Review: This Is My Family, Southwark Playhouse

If you won a free holiday anywhere in the world, where would you go? Surely your mind wanders far abroad. Is it Tokyo? Maybe Rio de Janeiro, or how about sunny Havana? 13-year-old Nicky (Nancy Allsop) has won such a reward by describing her family, albeit with light exaggerations, for a competition. Instead of a glamorous and far-flung destination, and feeling the disconnect within her family, Nicky chooses a camping holiday…in the rain.

Tim Firth‘s musical comedy This is My Family finally pitches its tent in London after earlier productions in Sheffield and Chichester. Now playing in Southwark Playhouse Elephant and directed by Vicky Featherstone, this new production is a light-hearted, gentle exploration of the chaos, absurdity, and emotional undercurrents of family life.

Father Steve (Michael Jibson) is in a mid-life crisis, with new hobbies all over the place: free running, roller skating, judo… Many laughs are had with throwaway lines suggesting the wide range of activities he has tried and given up almost as quickly. Teenage son Matt (Luke Lambert) is a broadly caricatured goth, a rebellious teenager more interested in his girlfriend than anything else and who communicates only in grunts – again, providing good humour, particularly when these are translated. Gay Soper, as grandmother May with advancing dementia, gets some of the best lines and biggest laughs. Mother Yvonne (Gemma Whelan) tries to hold it all together, but with her own space seeping further and further away in contrast to her sister, Sian (Victoria Elliott), who’s newly single and enjoying her freedom. Firth’s script is generous to the whole cast, giving each a moment to shine and to really bring a laugh out of the audience. There is a genuine sense of ensemble among the cast, with the family dynamics believable and recognisable. The love, affection, and underlying bonds stay in place underneath the bickering and frustration.

As a musical, This Is My Family is…barely one. It’s more sung-through, lines blending into being sung as they would be spoken, not belted out. The score underpins the story with repeating melodies but there are no big numbers, and the songs, while pleasant, are fairly unmemorable. The cast and seven piece band (arrangements and orchestrations by Caroline Humphris) do sound great, though; the music warmly filling the small space.

It’s not that This Is My Family is dull, but it is slow, and it runs well over its advertised two hours. A 19:00 start time crept to a 21:30 finish. The pace often feels like a slow meander, and with a story so predictable and so conventional, the journey doesn’t always feel worth the time. There’s a sense of ordinariness to it: which is not inherently a bad thing. In fact, there’s some charm in that ordinariness with more than a handful of genuinely funny moments. But every emotional beat feels safe; expected. It’s like watching a light episode of a warm but slightly dated 1980s sitcom: perfectly fine, but drawn out just a little too long.

That said, there is truth in it too – truth in the relationships. It’s hard not to recognise something very familiar in the family dynamics: the eyerolls, the deep sighs, the quiet tolerance of one another (often due to a lack of alternative options). At times, I saw echoes of my own family, with conversations from years ago flashing back to me as I watched them unfold on stage. For all its gentle comedy, the show does catch moments of emotional honesty that resonate.

Book and Music by: Tim Firth
Directed by: Vicky Featherstone
Design by: Chloe Lamford
Arrangements and Orchestrations by: Caroline Humphris
Musical Direction by: Natalie Pound

This Is My Family plays at Southwark Playhouse Elephant until Saturday 12 July.