Review: Relics (Lyric Hammersmith Theatre)

Review by Ruth Sealey

⭐️⭐️⭐️

It is quite a sobering thought to ponder what we leave behind when we die, and what value will be placed on the things we collected and curated during our lifetime. Relics, playing at the Lyric Hammersmith, brings that inevitability into sharp focus, exploring the value of our worldly possessions and what they mean to those we leave behind. Would this play prompt the audience to reconsider the legacy they leave behind and reflect on how we are remembered when we are gone?

Gathering at the home of their recently deceased mother, siblings Rob, Olivia, Michelle, and Jonny come together in order to sort through her possessions. This was never going to be a smooth process, as the family reunites with grief and humour playing out in equal measure, and frustrations and conflicts are laid bare for the audience. As well as questions about how well you truly know your own family, Relics manages to add a whole other dimension when a family secret emerges and threatens to divide them further.

Written by Ben Ockrent, Relics starts with a deceptively simple premise that most audience members will have experienced themselves or inevitably face in the future. How do you decide what to keep and what to let go? Who inherits family heirlooms,and how are those decisions made? From this situation, Ockrenthas the makings of a compelling family drama, but sadly, thesituation goes around in circles for far too long, without ever really leading us anywhere. The siblings spend much of their time arguing about tree-preservation orders and council planningregulations, subjects that feel drawn out and covered in far moredetail than is really necessary.

The four sibling characters do each have a distinct voice and potentially interesting character arcs, but it takes far too long into the play to reveal their true motivations for wanting to keep or sell the heirloom. By the time these details emerge, almost at the end of Act 2, I found myself far less invested in their stories than I should have been. Had these motivations been exposed earlier, they would have added far greater weight to the siblings’arguments, indecision, and ensuing conflict.

Ockrent’s story twists and turns, and he has chosen to mix comedy with a serious theme, which is, in itself, an interesting combination.  However, there are moments when it feels like the two never fully align, and some of the laughs feel slightly inpoor taste, creating an awkwardness in the audience. I am not sure that any comment about the Nazis, paired with a bizarre comment about sausages, should elicit laughter.

Michael Longhurst’s direction captures the chaos of this family reunion while never fully revealing, but constantly hinting at,what lies beyond the single room that becomes the setting of the entirety of the play. He manages to make the stage feel far more expansive than it actually is, through movement through doorways, glances out of windows, and the suggestion of the wider house beyond. However, at points, a lot of the action is static, with the siblings standing in a line as they bicker, reconcile, and then fall out again, and this creates pacing issuesin Act 1, taking too long to properly introduce the characters and their dynamics. Act 2 does, however, feel more assured, sharper,and more engaging as the story gathers momentum.

The cast work incredibly hard, but sometimes feel that they are fighting with the material, as so long is spent without really saying anything about who they are. Sally Phillips, as the oldest sibling Olivia, is a powerhouse on stage and also captures her vulnerability and frustration, adding depth to her performance while leading the family dynamic throughout the play. Like her character, she commands attention in every scene and delivers her lines with certainty and a dry edge to her humour.

Sam Swainsbury captures Rob’s bumbling awkwardness exceptionally well. Trying his hardest to please and pacify everyone, he is probably the character I understood the leastinitially, but ultimately emerges as the character with the most complex storyline, although his key revelations arrive too late to have their full impact. JJ Field, as Jonny, is the driving force behind the family conflict, and he sits firmly in the unlikable category for the entirety of the play, particularly once the shallow reason behind his pursuit of money is revealed.  He has some of the best moments of physical comedy and carries this off with ease.

Charly Clive plays Michelle with real charm and feels on the edges of the family dynamic, never really fitting in as the youngest and carrying her own personal baggage. Her subtle facial expressions and physical reactions to the other charactersare a joy to watch and make her extremely endearing.  Michelle grows increasingly exasperated with her family; her reactions often reflecting my own feelings towards the play’s tendency to revisit the same conflicts without developing them.

The set is a highlight of this production and gives a real sense of a place stuck in time, unwilling to let go of its own past. Joanna Scotcher has created a room that tells countless stories through its layout and the memories that fill it. At times, the room feels claustrophobic: a box set that contains the characters and an uncomfortable past and gives them little space to breathe or escape. The room is filled with detail, from the out-of-tune piano and hospital bed to the smaller objects lining the shelves. It beautifully captures the scale of things that take on meaning as we grow old and which, to others, might seem like possessions simply waiting to be boxed away.

Relics creates an ambitious and complex family drama that combines humour, grief, and questions of legacy delivered by a strong cast and thoughtful design. Sadly, the slow reveal of the characters and their motivations takes too long to develop, making it difficult to invest in them and their predicament. The play does raise interesting questions about childhood memoriesand how we process grief and understand our own past. Despite its flaws, its exploration of legacy and loss lingers, leaving the audience considering what trace of themselves they might leave behind.

Relics plays at the Lyric Hammersmith until 18^th July. Tickets from https://lyric.co.uk/shows/relics/

Photos by Marc Brenner