Alice is in a police station cell. She’s 69 years old and she’s mortified. Before we find out what she’s supposed to have done, she will tell us about her life and how it has brought her to this moment.
It’s a story that’ll be achingly familiar to women of Alice’s generation.
As In the Lady Garden opens, Alice (Julia Faulkner) is huddled under her regulation blanket. Woken by the crash of a cell door and the flush of a toilet, she looks terrified – where on earth is the solicitor who’s supposed to be helping her?
But then Alice is off on her monologue, taking us back to her working class childhood, recalling her mother and Auntie Vi drinking tea in the kitchen with their Woodbines behind their ears and their stockings round their ankles, and her own innocence, soon to be shattered by the realisation that little girls’ bodies, unlike those of their male counterparts, are shameful and disgusting,
‘…dark things, things of filth.’
Being bossy and ‘showing off’ must be avoided at all costs. Those things had different names when boys did them.
Throughout her life Alice’s dreams have been ruined. She didn’t especially want to get married and have babies, she’d much rather have had the education that might have offered her a way out of the standard offer for girls like her. Cruelly denied that, she’s made the best she could of life, but it’s been one disappointment (and one tragedy) after another.
Faulkner is a great storyteller; her imitations of her mother, of the snobby, judgemental nuns at her Catholic convent, of Father Flaherty, and of her best friend Enid, provide many laugh-out-loud moments. Enid’s novel use for a vibrator may well improve your life, or at least your cooking.
But for every moment of hilarity there is one of dashed hopes and heartbreaking sadness. Alice’s children see her as a joke; her son wants her to ‘get online and join the 21st century’, her daughter isn’t impressed with feminism, and people blame her for the breakup of her unsatisfactory marriage.
She’s not going to let the world win though, and when a chain of social media-induced circumstances offer Alice the chance of escape, the tables are turned in spectacular fashion, and Alice finds exactly what she’s been looking for ever since those long-gone convent days.
In the Lady Garden will resonate with all women, especially those of a certain age. It’s written, performed and directed by three women in their 60s, and every single thing Alice says will sound familiar to those who grew up in post war Britain, particularly any whose backgrounds are working class.
Eventually we do find out why Alice has been arrested, and more importantly what happens to her after that. From then on the plot is not, I think, intended to be serious; the ending is pure fun, wish fulfilment maybe – but hope springs eternal, and nowadays women who’re finally free of the domestic shackles are doing all sorts of wild things; why not?
I found In the Lady Garden hugely identifiable, if perhaps more for my mother’s generation than my own. We at least had the great benefit of free higher education – maintenance grants even! The 1962 Education Act liberated many baby boomers from the traditional constraints that had denied their mothers the freedom to flourish. Nevertheless, I’m sure most women of my own generation will recognise themselves in other aspects of Alice’s life.
In the Lady Garden is an entertaining and moving piece of theatre, ably delivered by Faulkner, writer Babs Horton and director Deborah Edgington; it may be a little bit silly at times but what’s wrong with that? I’m sure all three women had a good time making it, and I had a good time watching it. What’s not to like?
The Pleasance’s Bunker One fits this show well, and Faulkner made sure she addressed all three sides of the room generously. My only quibble was with the admission of latecomers, which is bad enough in a large theatre but here meant that people were walking across Faulkner’s performing space after the show had started. Please arrive on time!
This week In the Lady Garden has been shortlisted for the 2024 Popcorn Writing Award, which celebrates new writing at the Fringe.
In the Lady Garden is at Venue 33, Pleasance Courtyard (Bunker One), at 14.15 every day until 26th August. Please note there are no shows on Tuesdays 13th and 20th August. Tickets here.
