Menier Chocolate Factory – until 16 November 2019
Reviewed by Claire Roderick
5*****
Jane Austen’s unfinished novel is the starting point for Laura wade’s smart and witty play. In The Watsons, Austen had written a plucky heroine, Emma, who has no prospect of finding a suitor but longs to return to the financial comfort she has become used to while living with her aunt. Her two unmarried sisters are polar opposites, one dutifully caring for their dying father, and the other desperate to marry any available man. The three eligible men in town – the parson, the handsome cad and the lord of the manor – are all instantly recognisable Austen characters, and Wade introduces Emma’s world with a delightfully light touch before pulling a theatrical handbrake turn and introducing a mysterious maid, Laura. Laura reveals herself to Emma as the writer of the play, who wrote herself into it to stop Emma making a huge mistake. Emma, being an Austen heroine, doesn’t take the news that she is merely a character meekly, and very soon all the characters have notes for Laura.
The debate between Laura and her characters is twisty and gleefully clever, without ever becoming smug. Whether the characters are voicing their own ideas or Laura’s is unclear at first, and there are lots of familiar Brexit tropes about democracy and taking back power alongside ideas from Rousseau and Hobbes. Wade both mocks and lauds writers and the creative process in her engaging and freewheeling script, and Emma’s reactions are exactly what you’d hope for if Austen had written her entire story.
Director Samuel West handles the action with a light touch, and the stellar cast are all on fine form, with Grace Molony as Emma and Louise Ford as Laura shining as their verbal sparring escalates. Joe Bannister is a hoot as the awkward Osborne, who is much more comfortable talking to his dogs and horses than to human beings, and Laurence Ubong Williams oozes charm and arrogance as the ridiculously caddish Tom Musgrave. Jane Booker and Sophie Duval are lots of fun as the type of awful older women that inhabit Austen’s stories.
Bursting with intelligence and impish wit, The Watsons is crying out for a West End transfer.