Hull Truck Theatre – until 24th May 2025
Reviewed by Dawn Bennett
5*****
To Have and To Hold at Hull Truck theatre last night was one of the best plays that I have seen for a long, long time. Written by Richard Bean (One Man Two Guvnors, Made in Dagenham and The Hypocrite to name just a few) it was a roller coaster of emotions all the way through, from moments of sadness to full belly laughs.
Jack (Ian Bartholomew) and Florence (Paula Wilcox) have been married for 60 years. Jack isn’t as well as he’d like to be and Florence has a few memory problems and her eyesight isn’t as good as it once was. They live in Wetwang in the Yorkshire Wolds; they’re plodding along with their lives but just finding it a bit of a struggle now. Their niece Pamela (Sara Beharrell) does their shopping for them and the couple’s friend, Eddie (Adrain Hood) also helps out, going to the bank, keeping Jack company and taking up running his allotment.
Jack and Florence have two children, Rob (Stephen Tompkinson) and Tina (Rebecca Johnson) Rob is a crime writer and lives in London and is often in Los Angles were he’s in talks for his book to be made into a film. As he says he couldn’t stay in Wetwang as there’s no film industry there! Tina runs a company, which specialises in private Doctors practices, down in Somerset.
Rob and Tina don’t live near their parents so are not there to help them day to day as their cousin Pamela is always reminding them. They come home to have a family meeting to suggest to Jack and Florence that they move in with Tina and what follows is a heart-warming story of family life and the problems that go with it.
The interactions between the cast are just wonderful and very believable, they are very experienced actors and they were an absolute joy to watch,
The cast all played their parts brilliantly, I was really drawn into their story and a lot of it really resonated with me and possibly a lot of the audience with parents/partners of a certain age.
This is definitely must-see production, a five-star show by a five-star cast.