Review - My Mother Said I Never Should - People's Theatre

My Mother Said I Never Should 

People's Theatre 

14th Sept 2021

People's Theatre re-opened this week with a belter of a play. My Mother said I never Should is an examination of the mother/daughter relationship. Spanning decades we meet Doris, Margaret, Jackie and Rosie - four generations of mothers and daughters living through very different times,. None of them are entirely comfortable  with their role as mother or daughter nor with society's expectation of them. 

The relationships between the women are often uncomfortable and abrasive. Love it seems is given begrudgingly and affection if shown, is quickly dismissed. 

We first meet the all together as children reciting a nursery rhyme and then summoning granny from beyond the grave to help them kill mummy. This dark introduction  with its supernatural undertones is unnerving, and seems out of place as the play moves to the next scene - Doris and Margaret in war-time Manchester preparing for bed amid an air raid. Margaret seeks reassurance from Her mother, but Doris responds with  brusqueness and her "no nonsense" attitude leaves 8yr old Margaret alone with her doll as the planes drone overhead.. 

The play flits forward in time and we see Margaret with her own daughter, a rebellious teenage Alice.  The situation is different but the tone of the conversation similar, though this time the rebellious Alice dismisses her mother rather than the mother dismissing the daughter.. This supplication and rejection recurrs throughout the play between each of the women. We see each woman at her most vulnerable and her most resilient - though the resilience manifests as stubbornness, or argumentativeness, or simply turning in on herself and cutting out the mother/daughter. Through their interaction with each other we gradually piece together their stories - we discover their dreams and their disappointments, and we begin to understand why their relationships are so difficult. It is not that they don't love each other, simply that the love comes at a price - the price is duty, and sacrifice, and lost dreams. 

Maggie Childs, Anna Dobson, Emma Jane Robson and Theus De'Ath give convincing performances. They draw us in to their characters and show us their truth - their strengths and their weaknesses. We may not always like them, they make us uncomfortable at times, but we do understand them. 

After 18 months of Covid closure you might expect the theatre to opt for a guaranteed-bums-on-seats crowd-pleaser for their season opener., but true to their inimitable style, the People's Theatre have chosen a thought-provoking, challenging play about the nature of love, the expectations and restrictions of society, and under the direction of Mark Burden, have executed it with precision.  

My Mother Said I Never Should runs until Sat 18th tickets are available online at www.peoplestheatre.co.uk 

Denise Sparrowhawk