Review: Local, Finborough Theatre

When Liz Richardson tells people where she’s from she struggles to be truthful. Actually brought up in West Cumbria, branding her hometown with a ‘the Lakes’ tag makes it easier to name, but allows others – and herself – to imagine a reality different from the truth. Now the mother of a teenager, in this solo show she’s contemplating why she has this disconnect from her roots, which is so easily identified by her challenging 12 year old daughter. As her parents are planning to move out, and with thoughts on intergenerational legacy, she heads back to the family home, in order to reconnect with the locality and seek revelation while she still has time.

The show begins with an enjoyably retro soundtrack firmly establishing a link to the 90s and Richardson’s formative years. There’s telling music from The Cure and Stone Roses, and later references to Pulp that speak of being young and working class. The set is also domestically nostalgic – a teenager’s bedroom complete with a pair of roller boots, printed photos pegged on a line and a patchwork of fabrics that suggest a comfortable lifetime in bedding. Nestled within this, a merged projector screen neatly enables us to view extracts from diaries, to join her on a train journey along the North Western coast and to catch glimpses of her childhood town, giving a visual base of reality to the storytelling.

Richardson is a very likeable performer, who draws the audience into her personal recollections and contemplations. She’s confident, comic and full of energy as she portrays key characters who’ve played a part in her research, occasionally using a stand-up style to give texture to the performance, in which she is prepared to be the butt of the joke. 

She begins the show by declaring that this is a story without end, and that definitely feels the case come the conclusion. There’s undoubtedly a lot to consider, as she reflects on landscape, community, family and identity, yet the whole feels a little unbounded, and a stronger through line might guide the audience more deftly through the material and its overarching theme. The tale as it stands digs into emotional attachment to people, places, things and history, but there’s room to think more about wider issues such as the socio-political impact of living in a remote, often overlooked part of the UK, imposter syndrome and London-centricity, some of which are touched on but not developed. A later scene, featuring the arrival of her daughter, feels overly sentimental and rather awkward.

Where the piece works best is in Richardson’s vulnerably personal declarations about fear of loss around her parents, which are surely universally recognisable. The play as a whole offers an emotionally impactful definition of what ‘local’ can mean, expanding the definition from its geographically-based position at the outset to a very human conclusion.

Written by Liz Richardson
Directed by Amy Hailwood
Set and Costume Design by Lizzy Leech
Lighting Design by Arnim Friess
Sound Design by Pierre Flasse
Video Design by Tripledot Makers
Movement Direction by Jennifer Kay
Dramaturgy by Andy Routledge
LR Productions Ltd in association with Neil McPherson for the Finborough Theatre

Local runs at the Finborough Theatre until Saturday 1 August.