‘Finest start to season we could have hoped for’
The 2024 season at Chichester Festival Theatre opens with Mike Poulton’s adaptation of Philippa Gregory’s novel, The Other Boleyn Girl.
What the historians among you must realise is that it’s an adaptation of a novel based on historical events – so not everything the play presents as fact is, indeed, fact.
That, however, doesn’t detract from a banging show.
Following, essentially, the rise and fall of Anne Boleyn through the story of her relationships with her family including sister Mary, let’s start with a big hats-off to director Lucy Bailey and her creative team.
The set looms, menacingly; dark, shadowy, the suggestion of movement on the upper levels. It’s black, it’s white, it’s grey.
The costuming, however, suggests the palette of Caravaggio and the lighting is also suggestive of that artist’s work.
Then there’s the music –
The Other Boleyn Girl Chichester Festival Theatre
played live on stage by Nitai Levi, Chris Green and Sarah Harrison – that suggests Tudor music but isn’t.
And what of the performances?
Well, there’s no-one in there that lets the side down; this is a strong, strong cast. That’s not to say any of the Boleyns are likeable.
Anne – as played by the splendid Freya Mavor – is an out-and-out brat; spoilt, demanding, selfish. Sister Mary – the wonderful Lucy Phelps – is the only one of them you’d want to spend social time with; she’s the most human and caring.
The sexually-ambivalent George Boleyn is played by the very effective James Corrigan; effective because he makes George likeable, so when the truth of the other aspect of his relationship with his sister Anne becomes clear you feel truly sickened.
Alex Kingston, as the mother of the three siblings, and Andrew Woodall, as her brother, are both excellent, wringing much humour from their characters’ singleminded determination to make one of the girls – or both – the lover of the king. Kemi-bo Jacobs makes a fine job of the conniving (though greatly wronged!) Katherine of Aragon.
It’s atmospheric, it’s funny, it’s dark and it’s a treat.
Quite possibly the finest start to the season we could have hoped for.