Woman in Mind

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My mother, during the school holidays took me everywhere with her, often to London (we lived in Sussex) to visit publishers and editors, practically all female. And I sat there all the while, as they talked of this and that, a small boy listening - and largely unnoticed. Muriel, live-in sister to Gerald, dead weight about the house, self-centred, and an unimaginably bad cook;

The final shred of reality is when Muriel says "The ambulance is on its way", and a blue light flashes. Susan's speech descends into the same gibberish Bill used at the beginning of the play, and, with a desperate request to "December bee", she collapses a final time.

Right from the outset the eerie lighting courtesy of the excellent technical team creates an atmosphere of otherworldliness and confusion, and the minimalist staging perfectly complements this focus on lighting to allow the imagination of Susan to be externally portrayed in a vivid and alluring way. Whilst the first act may have benefited from a change in lighting to give more momentum to the gradually developing plot, the second act marvellously manipulates lighting and staging to enhance the psychological themes and characters’ interactions, resulting in a highly charged and vivid act that brings out the true life of the characters and the issues that shape the play. The simple set and spot-on lighting and sound complete the picture. This is a story told not in words, but visually and Bench Theatre nailed every element. Tremendous theatre! If the breach is great, seek a way of apology specifically for her and your specific shared circumstance. There is much good work to praise here. Sarah Parnell as the put-upon Muriel is a creation of genius and Pete Woodward and Simon Walton as vicar and doctor respectively, give nicely-studied work with an eye to detail. The ubiquitous Aaron Holdaway presents an essay in comedic delivery too. The grim reality is very different: husband Gerald (clergyman's son Paul Toy) is a self-obsessed priggish vicar, always in another room writing his interminably dull, interminably long parish history since 1387. They have reached the separate bed stage already.

Contrasting Susan's own family are three imaginary characters, existing only in Susan's mind (and therefore visible to the audience): She is also no saint. Remember that everything we see is her version. Ideally - in theory if not in practice (God forbid) - every time Susan blinks the lights should dip. We get her version of events from square one. Being the only version we're offered we should tend to trust her. After all, she is the central character. She should know what she's doing. Shouldn't she? a dazzling, provocative evening... which is both hilariously inventive and demonic" - Sunday TelegraphThe central character in Woman in Mind is, of course, Susan. She is a housewife who, in reality, is neglected by her husband, patronised by her sister-in-law, and estranged from her son. In her own imaginary world, by contrast, she is happy, successful, and loved by her perfect family. Susan remains on-stage throughout the play, and everything seen and heard on stage is what is seen and heard by Susan, both real and imagined. At the time of going to press a high wall of secrecy surrounds this project. Some have the theory that the reason for this is to protect such highly original comic material from the risk of plagiarism. Others, more cynical, suggest that it could be due to the fact that the author hasn't started on it yet and is anxious not to commit himself. At first, the imaginary characters are distinguished from the real characters by their white summery outfits. However, as Susan's mind goes out of control, the real characters start entering Susan's imaginary world, until it is very difficult to tell what is real and what is pretend.

I tell actors playing Gerald to be as nice as possible - if he says all the lines he'll never manage it - but he should try to be. It is very important that characters like Gerald are not so far out on the limb of outrageous caricature by the climax of the play that we cannot suddenly wonder if the man has a point after all as Susan destroys his precious manuscript. After all, we've only had Susan's word about him up till now and at this stage, how reliable is her word any longer?What does the 'incomprehensible' language Susan hears in the first scene and speaks in the final scene mean?