Abigail’s Party – Royal Exchange

Most of the packed press night audience will have arrived in the Victorian splendour of the Royal Exchange thinking they had a firm idea of what to expect from their evening’s entertainment. This suburban satire is firmly fixed in the collective theatrical imagination, chiefly thanks to the 1977 televised ‘Play For Today’, which confirmed Mike Leigh as a theatrical auteur and launched the stellar acting career of (his then wife) Alison Steadman. However, with this new production, the Royal Exchange has succeeded in demonstrating the bitter and caustic underbelly of this ‘puckish satire on contemporary mores’ without losing the humour at its heart.

Director Natalie Abrahami decides to transpose the action in place but not in time, so we are presented with our Richmond Road setting in suburban Manchester rather than the original Essex – more Didsbury than Romford. The 1977 timeframe remains intact with Peter Butler’s set channelling brown leather sofas and imitation Conran chic and topped with a magnificent fibre optic light dominating the circular set, lifting and closing at the opening and conclusion to reveal the inner lives of the characters within. Music evokes the time and place perfectly, Donna Summer beats added to the inevitable Jose Feliciano and Demis Roussos, creating a Proustian memory for the older audience members.

The move north works well, each of the characters feels freshly minted and authentic in their new setting. Angela (Yasmin Taheri) and Tony (Kyle Rowe) have recently moved into the area and are anxious to make a good impression on the neighbours, their nervousness is beautifully executed with Angela twitteringly accepting copious drinks from her overbearing hostess, whilst Tony is gruffly taciturn, his monosyllabic answers increasingly hilarious throughout the first half. Susan (Tupele Dorgu) represents the established middle-class heart of the neighbourhood, arriving last and with Beaujolais in hand (immediately shoved in the fridge!), she is expecting a dinner party rather than the ‘drinks and nibbles’ she is offered. Susan is the mother of ‘Abigail’ a 15-year-old hosting the eponymous party next door, her initially calm demeanour gives way to drunken paranoia as the evening descends into chaos at both houses.

Our hosts at this hellish gathering are Laurence (Graeme Hawley) and the magnificent creation that is Beverly (Kim Marsh) channelling Lady Macbeth in a maxi dress, she is in complete control of proceedings – until she isn’t. Hawley mines Laurence’s snobbery perfectly, he is obsequious to Susan and looks down on Tony and Angela, showing off his leather-bound Shakespeare and Van Gogh without realising his gauche stupidity. He reserves most of his spite for his wife who reciprocates the feeling fully, Beverly mocks his sexual performance as much as his pretensions, comparing his penis to an olive when explaining why she can’t stand eating them, as Laurence blithely ignores her.

Marsh gives a towering central performance, moving the character of Beverly away from the now ubiquitous version created by Steadman, into something fresher and more relevant to this Manchester audience. Her accent slowly slides down the social scale, reverting to broad Mancunian as she knocks back the gin and tonic, abandoning all social graces, sloshing drinks, spilling fag ash and hurling insults, the revolving stage reflecting this loss of control as we reach the conclusion.

Abrahami allows the first half of the production to follow these conventional lines, the laughter is uproarious as the social pretensions of the 1970s middle class are held up to the light for forensic examination. The prejudices inherent in the script aren’t shied away from with the racial attitudes and misogyny prevalent at the time all intact. Seen through the prism of 2025, we can both see how much has changed and how much remains the same; divorced Sue now seems commonplace but Tony’s character is especially chilling in his threatening control over Angela, strikingly modern in the era of toxic masculinity.

After the interval the satirical heart of the play is given much more precedence, displaying the bitter anger of the two couples to each other in a way that presages Leigh’s later social realism. The humour still streaks through the piece but the end is inescapably dark, when Beverly shrieks at the conclusion it is heart-rending and brings a very different tone at the curtain than the audience initially could have expected.

Verdict: Adding northern soul to a classic story, this ‘Abigail’s Party’ is one you will want to turn up to…

Reviewer: Paul Wilcox

Reviewed: 9th April 2025

North West End UK Rating: