Theatre / Reviews
Review: Steptoe & Son, Old Vic
Steptoe & Son, the well-known and well-loved sitcom from the BBC in the 1960s, has been replanted from black and white television to the stage of the Bristol Old Vic, where four episodes have been transformed into a brand new theatrical production about the famous rag and bone men business.
Steptoe & Son – Kirsty WoodwardLondon has been swapped for the West Country in this show by Cornwall’s Kneehigh, adapted and directed by Emma Rice in a co-production with West Yorkshire Playhouse.
It stars a larger than life Dean Nolan (below) as dreamer Harold, a gap-toothed Mike Shepherd as his dad Albert, and Kirsty Woodward (right) as a variety of incidental characters from a bunny girl to a housewife working a mangle.
Harold and Albert bicker and fight but their family bonds keep them together, despite Harold’s constant threats that he is going to leave for a better life.
At one point, Harold gets ready to pull away their cart away like a horse. In lieu of a real animal, Albert transforms himself with two big furry ears and a canter.
The stories told are brief, and by virtue of their brevity mostly unexplained. Rather than telling four, Steptoe & Son could have worked better telling just one.
But the performances of all three actors are terrific. In his first Kneehigh production, Nolan is especially good as a sort of man-child striving to break free of his father.
His dreams occasionally lucidly come to life, as when he doffs a pink shirt to go dancing at the Ritz, and when quite marvellously at the beginning of the second half, he and Woodward become a flower power couple.
He always comes crashing back to earth back home, however, where a chipped plate is something to be savoured and the father and son love is real. There is an especially touching scene when the pair help to dress each other, their shared clothes emblematic of their shared lives.
Extra period detail comes from the music, as records by Cliff Richard, the Rolling Stones and Louis Armstrong are put on the record player and danced and sung.
Familiar characters take on new lives in a show that is funny, tender and surprising at every turn of its characters’ braces, string vests and bunny outfits.
Steptoe & Son is at Bristol Old Vic until February 9. Click here for more information.
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