As director David Gilmore prepares to stage St John Ervine’s Jane Clegg at Finborough Theatre, he tells us about its “handling of a red-hot issue” and why it’s perfect for the acclaimed London pub theatre. Read his insightful interview, then book your tickets!
St John Ervine‘s pre-First World War tale of a woman attempting to escape her marriage premiered in 1913 at Manchester’s Gaiety Theatre, but which has not graced the London stage since 1944. It runs at Finborough Theatre from 23 April to 18 May 2019.
London, 1913. Travelling salesman Henry Clegg has taken his wife, Jane, for granted for most of their marriage. She endures his dishonesty, infidelity and neglect, as well as his demanding mother. But when Henry is accused of embezzling money from his firm and his latest affair is revealed, Jane realises she must finally escape her life of domestic abuse for herself and her children… only to find that for women without money and connections breaking free isn’t so easy.
The title role was originally created by Dame Sybil Thorndike, who performed it in Manchester, when the production transferred to London’s Royal Court Theatre and around the world.
Dame Sybil Thorndike stars in Jane Clegg in 1922
In this new production, Alix Dunmore takes on the role. Dunmore stars opposite Brian Martin, Victoria Lennox, Sidney Livingstone, Matthew Sim, Eve Prenelle & Theo Wilkinson.
Director David Gilmore has directed 17 West End productions in his career to date, including Daisy Pulls it Off, Lend Me a Tenor, The Hired Man and Grease. He’s also worked as Artistic Director of Nuffield Southampton Theatres, the Watermill Theatre and the St James Theatre (now The Other Palace) when it first opened.
Jane Clegg is the third of St John Ervine‘s plays that Finborough Theatre has rediscovered and staged, following 2011’s four-star hit Mixed Marriage, described by Michael Billington in The Guardian as “The most compelling play in London,” and 2014’s John Ferguson.
Finborough Theatre and Andrew Maunder stage Jane Clegg as part of a season that also includes are revival of Lionel Bart’s musical Maggie May and the world premiere of Julia Pascal’s tale of passion, war, women’s freedom and love, Blueprint Medea.
Interview with David Gilmore
How did you get involved with this production of Jane Clegg?
I had seen a number of productions at the Finborough over the years and been impressed by the high standard of programming and production. When I was running the new St James Theatre a few years ago, we transferred a couple of productions in from the Finborough and so began to develop a relationship. It was then a pleasure to be asked if I would like to direct something for them.
What caught your attention about the play?
I was immediately struck by St John Ervine‘s handling of a red-hot issue of the time. It was bang in the middle of the campaign for the emancipation of women in 1913, without being at all ‘preachy’ or lecturing. In fact, he never refers to the political issues of the day. The same cannot always be said of his two contemporaries, George Bernard Shaw and Harley Granville Barker, whose characters often seem to resemble theories rather than flesh and blood people who fall in and out of messy relationships and have a real day to day existence.
What is the play about?
Jane Clegg is a lower middle-class wife and mother of two children. Her husband would best be described perhaps as feckless. He’s a plausible charmer who, if he wants something must have it, whether it be another girl who has caught his eye or gambling with money he doesn’t have, characteristics that, upon their discovery, lead to the dramatic events of the play. Meanwhile his intelligent wife is tied, as most women of her class were, to a life of never-ending drudgery – cooking, cleaning, laundry, ironing, sewing – all day, day after day and all without the aid of washing machines, vacuum cleaners, etc. Her hopes for the future are centred on trying to make a better life for her children.
It’s not been staged in London for 75 years. Why is now a timely opportunity to revive it?
Firstly, it is always instructive to see what daily life was like in the past, in this case the past of our own grandparents (or great-grandparents even). Furthermore, human nature hasn’t changed, and although some great strides have been made in the daily life of women since the 1900s, people can still find themselves locked into relationships and situations which have turned out not to be what they thought they were entering into.
It sounds remarkably modern for a play written more than a century ago. Do you think it was ahead of its time, or have we not moved on as much as we’d like to think?
It was ahead of its time. Not so long before, a play about domestic life would almost certainly have been more sentimental and more melodramatic.
How much research have you done into the time and setting of the piece?
When preparing a play I generally tend to do some general reading around period in which it is set. Over the years I seem to have done quite a number of Victorian and Edwardian plays so am generally well up on the background.
How are you feeling about staging the show at Finborough Theatre?
The play is set in a small, lower middle-class living room. (They probably would have referred to it as ‘the parlour’.) The intimacy of The Finborough could not be better suited to conveying the somewhat cramped and claustrophobic world which the characters inhabit.
Why is theatre a great way of telling this story?
Theatre is a great way to tell any story. In this particular instance, we are in the room with them, we will share every moment – in close up – of their hopes, frustrations, disappointments and disillusionments. I realise that might make it sound a little depressing. It isn’t. There are moments of humour and fun. And, like all good theatre, it is, in the end, life-enhancing.
