Springwood review

In Nelson’s unhurried staging, each sequence develops gradually, with characters sometimes feeling adrift in conversations that meander towards anticlimactic conclusions. But crisp scene changes and a willingness to embrace moments of comedy keep the piece from feeling directionless.

The diligent cast members turn in detailed, thoughtful performances. Rebecca Night is enjoyably frosty as Queen Elizabeth, slightly horrified by everything she observes of American culture, but driven to gain a deeper understanding of it. A late conversation between her and Jemma Redgrave’s richly drawn Eleanor Roosevelt provides the play’s strongest dramatic moments, with both women pushing themselves to achieve mutual respect, despite their different world views.

Andrew Havill makes a believably nervy George VI, or King Bertie, giving a well-judged performance that sensitively depicts his infamous stutter. Bertie defuses awkwardness with flashes of gentle wittiness, implying a sharp if highly strung personality under the stiff facade imposed by his rank and his loveless upbringing. 

Robert Lindsay, meanwhile, projects steady self-assurance as Franklin but, like Bertie, wears a performative mask that slips more completely with every passing scene, revealing the tensions within his unorthodox marriage, his intemperate indulgence in affairs and his antipathy towards the physical disability that he refused to let define him.

A detailed soundscape by John Leonard adds significantly to the play’s subdued atmosphere. Characters comment frequently that the thin walls of the Roosevelt family home allow them to be overheard, and Leonard provides a constant susurrus of hushed arguments, muffled gramophones and the chirruping of tree frogs to imply everything that unfolds in the vicinity.

Tom Piper’s set features a stretch of worn wooden floorboards scattered with shiny rattan furniture and antique tables, which are piled high when the audience enters, giving the impression of a dusty second-hand store. An old-fashioned wheelchair sits, unused, in the shadows, suggesting the president’s larger-than-life presence before he ever appears.

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