Ruth Leon Pocket review – Dear England
Ruth Leon recommendsDear England – National Theatre
It helps if you know something about football. By ‘football’ I mean ‘soccer’, not that mysterious game played in America by huge men dressed up in spacesuits and helmets.
In particular, to appreciate Dear England to the fullest, it helps to know about the team of young millionaires currently playing for England, under the stewardship of their manager Gareth Southgate. It’s Southgate who’s really the star of the team, as well as the centrepiece of the play. If he’s anything like as charismatic as Joseph Fiennes, who plays him in James Graham’s play, I’m prepared to believe that he can make them do anything, including winning a World Cup. Which, incidentally, they didn’t. But true to the standard British stereotype, they lost very gracefully (triggering national mourning). And they nearly won.
Being the only person in England who is neither a football fan nor au courant with the names and peculiarities of each member of the team, I was at something of a disadvantage. Every time a teammember was mentioned, the rest of the audience drew a collective intake of breath as though they were being reintroduced to a dear friend. For me, though, the names represented a very distant echo and the individual characteristics of each one, recognised by most of the audience to applause and laughter, didn’t mean much despite the excellent acting and Rupert Goold’s dramatic direction.
A lot happens in Dear England which isn’t about fooball – Covid, Black Lives Matter, political turmoil, and lots of Prime Ministers – and Graham writes about them with his usual literate dispatch. I’m a fan of his plays – The House (about Parliament), Quiz (about Who Wants to Be a Millionaire), Ink (about Rupert Murdoch) – all illuminating some aspects of the British character and doing it with wit, perspicacity and humour.
Dear England, although probably every bit as telling, requires a greater knowledge and interest in football than I possess and therefore lost me long before the final whistle.
Ruthie, if you think that Graham’s play is really about soccer (er…football) you’re missing the point. All of Graham’s plays deal with the existential issue that Englanders have never been able to accept the fact that the mighty British Empire no longer exists. This collective denial colors everything from sports to business to politics (both national and international). It’s not just about winning and losing. It’s about giving it all you’ve got realizing full well in advance that it may never be enough (remember Churchill in WW2). “Dear England” is a tribute to keeping that “stiff upper lip” at all costs and always hoping that the Empire will rise again phoenix-like someday in the not-too-distant future!
Spot on. Nobody knows less about football than me and I loved it. And I’m not even English. Brilliant show.