REVIEW: THE VARIOUS METHODS OF ESCAPE at Bread & Roses 3 – 14 December 2024

Photography: Liviu Monsted

'Tense and absorbing' ★★★

Kidnap stories are compelling and recent criminal history has given us some hard to forget. In Austria, Natascha Kampusch was abducted at 10 years old and held for eight years. In the US, Jaycee Lee Dugard was abducted, aged 11 in 1991 and remained missing for 18 years. While many dramatized accounts of ‘girl to woman’ kidnappings focus on the circumstances leading to and ordeal of captivity, The Various Methods of Escape picks up with Grace, aged 19, back in the bosom of family life, having been through such a terrible, life-changing experience.

Grace, impressively performed by Maisie Tiedeman in her debut stage role is the young woman taken when she was 6 who has spent 13 years in captivity. Traumatised, ridden with anxiety and still adjusting to ‘normal’ life, her family, little sister, Hope (Violet Grace Fink) Mother, (New Zealander actress, Michelle Huirama) and Father (Mark Brent) are also dealing with the psychological fall out which builds, in the run up to the abductor’s trial This two act play of just over two hours with a short interval focuses on a broken family trying to find their way back to each other and hoping to heal.

Although the heinous kidnapping is over, captor Gregory is not assigned to the past. Far from it. Onstage for almost the entire two hours, he is the personification of a negative mantra and intrusive thought, the voice in Grace’s head; parent, groomer, significant other. There is the suggestion of Stockhausen Syndrome although this is not fully developed. Played as both devil serpent and hideous ‘other’ Gregory is demonically embodied by Mitch Howell, hunched over, like a creature from the underworld. He hisses and whispers, cackles, and undermines. Howell’s performance captures what Gregory has come to represent because we learn he is a ‘normal’ guy and polite, respectable neighbour with a steady job.

While the first half of the play is effectively terse and tense, full of awkward silences and stiff, painful attempts to readjust to family life, the second half feels drawn out with endless emotional exposition and too much catharsis laid on for the audience. The decision to have Gregory on stage throughout most of the play, sometimes works when he is interacting with Grace, but can equally be distracting, especially when he is just hanging about as a sinister presence and creating a conflict for the audience’s attention. The relationship between the two sisters is strong with two excellent performances and, there is much merit in this first play by Amber Spooner, an Australian playwright who currently lives in London. Absorbing and involving with strong performances, it would be even stronger, were it shorter and more distilled.

The Various Methods of Escape started life as part of a scratch night in Canberra and was picked by director Liviu Monsted, Artistic Director of Mon Sans Productions. It premiered in Sydney in 2022 and this is the first chance to see it in London.

Title: The Various Methods of Escape

Author: Amber Spooner

Director: Liviu Monsted

Venue: The Bread and Roses Theatre

Dates: 3rd December – 14th December 7pm Star

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