Yours Sincerely – The Vaults, London

Writer: Will Jackson

Director: Anna Himali Howard

Reviewer: Richard Maguire

Dear Will

Thank you for your show. We enjoyed it very much. Very funny, and occasionally moving, your play about the lost art of letter writing inspired us to write our own.

Yours Sincerely

The Reviews Hub

In 2017 Will Jackson accidentally stole 300 second-class stamps from a Post Office in Birmingham. Too scared to hand them back, he used them to write letters; for a millennial more used to texts and emails, old-fashioned letters were a revelation to Jackson. He wrote to his first crush confessing his love; he wrote to his family and friends, and he wrote to John Lewis pitching new ideas for their Christmas ad.

In Yours Sincerely, Jackson reads out some of these letters and those the recipients wrote back. His first crush suggests they meet. John Lewis says thanks, but no thanks. These epistolary scenes are broken up by some amusing lip-synching to the likes of Céline Dion and Christina Aguilera, but although these numbers add some camp sparkle to the proceedings they do little to move the story on. As the letters come and go, we find out more about Jackson’s life, and it’s not all plain sailing.

With no real overarching narrative, the story is a little thin, but Jackson is a very charismatic performer throwing himself into every role and throwing himself across every inch of the box-strewn stage. His energy is infectious, and you can’t help but root for him. However, towards the end of this fun-packed hour, there are glimmers of a more powerful show trying to come out, one that would match the ‘queer millennial perspective’ that he promises.

But under Anna Himali Howard’s slick direction and with Tom Rackham’s sound design, Yours Sincerelyis uplifting and entertaining, with the reveals coming in all the right places. It certainly delivers.

Runs until 3 February 2019 | Image: Elafris-Photography