by Ian Diddams
images by Ian Diddams, Next Stage Theatre Company and Mike Stevens
Florian Zeller is a contemporary French playwright and screenwriter, who received critical acclaim for his films, “The Father” and “The Son” in the early 2020s. The films were both adapted from his stage plays of the same name, and it will not therefore be a surprise that he preceded both of these original plays with a third “The Mother”. Next Stage Theatre Company bring this first Zeller play to The Mission Theatre, Bath this week, with its time slipping, reality questioning story of a post-menopausal empty-nester whose raison d’etre has gone.
Anne – the titular character role – played by Hayley Fitton-Cook, lives a lonely, insular and empty existence in a home dominated by her favourite colour, red. Her children have grown up and left home, and are somewhat estranged to her; her husband she suspects of having an affair. Her life is meaningless and she dulls the tedium with increasingly larger doses of pills, and booze. The play is her experienced life, the other characters being puppets to enact her perceived reality, though we very quickly start to question which is real, which is fever dream, and which is just unreliable memories. Hayley plays the character honestly – as written, straight, she explained, playing The Mother in each scene as if that is the time and place in the real world. Her uncompromising, incessant performance really strengthens the delivery as we wonder which of the almost repeated scenes with minor changes and nuances is the actual real one – they are all real to Anne as they happen.
The Father, Pierre, is played by Mayur Bhatt, as the slightly lost businessman trying to keep a connection to his wife, and failing dismally. He is kind and gentle in his own way but his work life is either overtaking his own existence, or is providing a cover for extra-martial nefarious activities. Mayur delivers his confused, hurt, but also self-centred character sublimely, delivering a perfectly crafted Willy Loman style businessman, looking forward to the next exciting convention on microcredits, while achieving not much at all – except an opportunity to avoid Anne.
Nicholas, The Son, is played by Oliver Manners. The Son represents Anne’s confidence crisis – he is mid twenties and has left home to live with his girlfriend, and hardly communicates with The Mother now, finding her too stifling of his life. His own relationship crisis brings him back to the family home and the inner tensions and loss of mutual support are exposed all too obviously. The Mother tries to mother him, which he is rejecting; his relationship with his father is at best strained, and Nicholas knows “things” about Pierre that Anne doesn’t. Its a tightrope of a plot line to follow for an actor – neither too close to his parents but equally not totally dismissive of them either; their remains some inklings to family ties but they are stretched. Oliver’s perfection of this fledged offspring counterposed by his critical encapsulation of Nicholas’ insecutorites belies the fact that this is his first role with Next Stage.
Finally the fourth character of The Girl is played by Perrine Maillot; the girl is a melange of various female characters within the story. The is certainly Nicholas’ girlfriend, Elodie… but she is – in Anne’s confused mind – also her husband’s lover, and a mental health nurse arranging treatment for Anne. And there may be a thought amongst the audience that maybe Elodie/lover is actually Nicholas’ sister who is continually referenced but never seen, and has no contact ever with her family. Perrine is strong in her characterisation of Elodie, the girlfriend that doesn’t like the Mother, who in turn doesn’t like Elodie – though they both like red dresses….
The mastery of the play is its continual time slip/alternative reality of scenes, often repeating themselves in a ground-hog day scenario, leaving the audience to work out their own understanding of what is going on. There are no right or wrong plot lines here – Zeller has deliberately set up the play with multiple answers and endings, leaving us to decide which narrative fits our own understandings. Is Anne mad? Is this all a repeating nightmare? Is some of it actually reality surrounded by alternatively recollected situations and outcomes in Anne’s addled mind. Is Anne depressed? Menopausal? Has she dementia? Are some of the characters Anne interacts with actually dead? Are they all dead? Do some of the characters actually ever exist and are just figments of her imagination in her Walter Mitty world?
The set is simplistically perfect – Anne’s favourite colour red abounds in the bedroom/diner open plan set. Even the scene changes are done to a lowered red wash of light. Created by Director Tiana James it is the perfect reflection of Anne’s mind. Lighting and Sound is provided between Rowan Bendle and Kris Nuttal with Nicky Wilkins as fight choreographer.
Its a challenging play – it will likely raise emotions, query one’s own visions of what is real and what is pretend, and some aspects may well be triggering. But art should challenge us – and Zeller’s play so well delivered by Tiana James on her directorial debut ably assisted by cast and creatives certainly provides the chance to be challenged in all the best ways.
“The Mother” is showing at The Mission Theatre from July 16th-19th 2025, at 7.30pm. Tickets from https://www.missiontheatre.co.uk/tickets/the-mother
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