An abusive encounter with a primary school child sparks a provocative witch-hunt in this sharp new work exploring society’s complex relationship with women, written by Helen Edmundson.
What is so striking about this play is the manner in which a simple catalyst sparks such a frustrating, horrifying chain of events. Some Woman centres upon Julie (Anne-Marie Duff), whose life appears to be spiralling in front of her, with her home going on the market, a complex relationship with her divorced husband Richard (Geoffrey Streatfeild), and an even more difficult connection with daughters Kate (Hannah Onslow) and Ginny (Grace Doherty). Yet it is a chance encounter with a child who slings slurs at her one evening at a train station that propels Julie into an outrageous court case, taking her to a much darker, more introspective place.
At its core, Edmundson’s work is an interrogation of how women are treated and perceived in twenty-first-century Britain. While the play’s delivery is far from subtle, the extremity of how Julie is treated, from the initial offence through to the utterly incredulous escalation of her prosecution, is impressively infuriating. Yet amid the disbelief of what is happening to Duff’s protagonist, the play offers plenty of moments for reflection, scrutinising how women, particularly middle-aged women, are victims of society’s changing attitudes to gender, as well as the impossible balance of motherhood, marriage, and career.
As Julie, Duff is exceptional at capturing a character at the end of her tether almost from the very beginning. Edmundson’s script is a little disarming, with all the other characters who surround Julie, including her family, directed by Blanche McIntyre in a way that makes them feel almost like caricatures, allowing Julie to be the only character with a clear sense of development. It is a little jarring to reconcile during the play’s exposition, yet as the one-act piece progresses, it is the shocking decline of Julie’s character, and her noble desperation to clear her name and assert herself, for herself, that Duff delivers so remarkably.
In this sense, one could draw parallels to Arthur Miller’s The Crucible, with Julie here similar to Miller’s protagonist John Proctor, falsely accused and keen to protect his reputation regardless of consequence. Julie does the same here eventually, but the modern-day witch-hunt that occurs, the play suggests, happens because she is a woman and society can get away with it. Nevertheless, the manner in which the child’s accusations escalate against Julie is terrifying, as is the horrific showdown between Julie and the child’s father (Stephen Wight) towards the play’s climax.
That said, it is a play that struggles to find its voice fully. The outlandish nature of how Julie’s persecution unfolds draws some laughter from the audience, which undermines some of the play’s tension. Julie’s difficult relationship with Kate is explored deftly in a neat duologue, but the latter’s character slips into a lot of shouting and finger-pointing, which feels a little obstructive. Moreover, the play feels a little too convenient at times, such as Daniel Millar’s headteacher, Mr Dunster, who appears to abandon all safeguarding and GDPR protocols in an exchange that pushes the audience to suspend their disbelief a little too far.
What is impressive, though, about Some Woman is how the play lingers long after it ends. The situation Julie finds herself in seems mad, yet underneath the hysteria, Edmundson does a slick job in the script to draw out the essence that Julie is only in this place, bullied and derided, because of her gender. While the events feel a little out of control, it is the message underneath, and Duff’s remarkable presentation of a woman caught in the crossfire of society’s insecure, preposterous attitude to what a woman should be, that lands with full force here.
