Theatre

Years

Almeida Theatre, London

4/5

Powerful quintet of women

Based on autobiographical fiction by Annie Ernaux, Nobel prize winner for 2022, Years is a clever adaptation featuring five female actors of different generations to enact a whistlestop tour of the crucial junctures in the life of a French woman born in 1940. The subject matter is mainly sexual: first period, masturbation, losing virginity and sexual assault/rape in one, sexual freedom, do-it-yourself abortion, sexual relationship with much younger man, all interspersed with cultural references to the respective decades, which include earnest music numbers (Harmony Rose-Bremner is an excellent singer), consumer goods long forgotten or taken for granted and name-dropped mainstream political context. The text is factual, autobiographical, at times banal, Eline Arbo’s direction imaginative, well-paced and skilful and acting superb from all five actors: Deborah Findlay, Gina McKee, Romola Garai, Anjli Mohindra, Harmony Rose-Bremner.

Reducing a woman’s life to her sexuality is reductive even when done in the service of feminism. Having said that the staging is of high quality and we are made to really look at these women as they try to negotiate what society expects of them. Although the bravery of the production needs to be applauded, it stays on the surface, freely providing the visceral and sensual which gets only partly sublimated into the emotional but doesn’t reach the intellectual. The most powerful scenes were either explicitly visceral, such as the uncomfortable abortion scene or playful such as the enactment of described photographs which sensitively and often humorously explores the relationship between expectation, perception and just being. A lot of humour is skilfully injected throughout to soften the harsh and banal reality.

About a quarter of the way through, the infamous self-administered abortion scene, sensationalised in the media as affecting mostly men, crept up on us. It was reported that on previous evenings the performance was interrupted to settle the audience and allow people to leave if necessary. The same happened during the evening I was attending. However it wasn’t only men, there was a cross-section of people who were nauseous or uncomfortable and the play was interrupted briefly twice, the second time due to an audience member fainting in the circle. It was a muggy warm evening and the auditorium was slightly too warm which did not help, particularly for those sitting higher up. I wanted to write about this in more detail as it is a very interesting occurrence. The discomfort came not from the visual enactment, but from the description voiced by Romola Garai, we assume as written in Ernaux’s book. The description was factual without any added gore or superfluous emotion. This bare documentary style tends to be more affecting as it allows the viewer or listener to step into the character’s shoes more organically.

We are all different and react to different things. Some of us are triggered due to past experiences, other simply through the simple humane instinct of empathy. The audience’s discomfort was sneered at in the media, and yet it is very important that we as a society are not desensitised to the pain of others. It is reassuring that there are people who can identify with the pain depicted on stage. It is healthy and decent to feel. I personally struggled with this scene as well, but a borrowed bottle of water (I stupidly forgot mine) helped me get through. An elderly man sitting next to me with his companion started shouting that it is ridiculous and that people should just get out if they can’t handle it. His insensitivity was staggering. I couldn’t even bear to look at him for fear I would start arguing with him. What makes people think that we are all the same and that stiff upper lip is the only face we should present to the world. Fictionalised accounts are never just fiction, they always have touch points with real lives and it matters a great deal to recognise this. As well as belittling female life experience, this man’s reaction attempted to shame all of us who are able to feel, just like the glib news articles about the fainting men.

My friend and I wondered at the end what would different generations of women make of this play. Was there anything in this for women in their 20s or would they just think of it as passé. Gina McKee at one point lists all the things that have improved, all so crucial and essential, and yet they feel insignificant as she is forced to defend this progress in front of her superficial blasé male offspring. This play tries hard to tick all the feminist boxes, and despite the fabulous cast and inspired direction comes short in presenting a rounded female experience.

Directed by Eline Arbo. Adapted as De jaren by Eline Arbo, in an English version by Stephanie Bain, based on Les Années by Annie Ernaux