Barbara Pym's novel, "Quartet in Autumn," a bittersweet yet heartfelt story about four office workers on the verge of retirement, comes to the stage for the first time in an adaptation by Samantha Harvey.
It's not hard to see why the play hasn't been adapted for the stage before. The beauty of the novel lies in the inner worlds of the characters: Edwin, Letty, Marcia, and Norman. They have unwittingly become the closest people to each other, even though they insist they're not exactly friends. It's this inner complexity that makes the play difficult to bring to the stage.
Pym's book was shortlisted for the Booker Prize in 1977. It is significant that the first stage version comes from Samantha Harvey, whose novel Orbital won the same prize in 2024. Although some of the novel's depth is naturally lost on stage, Harvey handles the material with care and assurance.
The adaptation is restrained, spare, and stripped of supporting characters. Edwin, a pragmatic widower played by Anthony Calf, is kept alive by his devotion to church life. Letty, sensitive and adaptable, played by Kate Duchêne, is terrified by the idea of a lonely retirement after her best friend is embroiled in a late-night romance. Marcia, played by Pooky Quesnel, is rigid, immersed in an imaginary relationship with her doctor, and hoards canned food while barely eating enough to function. Norman, played by Paul Rider, is a man who makes mistakes all the time, with a tactlessness so dry that it could be compared to David Brent from “The Office.”
Director Dominic Dromgoole humorously highlights the characters' idiosyncrasies, sometimes pushing for a laugh a little too hard. However, the everyday grievances of the four protagonists remain familiar and relatable to the audience.
Interestingly, their concerns about heating their homes and fears that computerized technology could replace their jobs still ring true five decades later.
Ellie Wintour’s costumes, with their thick sweaters and oversized glasses, set the mood squarely in the 1970s. Her set design creates a nondescript, nondescript office with a group of desks facing each other. When characters share their inner thoughts, which often happens in a story where more is thought than spoken, Dromgoole puts them under the spotlight.
The novel is also known as Barbara Pym's great comeback, after 15 years of rejections from publishers. It closes with Letty reflecting that life holds "endless possibilities." The same feeling is conveyed on stage, as these closed and tough antiheroes take their first steps outside the pages of the book, almost half a century after they were created. /GazetaExpress/
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