A new theatrical experience occurred here in York during my summer holidays. The National Railway Museum played host to a thrilling recreation of Enid Blyton’s beloved children’s tale, The Railway Children. Childhood nostalgia aside, for me the real excitment lay in the concept. I had never been to a production in which the set, consisting of a railway line, was in the middle of the audience. The exhibition itself was incorporated into the perfomance, the trains, of course, becoming the set. One could not help but feel entirely engrossed within the performance, despiute the fairly minimal set and lighting. The extremely apt location only added to the effect, It made it seem real. My partner and I truly were made to feel a part of Blyton’s whimsical world. I have never been to a production and found my self so immersed that I actually felt myself waving with the actors and actresses as they waved at the trains! Another additional effect was the curtains which ran across the audience, giving the impression of a tunnel.
For those unfamiliar with the plot (despite the films ubiquity on the television listings every Christmas and Easter), an overview: Bobby, and her siblings Peter and Phyllis are forced to move from London to Yorkshire when their father is arrested. The children tell the story as if they are adultslooking back on their summer spent in a little cottage by a railway. The children experience the struggle of their ne found poverty, and find themselves in adventures with Russian writers and Paper Chasers. The characters were portratyed just how I expected them to be: a somewhat toned down version of the characters in the aforementioned film. The production managed to avoid that cardinal sin of selecting cloying, irritating child actors. Instead the characters are interesting and well portrayed, rather than mildly annoying as in the film. The story focuses strongly on the family: their experiances of growing up in a world unfamiliar from their previous, well-heeled existance, and their perseverance through their various hardships. It may not be a story of our times, but I believe the moral is rather timeless, resulting in an engaging, relevant plot.
The characters would also sometimes break the fourth wall, addressing the audience as if they were telling us the story of their lives directly. This was a perfect opportunity to add humour to the scrip, and the perfomers delivered it well. The flitting between them talking to the audience and being the characters in the story was so close together that it was sometimes quite confusing. Nevertheless this was effective in allowing us into Bobby’s mind, and filling in gaps in the plot which the script could not provide.
The acting was superb, with the small exception of the stationer’s children, who were probably just there to look cute. The performers engaged with the audience from the moment they appeared on stage, chatting to us and asking if we had a good day. Once the play started they moved through the scenes excellently, and managed to strike the right balance between entertaining the audience and interacting with each other on stage. The production had made a comeback from the previous year, and I would highly recommend it to anyone if it returns to the stage of the National Railway Museum next year!