Review: THE UNBELIEVERS at Royal Court Theatre

Perhaps best known for Constellations, playwright Nick Payne is a writer of audacity and precision in his conjuring of dialogue. On a human level, the results are invariably real and messy and as a consequence, breathtakingly powerful and insistently demanding of our attention.

Over the course of seven years, as a family deal collectively and individually with the emotional fallout of 15-year-old son Oscar’s disappearance, we learn how each member of the family develop their own mechanisms for coping with the loss. Some manage to continue moving forward with their lives without being consumed by grief through the deployment of distractions such as ham fisted seances. Others cultivate new relationships or make bold decisions to move away from the family home via conveniently cultivated attachments.

On a split set within which the excellent cast members linger in a dimly lit, all-purpose upstage waiting room, the dialogue driven scenes take place downstage and are invariably raucous. Nicola Walker in the central mother role, acts as the light keeper, denying any suggestion that her son is dead and refusing any attempt to celebrate his memory until all leads and every single piece of evidence has been thoroughly investigated. The clash of procedure versus urgency is a familiar theme in such stories and the never-ending line of policemen, case workers, social workers, priests and others, is enough to drive any fretting parent mad or indeed, furious. There are occasions when argument dialogue overlaps to such an extent that lines get lost, but this reflection of an average family struck down by trauma, needs the chaos to truly come to life.

Marianne Elliott’s ensemble approach in directing the family meeting scenes and formal dinner, are filled with potential for antagonism, frustration and conflict. Unsurprisingly, rarely do any of the scenes play out without an almighty flare-up, but again this seems in keeping with the piece. The problems, when they come, are inevitably related to sequencing and an odd abandonment of chronology which leaves several scenes marooned in the midst of urgent moments. It doesn’t ruin the play, but it is frequently jarring and yet doesn’t appear to add anything of notable value.

Ultimately this gripping family drama taps into the zeitgeist for negotiating private grief in a loud and accelerating world. The focus remains firmly on people throughout, with the cast (Isabel Adomakoh Young, Alby Baldwin, Jaz Singh Deol, Paul Higgins, Ella Lily Hyland, Harry Kershaw, Martin Marquez, Lucy Thackeray and Nicola Walker) delivering a multitude of frazzled, emphatic, neurotic, becalmed, stilted, over-familiar and other assorted personalities and mental states during the course of the play. It often makes for funny viewing, followed inevitably by harsh and uncomfortable scenes.

The Unbelievers plays at Royal Court Theatre until 29 November