Review: EVEN THESE THINGS, Royal Exchange Theatre
Photo credit: Royal Exchange Theatre
Even These Things is a vibrant and emotive celebration of Manchester, and the strength of those who call Manchester home, when faced with adversity. Written by Rory Mullarkey and directed by James Macdonald, this three act original play is the third production in the Royal Exchange’s ‘A Homecoming’ season, which celebrates the 50th Anniversary of the theatre.
A pig, a post box and a property pamphlet: each punctuates a different moment in Manchester’s history; catalysts for three stories of resilience and hope for what can be born out of disaster.
We first meet Annie, an Irish migrant living in Angel Meadow in 1846, and walk with her through the trials of her daily life in Engels’ “Hell on Earth”, to St Michael’s Flags, where she must avenge a great personal loss.
150 years later. 1996. We look on with anxious foresight as the people of Manchester go about their business on the morning of 15 June, unaware that an IRA bomb is about to explode their world as they know it, bringing forth a new city.
Three decades on, in 2026, we return to the site of Annie’s vengeance, and witness a tense conversation between two women on ground that both holds their ancestors and fills the pockets of today’s property developers. Is the good that comes out of the bad really better?
Under Macdonald’s direction, Rory Mullarkey’s story inhabits this Manchester stage as a triptych of Mancunian experience: a monologue, a chorus, and a duologue.
Pacing boldly between the four corners of Laura Hopkins’ symbolic set, and expertly through the lyricism of Mullarkey’s writing, Elaine Cassidy delivers an epic monologue that drops us right into the sights, sounds and shopping lists of Annie’s Angel Meadow. As Cassidy deftly weaves a vocal and visual tapestry of the tension and the despair of Manchester’s slum, her soft silences speak as loudly as her combative cries.
A community cast of 108 inhabitants of Greater Manchester’s 10 boroughs, and a heroic stage team, animate a living and breathing slideshow of the Mancunian quotidian in 1996. This is narrated by Katherine Pearce’s emotive delivery of Mullarkey’s agile writing that lulls the audience into laughter before amplifying Ian Dickinson’s foreboding score, a constant reminder of what the end of the countdown will bring.
After the intensity and vibrancy of the first two acts, the stilted pace of the final duologue feels jarring at first, but this loud vacuum is later filled with the raw emotion of Jenny’s repressed loss, delivered with devastating poignancy by Katherine Pearce. Macdonald’s direction is clear; life continues, in its mundanity, under the heaviness of grief.
This is a striking, original and community-voiced telling of the power of hope across centuries. As Kaz tells us, this hope can often feel like fear, but Mancunians, both proper and honorary (!), will be fortified by the strength in togetherness if they are lucky enough to witness this tale at the heart of their city.
***** Five stars
Reviewed by: Lauren Wilson