Writer/Director/Musician: Kate Bramley
Composer: Jez Lowe
The Thankful Village was originally performed by Badapple Theatre Company in 1914 to commemorate the centenary of the Great War: hence the references to 100 years ago in the moving final song. It has been revived several times and in 2025 has a brief run at York Theatre Royal, followed by two more performances.
By approaching the war from an oblique angle – the Thankful Villages – it removes any hint of the whole thing being a centenary commemoration. The Thankful Villages were those in which all the menfolk who signed up (30 in Kate Bramley’s fictional village) returned safely, though in this case there is a final twist.
The effective set places the smoke room of an inn on half the stage whilst giving the rest over to the fields of Flanders, poppies and all. Nellie (Josie Morley) and Edie (Pip Cook) are maids at the inn which is presided over by the formidable Mrs Proud (Keeley Lane). Morley and Cook are an animated pairing, Morley politically aware, the high-spirited risk-taker, Cook the timidly clumsy one, forever dropping trays. Lane (or, rather, her character) is the problem: were inn-keepers’ wives ever so snobbish – or, indeed, as articulate? No matter: best to relax and enjoy the humour of her elongated vowels!
At the outset the room has been used for a meeting the night before at which all present committed themselves to volunteering and so all the actors take on secondary roles as their respective husbands/boyfriends, Mr Proud, of course, serving as officer. In these characters they have very little to say, but make the most of Jez Lowe’s songs; The Wrong Bus in the first half is delightfully witty and a song later on about not getting a blighty has bitterness overlaid with humour. Kate Bramley takes on another role as musician, playing mandolin and violin, accompanying the songs and linking scenes with atmospheric melodies as a wandering violinist.
The second half is where Bramley honours the nurses Nellie Spindler and Edith Appleton and chaplain Tubby Clayton, founder of Toc H, all non-combatant heroes of the Great War. Nellie joins the Queen Alexandra Nursing Corps and many of her moving reports from the front surely owe much to the diaries of Spindler and Appleton. Morley delivers these with understated solemnity, the more powerful because of understatement, while Lane is preoccupied with the extremely middle-class Women’s Volunteers.
Pip Cook and Keeley Lane offer comic depictions of British life pre-war (“Never such innocence again” in Philip Larkin’s words); Josie Morley presents the reality beneath their illusions. And the ancient recordings played before the start and in the interval (sentimental soldiers’ songs, romantic tenors and Harry Champion knockabouts) represent the pre-war world, innocent, but, at the same time, brutal and ignorant of social equality.
Runs until 26th April 2025
1 Comment
We attended the theatre to watch The Thankful Village on Saturday 26th April.
We travelled from Scarborough as we were vacationing for the weekend and got stuck in a flurry of traffic on the way, in addition my elderly mom with limited mobility was struggling to walk to the venue when we finally reached the nearest car park.
The venue were great and let us in as we were only late by 5 minutes but one man was being so rude and nasty about us trying to get up the stairs and being late, bearing in mind the stairs were pitch black and I’m trying to help my Mom and her walking stick up the stairs so she didn’t fall. He made comments all through the performance even laughing our extremely loud when there was nobody else laughing as it was an inopportune time in the play. Apart from this entitled man we thoroughly enjoyed the play and had the pleasure of sitting with one of the actresses parents. Very talented ladies indeed and the violinist was a lovely touch. It’s a great story and their adaptability to play all parts was very impressive.