Rachael Stirling Rory Keenan

Plenty

By David Hare

7 – 29 June 2019Festival Theatre

Overview

★★★★
Guardian

★★★★
Daily Telegraph

★★★★
WhatsOnStage

★★★★
Evening Standard

Susan Traherne is a former secret agent. Her heroic work with the Special Operations Executive in Nazi-occupied France brought her extremes of danger, as well as adventures and romance.

Twenty years on she is living a very different existence in London, as the wealthy wife of a diplomat. Her strained marriage and altered circumstances have threatened her identity and trapped her in a destructive nostalgia for her wartime idealism.

In a post-war land of plenty, Susan battles for her own body and mind, as Britain loses its role in the world.

Using a non-linear structure, the drama dips backwards and forwards in time to explore how the past and present coexist.

On its first appearance at the National Theatre in 1978, David Hare’s play caused a furore, and is now accepted as one of the great modern classics. David Hare’s previous plays for Chichester include South Downs (2011) and Young Chekhov (2015).

Kate Hewitt directs, following her acclaimed production of Cock (Festival 2018). Her productions also include Frost/Nixon at Sheffield and Jesus Hopped the ‘A’ Train at the Young Vic.

Rachael Stirling’s recent work includes Medea (Headlong) and The Winter’s Tale (Sam Wanamaker Playhouse), and The Bletchley Circle and Detectorists on television.

Rory Keenan's recent stage work includes Someone Who’ll Watch Over Me (Chichester 2015), Long Day’s Journey Into Night (West End and New York) and Saint Joan (Donmar).

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Our programmes are designed to be the perfect insightful companion to the production. This programme includes an article written by Daniel Rosenthal about the history of Plenty on stage and screen, a piece by David Stafford about the women of Britain's Special Operations Exective (SOE) , a brief background to the Suez Crisis in addition to a piece about the role of RAF Tangmere during WWII by David Coxon. There is also the usual rehearsal photography, biographies, events and news from the Theatre.

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Prologue tickets available

Reviews

★★★★
Rachael Stirling is excellent in Kate Hewitt’s invigorating production of a play about individual and national unease.

David Hare’s Plenty is the occasion for a critique of society that has unexpected resonances today. As the first scene is about the British penchant for lies and the second argues that it takes more people to dismantle an empire than to administer it, it hit me that Susan’s disgust at deception and incompetence finds an uncanny echo in the divisions and anger provoked by Brexit. But, if Hare’s elliptical epic lives on, it is because its portrait of individual trauma is matched by its ability to tap into our nation’s permanent unease with itself.
Guardian

★★★★
Plenty – the state of the (post-war) nation drama that firmly put David Hare on the map – premiered at the National in 1978, went to Broadway, and has been revived in the West End. Yet it’s in Chichester that it looks most at home.

Rachael Stirling triumphs as a fearless Bond-like figure in Kate Hewitt’s incredibly slick revival, stylishly designed by Georgia Lowe.
Daily Telegraph

★★★★
Susan, played wonderfully by Rachael Stirling who is seldom off stage, is bitter, restless, vicious; her acid wit pours forth again and again to sting another victim. But Susan is no monster, even if she wounds with almost casual lack of concern, she is honest.

Director Kate Hewitt's staging of Hare's late '70s creation is a sometimes stark, sometimes lavish production that surprises and assaults the senses in equal measures. We are both fascinated and appalled by Susan's character.

Designer Georgia Lowe creates a simple yet stunning set reaching its climax with the beautiful staging of the final scenes.
WhatsOnStage

As the redoubtable Traherne, Rachael Stirling – making her Chichester debut, and what a debut — is simply remarkable.

Intricately woven, wonderfully written, hilariously funny, utterly poignant and immensely powerful, Plenty has been hailed as a modern classic — and director Kate Hewitt’s take more than does it justice. A huge success.
Chichester News

Cast & Creatives

Cast

Rachael Stirling	Susan Traherne
Rory Keenan	Raymond Brock
Micah Balfour	Mick
Alan Booty	Another Frenchman
Anthony Calf	Sir Leonard Darwin
Raphael Desprez	A Frenchman
Gemma Dobson	Louise
Philippe Edwards	John Begley
Yolanda Kettle	Alice Park
Louise Mai Newberry	Mme Aung
Macy Nyman	Dorcas Frey
Nick Sampson	Sir Andrew Charleson
Rupert Young	Codename Lazar
Ozzie Yue	M. Aung

Creative team

Kate Hewitt	Director
Georgia Lowe	Designer
Lee Curran	Lighting Designer
Giles Thomas	Music and Sound
Nina Dunn	Video Designer
Charlotte Sutton	Casting Director

Gallery

Playing Susan Traherne

Playing Susan Traherne

It was in 1985 that Rachael Stirling made her first visit to Chichester to see her distinguished mother, Diana Rigg, playing the Egyptian queen in Antony and Cleopatra – the first of several such outings over the years. So it’s a great cause for celebration that Rachael herself is now making her debut on the Festival Theatre stage as the heroine of David Hare’s landmark play, Plenty.

Rachael will be playing the iconic role of Susan Traherne, a former Special Operations Executive struggling to come to terms with the reality of post-war life while caught in a stifling marriage to a low-rank diplomat. It’s a play she can’t wait to explore.

‘Cate Blanchett [who played the role in the West End in 1999] has said that, in her opinion, the three great parts for female actors of this age group are Hedda Gabler, Blanche DuBois (in A Streetcar Named Desire) and Susan Traherne. And it’s true.

‘It’s rare that you get to chart a character over 20 years, to see the beginning, middle and end of their youth – Susan is nigh on 40 by the time the play ends’, Rachael says. ‘She is an encyclopedia of a character: the woman you would want to (a) go into the trenches with but (b) stand next to at any party. Her company is thrilling, unpredictable, chaotic, exhausting and exhilarating.

‘Plenty is a period piece in the sense it’s set in the past but actually there are numerous women today who are full of potential but can’t find a place in which to shine. So Susan, actually, is timeless and not defined by the male company she keeps as much as woman characters often are. She sails her own path. I can’t wait to tell this story every night and to hear how the audience responds to her.’

Rachael is also enthused by the approach her director, Kate Hewitt, and designer, Georgia Lowe, are taking to the play. ‘The way that Kate and Georgia are designing this, is thrilling. They want to achieve something that’s visually spectacular but not necessarily absolute naturalism. And David Hare is very excited by it. He’s going to be constantly in rehearsals so he’ll have his hand on the tiller.

‘If you ask me, is there anything else that I would rather be doing at this exact moment in time than Plenty at Chichester, the answer is a resounding no. It’s one of the greatest challenges and a privilege to take this on.’

Women of the SOE

The Women of the Special Operations Executive

During the Second World War, very few people were aware of the existence of the Special Operations Executive, also known as “Churchill’s Secret Army” or the “Ministry of Ungentlemanly Warfare”. Created in 1940 and charged by the Prime Minister to “set Europe ablaze!” their purpose was to put British special agents into occupied territory in order to conduct espionage and sabotage in support of the resistance movement.

Trained in unarmed combat, firearms and wireless communications, they also had to be fluent linguists so that they could blend in seamlessly and avoid detection wherever they were dropped. Their skills also included resisting interrogation and evading capture; many agents hid suicide pills in their coat buttons in fear of the Gestapo.

Although the highest ranking staff in the SOE were generally public school and Oxbridge educated men, the agents ranged from electricians to journalists, former chefs to the daughter of a Brixton car dealer. Female operatives were critical to the success of the SOE; stereotypical attitudes to women at the time often worked to their advantage, as they were viewed as above suspicion. The SOE employed 39 female agents in France, with another 16 deployed to further enemy territories, and there are many stories of women displaying incredible daring, courage and the ability to evade capture during their time as agents. Many sadly suffered torture and death at the hands of the Nazis; those who returned quietly carried on with their lives, often not speaking publicly of their experiences until many years later.

Running Time: 2 hours and 30 minutes including the interval

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Cast

Rachael Stirling

Rory Keenan

Micah Balfour

Alan Booty

Anthony Calf

Raphael Desprez

Gemma Dobson

Philippe Edwards

Yolanda Kettle

Louise Mai Newberry

Macy Nyman

Nick Sampson

Rupert Young

Ozzie Yue

Creative team

Kate Hewitt

Georgia Lowe

Lee Curran

Giles Thomas

Nina Dunn

Charlotte Sutton

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