Haunted at Malvern Theatres (From Hereford Times)

Haunted at Malvern Theatres

1:49pm Tuesday 23rd February 2010 in

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LIVING up to its title, Haunted, with its palpable sense of loss, regret and desire, lingers in the mind long after the final curtain call.

Opening his front door one day, Mr Berry is confronted with the strangely compelling Hazel, a young woman whose past, it becomes clear, is as haunted as his own.

Hazel, an elocution teacher and stall-holder, has heard that he may have a piece of antique clothing, a coatee, that a customer has asked her to find. Snagged by sudden desire and desperation to see her again, he presses an item of his wife’s clothing on her, assuring her that the only payment he wants is for her to come back to give him elocution lessons.

Mr Berry has glimpsed a last chance of romance and sacrifices his wife’s wardrobe in pursuit of his desires, claiming to Hazel that Gladys is dead. But, just as he is unable to meet his very-much-alive wife’s needs or salve the still-open wound of her never-to-be-born baby, Jack StJohn Berry is blinded by his own longing to Hazel’s needs.

While Jack reinvents himself as Quincy for Hazel, the awkward cadences of Hazel’s speech hint at a her own reinvention, making her seem as new and innocent as the dolls that Mrs Berry spends her day manufacturing.

A compelling story of three damaged people whose lives collide to reveal the hurts, losses and despair they’ve worked hard to accommodate, Edna O’Brien puts the most lyrical of language into her characters’ mouths, making the final explosive confrontation all the more shocking.

Haunted runs at Malvern Theatres until Saturday, February 27. To book, call the box office on 01684 892277 or visit malvern-theatres.co.uk