Except for its being written by J B Priestley, I didn't know anything about this play beforehand, but as Jade T had tickets, bought on a whim a little while ago for no other reason than that she vaguely recalled having read it in a fill-in class one day in high school and thought it looked interesting, and I didn't already have plans for my Saturday night when she flagged it, I went along with her.
It's set a couple of years before the first world war, and focuses on what is revealed when a mysterious inspector calls on a well-to-do family one night with news of the suicide of an unfortunate young woman of the working class. The class element is foregrounded from the very beginning, with a vignette depicting street kids running around and squabbling over clothing and position, and kept in the audience's mind throughout by the set design, with the house's elevation above street level. As the inspector's questioning proceeds, each member of the family is brought to face their guilt, and the themes of individual and collective responsibility are worked through thoroughly and effectively; there's the industrialist patriarch of the family, Arthur Birling, and his wife Sybil, their grown children Sheila and Eric, and Sheila's fiancee, Gerald Croft, another pillar of capitalist-industrial upper-class society, and it soon becomes apparent that each of them, and the mindset they stand for, is in some measure responsible for the woman's death.
It's a cleverly-written play and one with both heart and head, and coming to it fresh allowed me to be taken by surprise by some of the twists it had in its tail, especially at the end when questions were being raised about the true nature of the inspector and the deceased young woman, both of which instabilities were effective in highlighting and generalising the underlying metaphor/symbolic conceit of the piece - the 'murder' of the working class and all unfortunate members of society by the relentless drive towards wealth, individualistic values and plain hypocrisy of those better off than them (including a not so veiled reference to the war that was to come). Also enjoyed the moment when the 'fourth wall' was broken, the inspector crying out 'stop' and the lights being turned on the audience as he addressed it (us) directly.
As to this specific production: directed by Stephen Daldry (name rung a bell; he's also the director of The Hours) and put on by the British company. Set design and special effects impressive (we were in the stalls, second row, and I must admit to having felt a bit nervous at the point when the house came symbolically and literally crashing down towards us) and gave the production a murky, noirish feel while also evoking Dickensian associations (both appropriate given the subject matter). All very dramatic, strident music and theatrical (but effective) acting; being as close as we were meant that we could see every detail, which was cool. And it gets its message across.
Here.
