WORTH A LOOK?: ****1/2

WHEN?: Wednesday 11 November 2026 and runs through 13 January 2027 RUNTIME: 165 minutes (including a 30-minute interval)

Caryl Churchill’s most recent play – Triumph at the Almeida – lasted 20 minutes and this revival of 1 of her best loved works from 1979 has an interval which is 10 minutes longer.

• Read on for reasons including including how we absolutely loved its sweary complexity, inhibition and unwillingness to be bound by traditional form

The reason is because act 1 is set in British colonial Africa in the Victorian era with a traditional proscenium arch decorated as a picture frame (family portrait above) and act 2 demolishes the frame with members of the audience seated at the back and side of the stage in the debris as the action moves to 1979 despite the characters only ageing 25 years.

It sounds overly complicated but director Dominic Cooke (Mrs Warren’s Profession, Garrick Theatre) is the new artistic director at the Almeida and provides the safe hands for this very funny, cross-dressing and sexually provocative piece to run riot.

In Africa Sam Troughton (Juniper Blood, Donmar Warehouse), of whom more later, is colonial administrator Clive cheating on his wife Betty, a hilarious Stuart Thompson (Cleansed, Almeida), who has her heart set on troubled explorer Tom Mothersdale (A Doll’s House, Almeida) who has overly affectionate relationships with the couple’s young son and their servant Joshua, a fabulously insolent servant given life by Eloka Ivo (Black Superhero, Royal Court).

Throw in Rebecca Humphries as both the object of Clive’s affection and a governess making unwanted lesbian advances to his wife and the scene is set for a quite mad exploration of what Victorian society expected of both men and women.

A 30-minute interval has to be hard-earned and the good news is here it most definitely is.

We weren’t invited into the onstage seating but audience members occasionally move on the periphery of the action while actors switch roles and scenes juggle ideas of polyamory, incest, open relationships and lesbian fulfillment.

As in the 1st act children’s nurturing to adopt traditional gender roles is explored with Troughton (pictured below) incredible as toddler Cathy.

Humphries (pictured above) literally has her hands full in Act 2 as the toddler’s lesbian mother with a soldier brother under fire in the Northern Ireland conflict as she contemplates how to woo a bi-curious Victoria given vivid life by Charlotte Ritchie who is straightjacketed by her annoying author husband played by Mothersdale who wants to write from a woman’s point of view.

Ivo is the gay and sexually free Gerry (pictured below) who is cheating on Thompson’s homeloving Edward who isn’t sure exactly what, or who, he wants.

It sounds difficult to follow but we absolutely loved its sweary complexity, inhibition and unwillingness to be bound by traditional form.

It’s a reminder of what an amazing talent Churchill is and remains as her new play opens at the Almeida early next year.

• Main pictures by via Facebook courtesy National Theatre Tickets
• Have you seen a Caryl Churchill play before and what did you think of it? Let us know what you thought in the comments below
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