“Woman in Mind” and the Comedy That Still Cuts – front mezz junkies, Theater News

The London UK Theatre Review: Alan Ayckbourn’s Woman in Mind

By Ross

I first encountered Woman in Mind when I was 22 years old, newly out of theatre school and living recklessly in London. I clearly remember watching the West End production of the play with the phenomenal Julia McKenzie inhabiting the lead character, Susan, with a ferocity and vulnerability that permanently altered my understanding of what comedy could hold. It was my gateway drug to Alan Ayckbourn (A Brief History of Women, By Jeeves), a playwright I now follow with something close to theatre-junkie devotion. That early experience lodged deep: the shock of laughter curdling into disturbance, the thrill of recognising that domestic realism could tip, almost imperceptibly, into psychological horror. So, returning to this same Woman in Mind decades later, in Michael Longhurst’s high-profile West End revival starring Sheridan Smith (Manchester Palace/West End’s Funny Girl), felt less like nostalgia than a test: does the play still unsettle, still sting, still reveal something dangerous beneath its jokes? And is it still such a wonder, like the play that lives in my memory of that youthful time so long ago?

Written in 1985 and first staged at the Stephen Joseph Theatre in Scarborough, Woman in Mind marked a turning point for Ayckbourn. His 32nd play is often considered one of his best and most personal, arriving quickly just before his sabbatical at the National Theatre. Influenced by neurological case studies such as Oliver Sacks’s The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat, and thrillers that destabilise narrative trust, the play places the audience squarely inside Susan’s fractured mind and perception. Unlike Ayckbourn’s own play, Just Between Ourselves, where a woman’s breakdown is observed externally, here, her everything is filtered through Susan herself, real people, imagined ones, and eventually the collapse of any distinction between the two. It is a darkly funny and deeply cruel play about neglect, isolation, and the seductive power of fantasy, with an added sting in its critique of organised religion and moral complacency.

Smith’s captivating Susan is the undeniable centre of this madcap revival, and she navigates the role’s immense demands with clarity and courage. Remaining on stage for the entire evening, Smith charts Susan’s psychological unravelling with precision, allowing humour and horror to coexist uncomfortably in the same moment. Her Susan is not just a victim; she is sharp, brittle, occasionally unkind, and it’s this edge that makes the character so compelling. Around her, the supporting cast is fascinating and superb. Louise Brealey (Channel 4’s “Back“; “Shetland“) and Tim McMullan (NT’s Twelfth Night) are exquisitely irritating as Muriel and Gerald, embodying the petty cruelties and obliviousness that make Susan’s retreat into fantasy feel almost inevitable. Romesh Ranganathan (Showtime’s “Just Another Immigrant“), making his West End stage debut as Susan’s fill-in doctor Bill, proves a genuine asset, his comic timing assured and his interactions with Smith finding unexpected shades of discomfort, warmth, and hilarity.

Longhurst’s astute direction leans enthusiastically into Susan’s disintegrating mind, particularly in a second act that thrillingly mutates from suburban comedy into something nightmarish and intrusive. Fantasy begins to sabotage Susan’s attempts at real connection, especially with her own, real-world estranged son, who hasn’t spoken to her, literally, in years. That said, while being completely engrossed in the disintegration, I also found myself less convinced by the overall design approach delivered forth by set and costume designer Soutra Gilmour (Broadway’s Waiting for Godot). Gilmour’s visual world, busy, messy, and deliberately destabilised, sometimes felt at odds with Ayckbourn’s razor-sharp, clean-cut writing. The opening image, with actors ducking beneath a painted safety curtain garden, struck me as more distracting than illuminating, keeping me at a distance from really engaging with the desired deception. I longed for a cleaner, sharper frame, tight English gardens, manicured within an inch of their lives, that might have trusted the text and performances to do the unsettling work.

What lingers, though, is the play’s refusal to offer any easy answers. Susan is not sainted by her suffering, nor redeemed by her collapse, and perhaps that ambiguity is the point, even if I didn’t fully grasp what Ayckbourn wanted us to carry out of the wreckage by the end. The journey itself remains gripping, hilarious, and deeply uncomfortable. This revival may not have fully captured the clarity or chill I remember from my first encounter with Woman in Mind, but it reaffirms why the play endures, and why I continue to love Ayckbourn. He has gifted us with a comedy that laughs as it cuts, and a tragedy that never lets us off the comfortable hook.