It feels a treat. Plays at the Royal Exchange Theatre in Manchester feel like they’re not there by accident. They’re there by design. I know what I mean and I’m sure frequent flyers of this theatre’s offerings will do so too. By the time you’re sat in the round looking down, ready to see how that circular space is going to be populated both physically and artistically, you know that whatever’s about to happen has earned its right to be there, and you’re ready to receive.

How’s about this then. Two for the price of one. But anyone (I don’t think anyone, actually), but anyone thinking they’re in for a light-hearted BOGOF nice and easy, efficient evening of theatre are mistaken. And anyone (as I say, I don’t think anyone, actually) worth their salt will be more than happy that this is not the case.

Caryl Churchill, is a playwright, who doesn’t waste any time with the lighter side of life. Well actually, I tell a lie. The, now, 86 year-old uses her talents to confront, challenge, send out a warning signal, look ‘the beast in the eye’, as actress Maureen Beattie puts it. But with a juxtaposition of the mundane and the, at times, comically ordinary, to provide what is the scariest of contexts and backdrops to anything apocalyptic and extreme – real life.

Escaped Alone

“I’m walking down the street and there’s a door in the fence open and inside there are three women I’ve seen before.”
Three old friends and a neighbour. A summer of afternoons in the back yard. Tea and catastrophe.

Tea and catastrophe is absolutely the humdinger of a phrase here.

The first of our two Caryl Churchill plays, brought together by Director, Sarah Frankcom, gives us tea and catastrophe and four, fine actresses – Annette Badland (Vi), Maureen Beattie (Mrs Jarrett), Souad Faress (Lena) and Margot Leicester (Sally), who come armed with talent finessed throughout an impressive back catalogue of work, each keeping you captivated as their characters take forward their monologues, amidst a backdrop of chatter and gentle chastisement between four women in their 70s.

Mrs Jarrett (Beattie) takes us into this world, through that door in the fence, somewhat reluctantly joining in the chit-chat, whilst occasionally breaking off into powerful soliloquy, to warn us of a time of devastation and damnation in the world, where the result in food shortages, will take popular culture down a particular path of aspiration and desperation, and the obese will both sell off and consume parts of their own bodies in the most macabre form of ‘the carvery’ imaginable. This against a backdrop of discussions between the women over the latest binge-worthy drama on television.

Yes, go back and read that paragraph again. It’s Last of the Summer Wine meets The League of Gentlemen.

But more than the sum of its parts which I’ve so pithily described.

As we learn of past lives ranging from mariticide to an extreme aversion to cats (which, by the time Sally (Margot Leicester) had finished voicing, even this cat-lover started to wonder whether it was time to put her own feline friend out to the highest bidder, this 55 minutes of theatre should be seen, heard, yes most definitely amused by and thought on…but not before we return back to the theatre space some 20 minutes later for Churchill’s second offering…

What if if only

“Make me happen”
Your partner’s died, could things have been different?

No you may not ease out of the evening with 30 minutes of whimsy and light entertainment. For this is Caryl Churchill and that’s more than ok with us. Bring on the grieving woman, please.

I throw out this glib introduction, but I know I do it out of keeping the very real and tragic concept of losing a partner at bay, and the desperate need for answers and a reversal of time that must come with it.

As the lights dip for our second performance, the square patch of garden from the first impressively transforms before our eyes, via some clever mechanics and suave set design, into the floor of an apartment/sanctuary/self-imposed cell of solitary confinement of grief, where we meet Danielle Henry as ‘Someone’. Someone who has recently lost a partner.

Someone who sits with their memories, record-player, questions and grief, who speaks to an empty chair where he once sat, questioning what happened to their pact of sending a sign back to the other should they ‘go’ first, and why this has been seemingly broken.

And in this summoning, we see a return to the stage of Annette Badland as ‘Future’. We’re given Lamin Tourey as ‘Present’. We’re introduced to Bea Glancy as ‘Child’. And as each visitor, with more than an echo of A Christmas Carol (but bringing with it a far deeper dive into the concept of time, the futility of regret but with the hope of a constant refresh, with the reality of the continual resetting of the present) we’re forced to confront our own questioning and anguish over the meaning of what was not supposed to happen, why it did, and what could I do.

But most importantly, what should I choose for the now which a second ago was the future. I know.

And with barely time to deconstruct and apply the messaging to my own reality, ‘Someone’s’ world and the stage in front of us swelled further as the Royal Exchange Elders appeared, a rhythmic collective of voices and food for thought.

Yes, I told you. Put any fears of being short-changed on powerful themes, exploration of life and the human psyche on hold. This evening of theatre might be giving double-bubble of two productions in the space of 90 minutes but there is nothing held back.

This is Caryl Churchill, a Royal Exchange Theatre production, and everything that reassuringly comes with that.

Escaped Alone and What If If Only is at Royal Exchange Theatre, Manchester, until 8 March 2025. For full details including cast, crew and tickets, visit https://www.royalexchange.co.uk/event/escaped-alone-and-what-if-if-only/

Production images – credit Johan Persson