Writer: Caryl Churchill
Director: Stella Powell-Jones
Rightly lauded now as one of Britain’s pre-eminent playwrights, the genius within Caryl Churchill’s later works is occasionally visible within her earlier ones. So it is with 1972’s Owners, which was Churchill’s first professional stage play after writing short works for radio.
Taking a look at the contemporary rise of individual property speculators whose greed starts to price London residents out of their flats, Churchill’s theme has a modern resonance that makes Jermyn Street Theatre’s revival a timely one. Nevertheless, this is a period piece, with jokey references to mental health and suicide that a playwright taking aim at the same targets today might sidestep.
Other themes have not rescinded into the depths of history, most notably the misogynistic attitude of Mark Huckett’s butcher, Clegg, towards his wife, Laura Doddington’s Marion. A self-made property tycoon, Marion’s success in business while failing to provide him with the son and heir he wants has embittered Clegg to the point where he openly speculates about ways to kill her. His confessor to his murderous desires is Marion’s suicidal assistant Worsely (Tom Morley), a laconically hapless young man whose desire to die is dwarfed only by his incompetence at doing so.
Doddington is in blistering form as Marion, for whom ambition is both her greatest strength and her downfall. As a pair of tenants – Boadicea Ricketts’ Lisa and her husband, the annoyingly Zen-like Alec (Ryan Donaldson) – refuse to vacate, making it harder for Marion to flip her latest property purchase, the Cleggs’ previous relationships with the couple reveal another side to the play’s title: the (perceived) rights of one person to have total control over another.
This is manifested in a scheme by which Marion agrees to take in Alec and Lisa’s new baby as her own. Ricketts plays Lisa as a charming, slightly naïve woman who always seems to come second to the needs and desires of those around her. Her character develops in the second act to more closely hew to Churchill’s thesis, but the softness of the portrayal in this production reduces the acidic subtleties of the writing. This works in the play’s favour, for too many characters with a callous disregard for others could overtip the delicate balance that Churchill and director Stella Powell-Jones need to maintain.
And it is the character balance that makes Owners really shine. This is far from Churchill’s best work – that was yet to come – yet there is so much in evidence of her eye and ear for character here. While every role is very much reduced to an archetype, with only occasional flashes outside of whatever characteristic they embody, each has such depths of humanity that they nevertheless feel fleshed out.
Some of Churchill’s early works, particularly her radio plays, sometimes feel like they might be of interest only to completists. Owners is more than that: the work of a playwright on their way to greatness, for sure – but a play whose revival feels worthwhile, fulfilling and relevant.
Continues until 11 November 2023
