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Elisabeth Dermot Walsh as Diana, Flora Spencer-Longhurst as Deborah, Kirsty Besterman as Nancy and Ell Potter as Unity in Swinbrook House, their Oxfordshire home. Pictures Mark Senior The Party Girls Birmingham Rep *** When it came to causes célèbres the Mitford sisters had the market all sewn up in the 1930s, and as for the parties, it could be a Debs’ ball of course, the glittering dating, pre-web apps of the rich and entitled gay young things, or, when it came to the Mitfords, the parties could well be those of the Communists, the Nazis or even the Greens. The six sisters were the children of David Freeman-Mitford, 2nd Baron Redesdale, which gave them title, status and enough wealth to indulge themselves in whatever took their fancy, and Amy Rosenthal's play tries to balance the family life and its conflicts with the divergent politics and lives of the sisters set around world events. It is a broad canvas to fill. The eldest is Nancy, played by Kirsty Besterman, who became a successful novelist and biographer, using her family and society for characters and plots, which was not always appreciated. Divorced she lived in Paris for much of her adult life, dying there in 1973. Next was Pamela, loved by John Betjeman, who grew vegetables and raised pigs, lived a rural life and gets little more than a mention in passing. Breaking up the line of sisters comes the only son, Tom, who gets a similar passing nod to his existence. He was a supporter of fascism, who, as a major in the Devonshires, did not wish to fight against Germans in Europe so was sent to Burma where he died in action in 1945 Back to the sisters and next in line came Diana, played by Elisabeth Dermot Walsh, and perhaps the driving force of the younger sisters. She married into the aristocratic, Irish Guinness family but left four years later embracing fascism and Oswald Mosley, the couple eventually marrying in1936, with a certain Adolf Hitler a honoured guest at the wedding. Diana and Moseley were interned at Holloway Prison during the war, an event which hardly features in the play.
Emma Noakes as Decca with Joe Coen as Bob Her younger sister Unity Valkyrie Mitford, played by Ell Potter, dominates by not so much strength of character as being the biggest, loudest and most outspoken. The family had gold mines in Canada and Unity was reputedly conceived by her parents on a trip out there in the town of Swastika in Ontario, ironic as it turned out. Unity became a poster girl for Nazism, fascism and antisemitism. She adored Hitler, moved to Munich and rumours persist that she even had a secret lovechild with Adolph. Jessica, played by Emma Noakes, is the outlier in this family of fascists. She was a communist and eloped to Spain with Esmond Romilly, a nephew of Winston Churchill, and fought in the Spanish Civil War before moving to the USA. Romilly joined the Royal Canadian Airforce and in 1941 his aircraft, and all on board, was lost at sea returning from a bombing raid on Hamburg. The youngest was Deborah played by Flora Spencer-Longhurst, who to the amusement of her older sisters, declared she would one day marry a duke – which, to give her her due, she did, the Duke of Devonshire, and helped turn Chatsworth House into a stately home success story. That is seven stories that could stand on their own, but the play tries to weave them together with Jessica, with the pet name Decca, the sort of anchor point. After the initial introduction to the sisters, we find her in New York and San Francisco and a hesitant, reluctant almost hostile love story, growing as she waits, with hope in futile defiance of logic, for the return of her husband. Her emotions are being challenged by Bob Treuhaft, played by Joe Coen. Bob is a work colleague, a Jewish lawyer and a fellow communist, with their stumbling love story running thread-like through the play with the plot giving us regular visits to the USA for updates during the war years. The touchstone of Decca and Bob's burgeoning romance is interspersed with visits to the childhood family home, Swinbrook House in Oxfordshire, before the war and again after the war as well as jumping to 1969 and Nancy's home on the rue d’Artois, Versailles, France following her becoming ill and where she will die of Hodgkin’s lymphoma in 1973.
1969 and Nancy's home in Versailles in the outskirts of Paris with Elisabeth Dermot Walsh as Diana, Kirsty Besterman as Nancy,and Flora Spencer-Longhurst as Deborah The flashbacks and jumps in time and place from the 1930s, to WWII, to the USA, Oxfordshire, Paris, the 1960s . . . do seem to break momentum and with so many sisters and so many stories to tell, character development and emotional currency suffer from the necessary brevity. We do get flashes of emotion, such as when the 1969 Decca, in utilitarian dress, unloads on Diana, attacking her Nazi ideology and her almost holocaust denial, or with war approaching, Unity extolling the virtues of her beloved Adolf and the need to exterminate the Jews. Unity was to make her own dramatic statement in Munich soon after war was declared in 1939. It left her brain damaged, her attempt belatedly succeeding nine years later. With so many tales to tell and times and places to visit, you are left with a feeling that this is not so much a journey as a meander around the lives of the Mitfords. If you knew little about them when you sat down at the start, you would not be a lot wiser when you rose to leave. By its very subject there is a sense of comparison with the world's new dalliance with populism. Hitler not only had a disturbing form of charisma but he also had a well honed message that found an audience. He gave them a scapegoat, targeted groups he credited as responsible for all that was wrong with society be it low wages, high prices, unemployment – anything unpopular. Jews, communists, homosexuals . . . they were never remotely the cause of society's ills, but Hitler made them the solution – the final solution in his case. It is beautifully acted and the cast interact and bring the sisters to life, although with so many years and locations and so many lives the interaction seems a little superficial and it is hard to see where the play wants to take us. What we get is a snapshot rather than an examination or explanation. Simon Kenny's set is a fascinating wonder with roll on platforms for the USA, a roll-on bed and backdrop mid stage and the Mitford home in its own box at the back sliding forward to fill the stage and sliding back when its moment had ended. Just a point here. Audience in seats on the flanks can see past the legs into backstage, see actors waiting to entrance and stagehands dressing and operating the platform pulleys. Intriguing to watch the backstage workings but perhaps sight lines could be looked at here. The set, with video information (Dick Straker) on place and time projected on a front scrim appearing at scene changes means they are seamless and fast, and Director Richard Beecham keeps up a good pace. The result is a watchable, interesting and in many ways enjoyable play, but there is a feeling it could have been so much more and had so much more to tell. To 11-10-25 Roger Clarke 06-10-25 |
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