Review: Never Let Me Go, Bristol Old Vic – ‘Chilling, compulsive and totally devastating’

Kazuo Ishiguro’s international best-selling novel Never Let Me Go arrives on stage at the Bristol Old Vic in this world premiere of Suzanne Heathcote’s gripping new adaptation.

Under Christopher Haydon’s accomplished direction, this rich and thought-provoking fantasy is given a riveting theatrical life.

Visualising a contemporary England in which clones are bred for the express purpose of organ donation, the quietly horrifying narrative occupies a liminal space in which memory, time and reality collide.

It challenges us to think about what it means to be human: what it means to have hope and heart; to love and to lose. At its centre, it also poses a cruel question: what if the whole reason for being was not about your life but about making someone else’s possible?

The play opens in a bland but cryptic medical facility, where sensitive Kathy (Nell Barlow) is tending to a young man who is about to have an operation. Kathy has been a ‘carer’ for 11 years, yet she is anything but a medical professional.

When the man discovers that Kathy went to a school called Hailsham – a word that elicits a response of fear and awe from all who hear it – he demands more details about her life and experiences.

Parallel narratives of past and present are woven together, as we follow Kathy’s memories from her powerfully impactful experiences and relationships formed at Hailsham through to her adulthood.

From the outset, there are subtle undertones of the unspoken treatment that will befall the children once leaving Hailsham – they are clones raised only for their organs to be harvested to save the rest of humanity from killer diseases.

The adolescent dramas of Kathy, Ruth and Tommy provide a welcome distraction. Hailsham represents the golden childhood which everyone would wish to look back on – pranks, caring teachers and a beautiful place to grow up in.

But this paradise is shattered during the play as the true meaning of their lives overtakes the relative innocence of their childhood.

Although Kathy has complicated relationships with her best friend Ruth (Matilda Bailes) and her eventual lover Tommy (Angus Imrie), at the core of Never Let Me Go is the enduring nature of love and friendship.

Director Haydon keeps the action moving and gives the actors space as they burst through the walls of Tom Piper’s suitably clinical set, representing figures from Kathy’s memories or present-day medical staff involved in the organ removal.

The ensemble cast are terrific, as they are asked to follow a number of characters from childhood, into their late teens and adulthood. There are several standout performances, particularly Imrie as Tommy, who can swing from funny and charming to fits of uncontrollable anger.

Matilda Bailes, as his girlfriend, strikes a particularly poignant tone as the brittle, bitter Ruth that later implodes to reveal her hurt, uncertainty and insecurity. One of the highlights of the unfolding narrative is the interplay between Kathy and Ruth, who is slowly crushed by the knowledge that her time as a healthy person is so limited.

And then there is Barlow’s quietly compelling performance as the ever-present Kathy, unsettled at what she learns but powerless to fight against it. She carefully portrays the deep-rooted, unchosen melancholy, and both her glimpses of anguish and brief moments of joy are painful and affecting.

Kathy and Tommy clinging to each other in the stark face of reality makes for a heartbreaking, unforgettable scene that has some of the audience in tears.

Throughout the play, while friendships and romances form, flourish and fail, there is a prevailing and unsettling bass note of disquiet. And this is borne out by the ingenuity of Piper’s staging, which manages to take the grim story and combine with false sunny normality.

Joshua Carr’s lighting bathes the whole set in a halcyon glow of childhood memories before the cruel reveal of the true nightmare. The presence of high walls reflects a lot of light, yet somehow the effect is claustrophobic and invokes a sense of foreboding.

For audiences, the triangle of emotions that exist between Kathy, Ruth and Tommy will resonate with anyone who has ever been in love and anyone who has lost that love. But at its heart, Never Let Me Go is a tale of hope and how, even when hope is gone, there is still love.

Chilling, compulsive and totally devastating, this thoroughly engrossing, thought-provoking play needs to be seen.

Never Let Me Go is at Bristol Old Vic on November 5-23 at 7.30pm, with additional 2.30pm matinee shows on Thursday and Saturday (no shows on Sunday). Tickets are available at www.bristololdvic.org.uk. The show is a co-production between Bristol Old Vic and Malvern Theatres, Rose Theatre, and the Royal & Derngate, Northampton.

All photos: Hugo Glendinning

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