Theatre / Reviews
Review: The Beautiful Future is Coming, Bristol Old Vic – ‘A shocking and sharp call to action, and an urgent triumph from Nancy Medina’
You may have noticed a native field maple garlanding the foyer at Bristol Old Vic in recent weeks, celebrating the arrival of Nancy Medina’s third production as Artistic Director: The Beautiful Future Is Coming.
As Medina’s tenure takes shape, we are beginning to develop a sense of what to expect from her work. The productions so far have been written, rather than devised, and have tackled themes of social justice.
Another hallmark of Medina’s work is the outstanding performances she is able to get out of actors, and in this, as well as the other two characteristics, The Beautiful Future Is Coming is no exception.
Phoebe Thomas and Matt Whitchurch as Eunice and John
The central subject of Flora Wilson Brown’s play is climate change, and this topic is portrayed through three stories spanning two centuries. Aldo Vásquez’s set intelligently caters to this triple-timeline, blending and bleeding each world into the next to indicate the pernicious quality of this multi-generational threat.
Medina’s directorial decision to have characters from each world overlap in transition feeds further into the presentation of climate change as fundamentally insidious, contributing to this confident production’s cohesion and clarity.
Each of the three stories features a different pairing: Eunice (Phoebe Thomas) and John (Matt Whitchurch) in the past, Claire (Nina Singh) and Dan (Michael Salami) in the present, and Ana (Rosie Dwyer) and Malcom (James Bradwell) in the future.
Michael Salami and Nina Singh as Dan and Claire
In 1850s New York, Eunice makes a significant breakthrough in the study of carbon and its emission as CO₂. Her achievement is ignored by the bloated patriarchal institutions of the day, and she considers using her husband John as her nom de plume.
Thomas’ acting is superb, holding tightly the exasperated expression of a clever woman in a stupid system. Whitchurch too is fantastic, and carries much of the energy and momentum in these scenes as John tries to gee up an often resigned and despondent Eunice.
In contemporary London, Dan and Claire are colleagues who have started dating. Claire is Dan’s professional senior, and the gender politics of this dynamic are softly but smartly touched upon, helping to convey the feminist messaging of the play without it feeling cack-handed.
James Bradwell and Rosie Dwyer as Malcom and Ana
Singh gives a particularly exceptional performance, bringing a deeply persuasive naturalism and candour to the role. Salami’s grief later in the play is brilliantly performed, and will have severe consequences. I found the writing occasionally unconvincing in this section of the play – Dan’s romantic behaviour on the day of a funeral struck me as far-fetched. And Venice is certainly a strange place to visit during a fatal elevation of European water levels.
Lastly, in 2100 Ana and Malcom are trapped in a research facility in Svalbard. The world at this point is unrecognisable, and the colleagues are working to establish the viability of a particular grain in combating climate-driven food scarcity.
Bradwell’s is a stand-out performance. He intentionally stumbles and stutters his way through a horrifyingly detailed monologue that describes the death of his parents, in the play’s most powerful moment. Dwyer too is fantastic, barely suppressing the anxiety of being heavily pregnant and isolated in a world whose future looks anything but beautiful.
Phoebe Thomas (Eunice), Nina Singh (Claire) and Rosie Dwyer (Ana)
In landing so close to home, art risks becoming part of the furniture. In telling so unsmilingly the truth, stories risk losing their ‘story-ness’. But Wilson Brown’s script – a feminist call for climate justice set as a triptych across 250 years – is certainly an ambitious one. I had difficulty in feeling deeply for the characters, I think largely because the protagonist of this play is basically planet Earth. And we are already acting out the narrative.
All in all, this production brings the climate crisis into stark focus. The Beautiful Future Is Coming is an urgent triumph from Nancy Medina. It is a shocking and sharp call to action. The Future Is Coming, if we like it or not. Whether it’s beautiful is up to us.
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The Beautiful Future is Coming is at Bristol Old Vic on May 15-June 7; times vary. Tickets are available at www.bristololdvic.org.uk.
The Festival of Nature runs in Bristol and Bath from June 7-15. For more information, visit www.bnhc.org.uk.
All photos: Ellie Kurttz
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