“Somehow it was personal for them as well… people who, when they were children, found books safer than other people…” – Neil Gaiman
Ocean at the End of the Lane was adapted for the stage by the National Theatre from the magical, surrealist book by acclaimed fantasy author Neil Gaiman, reaching the West End in 2021. After its critically-acclaimed run in the West End, Ocean is now on its first national tour around the UK, and I was privileged to catch it at the Bradford Alhambra.
This is a story following a Boy’s relationship with the three strange women that have occupied Hempstock farm for as long as anyone can remember. He encounters strange creatures on the edges of reality, and soon finds that he can no longer tell where imagination stops and real life begins as an intruder begins to infiltrate his home.
You need to see Ocean to believe what it accomplishes with its action sequences, intricate puppets and the complexity of its choreography. Everything from movement, set, costumes to puppetry and props compounds to create a stunning visual experience that is novel in theatre right now, and situate you with ease in the mind of a child with too much imagination.
The best performances are, without a doubt, the work of the ensemble. Whether giving life to a puppet-monster, an object, or a bundle of thorns, they commit completely. They move as one entity with an exact precision, fluid enough that they blend into the background, manipulating the characters like the unseen forces of the spirit world. As they done their costumes to become hunger birds, their squawking and flapping inspires a child-like terror that took me back to what it felt like to feel shadows moving around my bed in the dark. (Note that this is a play about being a kid, not for kids – leave your poor child at home to avoid many sleepless nights!)
The sound design by Ian Dickinson is masterful, underscoring the action delicately and taking the reigns to deliver an emotional sucker-punch that will leave you reeling.
Millie Hikasa is an expressive, lyrical south-western farm girl full of cheerful optimism. Keir Ogiluy plays a nervy, frantic, bookish boy with all the mannerisms of a 12-year-old others might call strange. Trevor Fox is a warm, likeable Dad, struggling to be present emotionally for his children while suffering through grief and financial troubles. Finty Williams shines as Old Mrs Hempstock, an eccentric old woman with an air of witchery about her.
Frustratingly, I found that for many of the opening scenes and moments in the Hempstock and Boy’s kitchen, we get swept away in the pace of the action and rushed delivery, the actors hardly taking a breath in between their lines and feel the unspoken weight of what they’re going through. This had the effect of, in some places, leaving me checked out waiting for the next magical action sequence.
Ocean is theatre at its very best. It makes a firm commitment to its premise and no expense is spared to transport you into Gaiman’s nightmare-ish world (props to Jamie Harrison, the Magic and Illusions Director and Designer.) Ocean expresses the often-overlooked terror of being a child in a world run by adults who are scary, unpredictable, and all-powerful, governed by laws you are expected to follow without truly comprehending them; and yet, there is a beauty in it that we are sad to lose.
Playing until 8th April, https://www.bradford-theatres.co.uk/venues/the-alhambra-theatre
Reviewer: Bo Warner
Reviewed: 4th April 2023
North West End UK Rating: ★★★★