Brighton Theatre Royal – until 23 April 2022
Reviewed by Sue Bradley
3***
The thought of an outdoors team-building weekend might seem like an opportunity to make new friends and have some gentle adventure. On the other hand, you might find yourself a member of a mismatched group of middle managers, stranded on an island somewhere in the Lake District. Welcome to Sheila’s Island.
We take our seats to the cheery strains of songs like ‘Summer Holiday‘ and ‘Girls Just Want To Have Fun’ before the tone changes with Sheila (Judy Flynn) staggering on stage literally soaking wet. Closely followed by her three equally wet companions, the scene for the story is set as we learn how they have come to be ‘shipwrecked’, all the while performing a wonderfully unglamorous full costume change in plain sight. Now, all they have to do is survive long enough to get rescued – which strangely never happens, given that they are on the island for a couple of days and not far from where they are supposed to be, which is in a nearby hotel on the mainland with the organisers of the weekend.
This gentle comedy, with characters who belong somewhere between The Office and Miranda, have to face their own Lord Of The Flies as the true nature of each of their characters is revealed whilst they bicker, sometimes good-naturedly, sometimes less so.
Written by Tim Firth, whose previous credits include Calendar Girls and Kinky Boots, the play was originally written as Neville’s Island for an all-male group but, at the prompting of director Joanna Read, Firth re-wrote it for an all-woman cast. Although he wondered whether the transition would be successful, the play, as he himself puts it, is “largely about being human, rather than being male or female”.
Abigail Thaw as Denise probably gets the most comic lines and her caustic wit is a good foil for the other-worldly Faye (Sara Crowe) and the hapless Julie (Rina Fatania). ‘Denise’ also provides a good portrait of the kind of team member who is never happier than sniping at Sheila’s slightly inept leadership, whilst never actually taking on the role herself.
There are some funny lines and quite a few sight-gags that work very well. We are early on in the run so perhaps the cast have not yet quite honed their comic timing, but we found enough humour and gags to laugh at.
This show provides a couple of hours of amusing diversion and, although it will not leave you with tears streaming down your face and your sides aching with laughter, it does provide gentle amusement and the changes our heroines have to undergo gives us plenty of pause for thought.