A few hundred feet from this theatre stands a statue of Bradford’s favourite son J B Priestley, so it was fitting this perfectly realised revival of his enduring drama was coming home after becoming a worldwide hit.
On one level it is a clever thriller with a smart twist, but on a deeper level it remains a searing condemnation of the cult of the individual – which is the essence of capitalism – written by a lifelong socialist who survived the horrors of the trenches in the First World War.
Some theatre goers might find the political undercurrent a turnoff, so can just enjoy a mysterious police inspector calling on the well to do Birling family in their mansion where he strips bare their Edwardian hypocrisy as he reveals their culpability in the suicide of a destitute young working-class woman.
If don’t want the politics then you should really stick to bright and breezy musicals because this is an angry work written when an optimistic Britain had just elected Atlee, and his vision of care to grave care that didn’t exist in 1912 when there was nothing for the poor, especially women.
Ian MacNeil’s design delivered a set that’s quite simply a masterpiece, with a miniature version of the Birling’s mansion where they revel in their wealth that stands high over the squalor of the town of Brumley where they made their fortune on the back of the locals. The set becomes an additional member of the cast ingeniously opening and closing to create different scenes and moods that is a tribute to a designer at the very top of his trade.
An Inspector Calls is such an enduring piece it’s still on the GCSE syllabus, and a strong cast did really well to keep going as a large and raucous school party seemed to think at times it was panto season cheering and whopping whenever the stage action heated up.
Stephen Daldry originated the revival at the National Theatre in 1992 as he had vision to see it was still relevant, and as always, his direction is subtle, never overplaying the themes, and recognising that this is also a thriller.
Jeffery Harmer’s Arthur Birling is full of the bluster of an insecure ‘self-made’ man who boasts about self-reliance yet exploits everyone, and Beth Tuckey is suitably awful as his snobby, convention bound wife Sybil who uses her status as power. Simon Cotton is wonderfully thick as self-serving Hooray Henry Gerald Croft, and George Rowland showed great potential as pathetic drunk Eric Birling.
Sparks really fly between Liam Brennan’s sly Inspector Goole as he forensically rips apart the self-serving Birlings, and Chloe Orrock’s Sheila Birling, who is the only one of that awful family to get why the policeman is doing what he is doing. Orrock’s skillfully played journey from spoiled young woman to a kind of redemption offers some hope a new generation might learn from the mistakes of their supposed elders and betters.
Wandering back from the Alhambra through Bradford’s city square where some of Britain’s dispossessed and marginalised gather you can’t help but see that Priestley’s message that we are at our best when we stand together as a fair society is still as pertinent as it was the day he submitted his final draft.
An Inspector Calls is Alhambra Bradford until Saturday May 13th. To book 01274 432000 or www.bradford-theatres.co.uk
Reviewer: Paul Clarke
Reviewed: 9th May 2023
North West End UK Rating: