Jennifer (Anastasia Hille) is about to marry the never-seen John and become stepmother to Delilah (Erin Kellyman) in Anna Ziegler’s Evening All Afternoon. The play switches between extended addresses to the audience and scenes playing out between the two women grappling at being thrown together. Her father’s remarriage leaves Delilah consumed by grief over her mother’s death, leading to hallucination as she speaks with her dead mother.
Delilah’s cheekiness pushing and testing Jennifer, feeling at liberty to really press on issues contrast strongly with Jennifer’s primness, never even untucking her blouse as disdainfully noted by Delilah. Delilah’s mother was younger than her father, Jennifer is a full decade older than John. Boomer and Gen Z and there is a gap there at once, with Jennifer having to look up things Delilah says. There’s a really interesting contrast between Jennifer, prim and proper and conservative, white English, and what little we learn from Delilah about her mother, Jamaican American, outgoing – even gregarious and we pick up little pieces on this but it’s left there too shallow to really do anything with, the cultural undertone underplayed and the contrast really just lying there.
Their backgrounds are so different, Jennifer living up to that reserved British stereotype, aware of it and okay with it, Delilah so different, a sense of loss and being in the wrong location crashing up against Jennifer’s reservedness. Jennifer searches for some sort of common ground, some language she can use to connect further with Delilah. Hille brings a poise and a restraint to Jennifer, playing the frustration well and never letting us think that the prim and proper British stiff upper lip is all there is, there are clear emotions flowing underneath. Kellyman has a bigger presence, the younger American not fitting a brash stereotype but more vivid and obviously full of life. Kellyman is particularly good at showing the loss Delilah feels for her mother. Together, the cast are the strongest elements of the production.
The script often feels unfilled, Delilah’s eventual breakdown feels very undertreated; she is hearing voices and hallucinating, but this just leads to conversations about a wobble and a hug. It comes across as surprisingly lightweight and somewhat unserious. Setting this during the Covid pandemic feels slightly forced. The two women are already isolated and lonely in their own ways, throwing this on top feels a bit like overreach. It is too broad and treated too shallowly. We miss out on a real sense of their living conditions or how Delilah’s already tricky education was affected.
There are some striking pieces of set design. A minimalist almost empty stage, all pointed blue but with a resolve allowing the two to face off against each other, literally circling each other, forced together by their different relationships with John. The small but powerful use of shadow puppets is excellent, a first use to set the scene and then later with small props is a beautiful scene. As Delilah talks with her mother, lightbulbs drop from the ceiling presenting the memory or hallucination and eventually form a simple beautiful chorus above.
While the cast are strong, it is difficult to connect. We spend so little time with the characters, and it is rarely enough; we get only a superficial look into small aspects of their lives. The characters and their conflicts are compelling in concept, but too much is left unexplored. With more focus, Evening All Afternoon could have been a powerful evening. Instead, it feels sometimes close but ultimately shallow.
Evening All Afternoon plays at Donmar Warehouse until 11th April, https://www.donmarwarehouse.com/
Reviewer: Dave Smith
Reviewed: 25th February 2026
North West End UK Rating: