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★★★½
LUNG Theatre are at Southwark Playhouse Elephant in London for the next few weeks, with their new verbatim musical ‘The Children’s Inquiry’: a new piece of writing about the evolution of the care system and foster services in the UK. With a book and lyrics by Helen Monks and Matt Woodhead, the educational and informative production uses a lively, rhythmic score to share a dual narrative, covering the real life stories of four teenagers who grew up in care and also the history of the foster system from the 1890s to the present day. With political undertones, the musical features Owen Crouch and Clementine Douglas’s modern day, pop score, highlighting some horrific events throughout history. Over the course of approximately 2 hours 30 minutes of theatre, the cast brings to life snippets of real-life accounts, spreading the word about the lives of looked after children and how they have been impacted from government to government.
Inquiry format
The sung-through musical is set in a youth club and follows the format of a public inquiry, except this time the council are young people calling historic figures to the stand. This format runs throughout the whole production, with the music and verbatim audio recordings acting as the greatest storytelling aspect. The audience is encouraged to immerse themselves in the implied courtroom, taking time to reflect on over 130 years of history. The format is a little repetitive in places, but it provides a clear and defined structure, where every witness is held accountable for their actions, from the era of the workhouses until last week’s election. Will Monks’ lighting and props also keeps the visual design exciting, recreating memorable decades such as the swinging sixties and the nuclear fears of the 1970s.
Structure
Overall I found the material slightly too long, but the amount of time and history that is covered within the runtime, does indeed justify the 145-minute runtime. The chronological structure is straightforward and easy to follow, with the exception of the present day sections that are sandwiched into the evolution of child services. These scenes ground the material and also provide some really important real life stories, but in my opinion there isn’t enough time for audiences to truly get to know Angelica, Amber, Frank and Jelicia.
Impressive ensemble performances
There are two casts for this run at Southwark Playhouse and with how demanding the musical is, it is no surprise that the performers will be alternating appearances. The talent in the room on Tuesday was exceptional, both musically and comedically, specifically when the performers mimed to the ministerial interview footage and executed Alexzandra Sarmiento’s choreography. There was so much sass and conviction in each of the character performances, particularly from Fearn I’Anson and Hari Aggarwal who each offered incredible stage presence.
An eye-opening musical about the foster care system in the UK
LUNG’s ‘The Children’s Inquiry’ provides a voice for all of the young people that have been affected by the system and the structural changes over the years. The verbatim sections are extremely impactful and make the material take on a whole different meaning, even going so far as to make recent history carry more weight than I remember. It is a really important and well crafted piece of theatre that needs to be watched to appreciate the creativity of it. The musical is at Southwark Playhouse Elephant until Saturday 3rd August, with tickets available via the theatre’s website.
Thanks for reading my blog today.
Love Kat xxxx
*My ticket for The Children’s Inquiry was gifted in exchange for coverage of the show.
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