the bumbler in question is Steven Pinder’s Dr David Mortimore, preparing to give an important lecture that will change the course of his career if it goes down well. As he struggles with his finishing touches, a former nurse colleague (Jane Tate) arrives to let him know that her son, the result of their sluice room dalliance some 18 years prior, wants to meet the father he has never known.

As stakes go, those are some of the lowest in Cooney’s catalogue, so Mortimore’s subsequent actions could quickly feel overblown, even in a comedy genre for which subtlety is anathema. This is where Pinder proves to be excellent casting, placing the doctor on a sufficiently grounded footing that his increasingly frenetic machinations play out well.

In this endeavour, he is ably assisted by James Bradshaw as fellow doctor Hubert Bonney, who is dragged into Mortimore’s increasingly deranged plans. Bradshaw starts on a much more comedic plane than Pinder, which makes their double-act work all the better. As the stakes rise – including multiple people on a window ledge, a matron (Elizabeth Elvin) being injected with sedatives, and a befuddled patient forever threatening to give the game away – Cooney’s plotting is a masterclass in upping the stakes.

Director Ron Aldridge keeps a firm hand on the pacing throughout. Like many a farce, the stakes rise incrementally throughout, bringing an increasing sense of anguish from its beleaguered leads. Aldridge is wise enough not to try and accentuate that with an increased tempo, allowing Cooney’s script to develop the pace correctly until the end.

When It Runs in the Family debuted in the West End in 1992, it marked a small but significant change, being the first production in the Playhouse Theatre after playwright Ray Cooney had purchased it. Here, too, at Sonning, it marks another small change: the dinner included with every theatre ticket has changed from the traditional hot buffet to a 2-course table service. The new menu massively reduces the amount of food waste while also making the pre-show dining experience a much more relaxed and refined affair.

And while It Runs in the Family could itself hardly be referred to as relaxed and refined, it is still very classy – and a fine example that farce, when executed well, fully deserves its place in the theatrical canon.

Continues until 12 April 2025