DIRECTOR'S NOTES

The Winslow Boy is a play by a very gifted playwright, Terence Rattigan, who has undeservedly fallen out of favour in recent years. I came across him several years ago and have read many of his full-length plays and become a Rattigan fan!

This play is based on the true story of a family in England over 100 years ago. They started a legal case against the Crown and this play follows their real-life journey over a two-year period just before the start of World War 1.

Terence Rattigan very cleverly locates the action entirely within the drawing room of the family’s Kensington home and brings different characters to the room over this period. Reporters, lawyers, family friends and servants all enter the room to progress the story. In today’s terms it is a relatively long play, but Rattigan keeps the action moving.

Fascinatingly, the story shows us the parallels between family life 110 years ago compared with what we know today. We meet a retired bank manager who worries whether his superannuation is sufficient to fund his children’s education and set them up for life. We have parents complaining about the modern music of the day that their son plays on his device – that is “blessed ragtime” music on a gramophone machine! We have gender equality and pay-gap issues being discussed by the daughter who works for the suffragette movement. We have a family providing care and support to an employee with an intellectual disability.

Even more interestingly, we see the social media of the day. Both in true life and in the play, the legal case very much entered public awareness in England. The case was debated in the House of Commons and certainly polarised public opinion. Letters were written to the newspapers – some wholeheartedly supporting the family and some condemning the family for wasting parliament’s time.

And the result? Well – no spoilers here I’m afraid! At the play’s end, all will be revealed!

- Meredith McQueen