Review: The Wicked Lady, New Vic Theatre, Newcastle

By delks

HEALTH and safety operatives – or whatever they call themselves – should avoid the New Vic theatre in the same way they should avoid loose women or, indeed, wicked ladies.

If they don't, they risk apoplexy, seizure or, worst of all, closing the theatre down.

The reason? A series of frankly hair-raising stunts involving ropes, slings, harnesses and ladders more usually found in the big top than in the theatre – and there's not a safety net in sight.

The rest of us, however, who tolerate health and safety because we have to, should applaud the New Vic for presenting probably the most spectacular aerial stagecraft ever performed at the theatre.

So much so one might wonder whether Bryony Lavery's adaptation of a novel by Magdalen King-Hall, which became the top-grossing British film of 1946, is merely an excuse for effect and acrobatics.

This, however, would be unfair to a script that takes a look at a loveless marriage in which, as the wicked lady Barbara says, she is never alone but always lonely. In this respect the play is remarkably modern. While not every woman so trapped turns to crime there are nevertheless many who, to succeed in a man's world, adopt male characteristics.

Thus Barbara, played with dash and daring by Róisín Gallagher, breaks out of her repressed, rural existence to lead a double life. The consequences are robbery and murder, burglary and betrayal, and eventually the wicked lady receives her comeuppance.

To single out other members of the cast would be unfair. Director Theresa Heskins has assembled a razor-sharp team and rehearsed them in some cases to acrobatic perfection. There are outstanding moments: a bedroom scene, exploiting the aerial resources, is almost erotic; a public hanging is breath-taking in its audacity.

No doubt, during preparation of the play, the demands of health and safety were met. Just as well: it would be galling if some jobsworth were to shut down the New Vic's superb summer spectacular.

The Wicked Lady runs until Saturday, July 25. Tickets are available from the box office on 01782 717962.

– Paul Gubbins