Bartlett is a highly versatile playwright and screen writer whose work encompasses theatre, radio and television. In 2005, as part of the Old Vic’s New Voices project, his play Comfort was written and performed in twentyfour hours. This was followed in 2007 by a radio play, Not Talking, which explored the issues surrounding conscientious objection in the UK during World War II and also the problems of bullying within the armed forces. During the same year he was Writer-inResidence at the Royal Court Theatre. Earthquakes in London, described as an “epic, expansive play about climate change, corporate corruption, fathers and children” (Michael Billington), was staged at the National Theatre in 2010. His play 13, seen at the National in 2011, portrays “a Britain where the old tribal loyalties are increasingly irrelevant” (Michael Billington again). Bartlett’s television drama, Doctor Foster, was aired in 2015 and other television work includes Press (2015), an adaptation of his play King Charles III (2017) and an episode of Dr Who (2016). Described in the New York Times as “a tragicomic paean to England and its discontents”, Albion was premiered at the Almeida Theatre in 2017 and revived there in 2020. Bartlett’s play Cock, premiered at the Royal Court in 2009, is currently playing in a revival at the Ambassadors Theatre. Bartlett has won numerous awards, including three Olivier Awards, two National Television Awards and a Critics’ Circle Award. DIRECTOR’S NOTES Rupert Goold, director of Albion at the Almeida in 2017 and 2020: “Plays like plants grow over time. Their meanings shift.” Albion was written in 2017 in response to the protracted path to the Referendum, between the vote and the enactment of the result. The play is a state-of-the-nation piece, taking the temperature of the country at that moment in time. But like all good plays, it does far, far more than that. It explores what it is to be and to feel English and what that means in the context of the relationship with Europe. It is an allegory, where the garden in Oxfordshire is the England of our dreams, fashioned in the aftershock of the First World War, and London is the EU. The house and garden are called Albion, an ancient term for England, and the names of the characters are emblematic, resounding with the tradition, culture and heritage of the country. The play is also about sacrifice and grief, and how people process those. As we emerge from the last two years, this mournful, fascinating, and complex play asks us to examine how the seismic shifts in the political landscape affect our identity and divide us a people. The important themes of the play are underscored by Mike Bartlett’s gift for wit as he examines romanticism about the past, and how that sits alongside a restless hunger for change – the nation’s neurotic divisions, a peculiarly English confusion. I first saw the play at the Almeida in 2017 and was emotionally poleaxed by the experience. Its profound exploration of our troubled times through the intimate struggles and relationships of Audrey and her family strikes a deep chord. I hope that, as it did for me, the play lives with anyone who sees it, long after the houselights come up. Claire Evans
Audrey Walters Cheryl Malam Paul Walters Jonathan Constant Zara Walters Sophie Walker Katherine Sanchez Gilly Fick Anna Gabi King Edward David Hall Krystyna Cheryl Matthew Gabriel Claire Howes Barbara Tresidder Kim Ferguson Gwithian Evans PRODUCTION Director Set Design Set Drawings Set Construction Lighting Lighting Assistants Sound Costumes Stage Manager ASM Properties Claire Evans Kim Ferguson Peter Elliott Graham Russell-Price, Michael Burne Robert Sheppard Jonathan Arundel, Steve Sheppard Simon Price Tina Wareham Kevin Malam Divyanshi Menaria Tina Wareham Publicity Gilly Fick Prompt Sue Poole Programme Robert Sheppard (with Ian Nichols) The action of the play takes place in the garden of a house in Oxfordshire Image Manipulation Jonathan Con- stant Act 1 - late February Griffith Act 2 - late May, evening Interval - 20 minutes chael Burne Publicity Photography Phill Transport Mi-
“Then shall the realm of Albion Come to great confusion.” (Shakespeare, King Lear) The use of Albion as a name for Great Britain goes back thousands of years. Believed to have come originally from the Greek language it was used by many classical writers in preference to the Roman name, Britannia. In Celtic languages it became Alba as a name for Scotland only. Mike Bartlett’s play is, at least in part, an allegory for post-Brexit Britain and, in employing this form, he follows a notable tradition in English literature. One of the earliest surviving examples is the anonymous Everyman, a late 15th century morality play. Everyman, the eponymous central character, representing all mankind, tries to persuade other characters, such as Strength, Discretion, Knowledge and Friendship, to accompany him in a quest to improve his life, eventually realizing that he is essentially alone in his accountability. Very similar in concept is John Bunyan’s famous Christian allegory The Pilgrim’s Progress, written between 1678 and 1684. A symbolic vision of one man’s journey through life, Christian’s pilgrimage takes him from the City of Destruction to the Celestial City, passing through – amongst other places – the Slough of Despond, the Village of Morality, the Valley of the Shadow of Death and Vanity Fair, and meeting on the way a whole slew of memorable characters, including Evangelist, Obstinate, Fruitful, Heedless and Madam Bubble. Remarkably, like the Bible, the book has never been out of print. Much more resonant in the 20th and 21st centuries, perhaps, is George Orwell’s Animal Farm (1945), an allegory based on events leading up to the Russian Revolution in 1917 and then on into the Stalinist era of the Soviet Union. The book tells the story of a group of farm animals who overthrow their human master in the hope of creating a society where they can be free, equal and happy. But their hopes are destroyed by the increasingly dominant and cruel pigs, under the dictatorship of the brutal tyrant Napoleon, with their chilling maxim “All animals are equal but some are more equal than others”. Animal Farm was followed in 1950 by The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, the first of the Chronicles of Narnia by C S Lewis. The book is sometimes regarded, to a certain extent, as a Christian allegory because of the death and resurrection of the lion, Aslan, although Lewis himself wrote that the story was “not so much allegory as supposal”. Suppose there were a Narnian world, he posited, and it, like ours, needed redemption. Arthur Miller’s play The Crucible, written in 1953, dramatises the Salem Witch Trials that took place in Massachusetts in 1692-93. Miller took some liberties with the facts to create a highly compelling drama which he intended as an allegory for the activities of Senator Joseph McCarthy following the appearance of the so-called Iron Curtain after World War II. McCarthy sought to uncover alleged Communists in all areas of American public life, forcing those involved to choose between their moral conscience and saving their own skin, just like John Proctor and Rebecca Nurse in The Crucible. Miller’s defiance of McCarthyism resulted in his conviction for contempt of court and the term ‘witch-hunt’ has passed into general use in the language. Everyman John Bunyan George Orwell C S Lewis Arthur Miller
Merrist Wood College The National Operatic and Dramatic Association (NODA), founded in 1899, is the leading representative body for amateur theatre in the UK. The Association has a membership of approximately 2000 amateur theatre groups and approximately 800 individual members, staging musicals, operas, plays, concerts and pantomimes in a wide variety of venues ranging from the country’s leading professional theatres to village halls. Covering a broad spectrum of age ranges, NODA member societies meet the needs of all levels of both performers, whether dramatic, dance or musical, and those involved backstage, Guildburys Theatre Company is a founder member of the Guildford Amateur Theatre Association, an umbrella organisation of groups supporting and promoting the interests of amateur theatre and public education in the dramatic arts in and around Guildford. It was largely through the efforts of GATA that the Electric Theatre opened in 1997, converted from the town’s old electricity works. Since the theatre’s lease to ACM in 2015, GATA has continued to work in support of its community function as a venue available to amateur
Etymology: Albion - from Greek/Latin, meaning white. The first view of our islands by foreign raiders was the white cliffs of Dover and hence their name for Britain. As a term, often used when referring to ancient times and values. Audrey Walters has acquired a large country house and its decaying garden, named, significantly, Albion. It has obviously been a great beauty in its prime of the 1920s, and now her fervent wish is to reclaim it and give it purpose. “A house to dream of and a garden to dream in.” But Audrey seeks ownership, not only over this garden, but also over her daughter and all others around her. Other interests must step aside if they don’t match her plans. Mike Bartlett set his play entirely in this garden in rural Oxfordshire. His inspiration came from a visit to a National Trust Arts and Crafts property, Hidcote Manor, with its intricately designed gardens in the Cotswolds. Hidcote is neither solely ‘cottage garden’ nor ‘landscaped parkland’, but a huge space divided into various hedged areas of differing styles. The first, modest sized, ‘rooms’ burst with vivacious flower colour before giving way to vistas of larger, subtler ones with an apparently natural arrangement of bushes, trees and paths. However, nothing is actually random, and everything is designed to be ‘experienced as a journey’. Audrey wilfully uproots everyone else in her pursuit of a garden. She wants total control over it, but it has been central to its local community for many years, hosting two local festivals each year. Now the community is to be banned from the garden and access only given to those Audrey selects as suitable. Chekhov had his cherry orchard; Bartlett has his hedgerows to keep the neighbours at bay; and previously Tom Stoppard had used Arcadia (staged by Guildburys in 2001) for his misinterpreted landscape. The play leads us through a neglected garden of supposed English values touching, metaphorically, upon such subjects as Brexit, class divisions, patriotism and our attitudes towards those foreigners essential to our well being. Even the names of the characters speak of traditions and culture. So, using our garden metaphor, should we preserve the past or radically reform it? And, of course, Audrey’s desire for ownership ultimately may fail, with neither the garden nor people necessarily being brought to order! Ian Nichols
Fleepit Digital © 2021