Playhouse, Sheffield – February 8th 2025
Reviewed by Sharon Farley
5*****
Driftwood is a tumultuous ride through a family drama, focusing on how two brothers deal with the death of their father in very different ways. Though the underlying story encompasses some heavy topics, there is much levity within the dialogue to put the audience at ease.
The majority of the tale plays out on the beach of their hometown, Seaton Carew, a fairly unremarkable northeastern resort. Mark (James Westphal: A-Typical Rainbow, Sweetheart) is metropolitan and urbane, having left his family behind many years before in exchange for a city lifestyle and finding a successful career in the process; Tiny (Jerome Yates: Peter Pan and the Battle for Neverland, The Children) is 7-years Mark’s junior and stayed behind, finding his escape through online gaming whilst also becoming a full-time carer for their father through the long-term illness leading to his death.
When Mark returns, Tiny tries to rekindle family connections but Mark is clearly struggling with the prospect of saying goodbye to his estranged father. While he compensates by organising the necessary, practical arrangements, Tiny begins to unravel as he mourns the loss of their father alone, fixating on local folklore – the mystical legend of ‘The Mariner’, said to emerge from the sea to take the souls of the dead back to the wreck of the H.M.S. Stag with him. The rising tensions come to a head on the day of the funeral; they both dress for the occasion, but things don’t go according to Mark’s meticulous planning. Buried issues of abandonment erupt and a past trauma is re-enacted at low-tide with life-threatening results. They both emerge from the sea with new perspectives and, whilst we are granted a happy ending through their reconciliation, the resulting sense of belonging that the two men discover provides an entirely unexpected twist.
Though the plot layers are complex, the set is simple with a little ‘sea mist’ and sand providing some atmosphere aided by a digital backdrop, which also prints the dialogue as it’s spoken – an added bonus for those of us who are hearing impaired. The combined direction of Neil Bettles (The Unreturning, How Not To Drown) and Elle While (One Of Them Ones, The Silence and The Noise) puts Yates and Westphal through their paces and is occasionally quite acrobatic, using contemporary movement to represent parallels between the characters and the passage of time. The cumulative result does an excellent job of bringing the writing of multi-award winning Tim Foley (Electric Rosary, Astronauts of Hartlepool) to life and has been nominated for an Offie Award for Best Online Production. Audiences across the UK will have the opportunity to submerge themselves in this production of Driftwood during its 2025 tour