5/5
Review by John P. Harvey.
Melanie Tait, playwright, and Ensemble Theatre, who together brought you The Appleton Ladies’ Potato Race, have produced another humorous look at human relationships and their societal context, this time focusing on what leads a royal nanny to become a pioneer of insider royalty news and how her relationships with royalty changes as a result.
The play’s seven characters are handled by three actors. We initially meet, in a scene that frames the story, the retired nanny, Marion Crawford (Elizabeth Blackmore), and a journalistic narrator. In the second scene, the narrator introduces us to Elizabeth (Emma Palmer), Duchess of York, who later becomes Queen and then Queen Mother; and her husband, George, Duke of York, who later becomes King George VI. The third scene has Marion meet the elder daughter, Elizabeth, who later becomes Queen Elizabeth II. It is Elizabeth and her younger sister, Margaret, whom Marion is hired to look after and educate.
These meetings set the tone of the relationships that will play out in the 17 years for which Marion leaves her own life and family ambitions aside to raise the daughters of royalty.
The play’s action occurs in several locations, all represented by the one striking set, with some variation in props. What most clearly and dramatically indicates a change of scene is the play’s clever use of changes in the character whom a particular actor represents. Matthew Backer played no fewer than five characters — and astonishingly managed to make each one instantly recognisable via voice and mannerism alone, though it must be said that Melanie Tait’s sharp ear for language use by different English and Scottish speakers played an essential part in that.
Funny and heartbreaking, ironic and insightful, The Queen’s Nanny opens eyes and hearts as it takes us on Marion’s journey, in which George, the Duke of York, and his wife, Elizabeth, take contrasting attitudes to Marion, whose love for their daughters shapes our best-known monarch, Queen Elizabeth II. Melanie Tait’s fictionalisation of the play’s closely researched intimate relationships deserves wide exposure for Marion’s influence alone; but the play’s performance on opening night could hardly be improved on. Lively; physically embodying sometimes conflicting, sometimes surprisingly harmonious values; with speech and action articulated and timed to perfection; and supported by impeccable control of lighting, sound effects, and audio, it was utterly believable and a joy to behold.
The production is in Canberra for a very short time before touring New South Wales.