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Show: Twopence To Cross The Mersey
Society: Fairfield Halls Croydon
Venue: Ashcroft Theatre, Fairfield Halls. Park Lane, Croydon, Surrey CR9 1DG (and touring)
Credits: Adapted from Helen Forrester’s book. Adapted by Rob Fennah. Directed by Gareth Tudor Price. Produced by Pulse Records Limited in association with Bill Elms
Type: Sardines
Author: Caroline Jenner
Performance Date: 17/10/2022
Twopence to Cross the Mersey
Caroline Jenner | 18 Oct 2022 22:56pm
Adapted by Rob Fennah from Helen Forrester’s autobiography, Twopence to Cross the Mersey is a period drama set in 1930’s Liverpool during the Depression. Helen’s spendthrift father is declared bankrupt, forcing the family to leave behind their comfortable home with nothing more than the clothes they stand up in and a painting belonging to her mother. The family of nine take the train to Liverpool, which they discover is no longer a thriving city. While Helen’s parents search unsuccessfully for work, she is forced to look after her six younger siblings. Desperate to return to school she begins a battle to take evening classes and ensure her future holds more than just the prospect of looking after the household and marriage. In Liverpool we find the family forced to rely on handouts from the local parish, the Salvation Army and the kindness of strangers.
The show is punctuated with occasional crackly radio announcements and conversations that help set the period and remind us of the deep recession of the thirties and the rise to power of Hitler – who we are told might do well here as at least he sorted out the unemployment problem in Germany.
Jenny Murphy presents us with a tenacious Helen Forrester. Her engagement with a mixture of helpful and not so helpful characters during the course of the play is engaging and builds up a rapport with the audience that has us willing her to achieve her dreams. The scenes when she describes seeing her reflection in a shop window and the moment where she almost throws herself into the River Mersey are unbearably poignant. Mark Moraghan too gives us a strong performance as the insipid Mr Forrester, who continues to wear his old school tie with pride despite being unable to support his family, allowing them to go hungry whilst he manages to supply his wife with cigarettes. Lynn Francis, as his feckless, arrogant wife, successfully manages to alienate the audience with her lack of care for her children, constant haranguing of her husband and selfish inability to give up possessions that might help feed her offspring. She is truly obnoxious.
However, it is the array of characters we meet throughout the production that really stand out. An excellent ensemble cast bring us an assortment of Scousers who entertain, shock and surprise us. From the opening scene at Liverpool Lime Street station, the conversation on the tram, the gentle kindness of the neighbour who knits them gloves and cooks their Christmas dinner, the avaricious landlady and her half crazed brother to the elderly gentleman who encourages her never to give up on her education, we see a plethora of individuals who bring this story to life. Under the careful direction of Gareth Tudor Price we watch the main characters engage with those around them whilst their clothes become more and more threadbare, the children are eaten alive by bedbugs and the baby almost starves to death, but for the helpful policeman who provides the family with a pint of milk every day for two years.
Simple staging leaves the various locations to the audience’s imagination and allows for slick scene changes, transporting us to the period with some great costumes and sensitive lighting. Sadly, despite this and the confident performances, the first half is a little disjointed with the narration slowing the pace and jarring uncomfortably. This is perhaps a result of an attempt by Fennah to use the text of the novel, with Helen breaking up the action to give commentaries that describe the family’s everyday life and the behaviour of the four siblings who never appear on stage. The second half flows more seamlessly than the first with the interlinking narration holding the vignettes together and keeping the audience’s attention much more securely.
For anyone who is caught up in what is in fact an autobiographical account of childhood in the 1930s, and does not want to wait till the 2023 tour of the next instalment of the Forrester story, you could like Helen, head down to your local library and read the books for yourself.