Kindertransport - Theatro Technis

Statue commemorating the children of the Kindertransport

I'm sorry for my lack of posting of late. I'm sure my followers have been perturbed by my absence, and I'm sorry to have disappointed the two of you. I know I said my next review would be of Timon of Athens but I'm afraid that ship has sailed. Too much time has elapsed. It was a well-performed play but not one of my favourites.

Kindertransport by Diane Samuels is an incredibly powerful, haunting, thought-provoking play, sensitively performed by the Tower Theatre Company. It tells the story of nine-year-old Eva, a Jewish girl who travels from Germany to Britain via the Kindertransport in 1938, leaving behind her beloved parents.

Based on real life experiences, the play added a new dimension to the way I'd always thought about the Kindertransport (the programme introduced by the British government in 1938 to give (mostly) Jewish children in Germany, Austria, Czechoslovakia and Poland safe passage to the UK). My past thoughts about it had been predominantly rosy: how fortunate the children had been to have managed to avoid further persecution by getting out of increasingly anti-Semitic countries before the outbreak of war, and how wonderful it was that British people had been willing to take them in. Of course I knew it must have been terrible and psychologically scarring for the children to have had to leave their parents, but that paled in comparison to the horrors they would almost certainly have faced had they stayed - horrors that most of their parents did end up experiencing. The Kindertransport saved the lives of thousands of children, and it is important to celebrate that.

However, Kindertransport effectively shows the true complexity of the situation; that while the Kindertransport children were 'lucky', even those children placed with loving foster parents were not immune from complicated, severe, adverse psychological reactions from the experience - the ramifications of which would reverberate through generations. Set in 1938-1947 and the 1980s, switching seamlessly between time periods, Kindertransport deals with issues of identity and the loss thereof, and the harm and devastation that can come about through actions carried out with the best of intentions.

Eva was played engagingly and convincingly by Katrin Larissa Kasper - a difficult part involving the ability to speak German and portraying a character over the course of eight or nine years. At times, the actions of the characters Evelyn (Ruth Sullivan) and foster mother Lil (Amanda Waggott) made me angry and uncomfortable. When I first heard the play as a radio adaptation, I struggled to sympathise with Evelyn at all. But actually seeing Kindertransport made me see her in a more sympathetic light. All the female protagonists are sympathetic characters, trying to make the best choices in intensely difficult circumstances, and credit goes to the actors for evoking such strong feelings of sympathy and anger.

The Pied Piper of Hamelin 'Ratcatcher' figure lurking in the background and physically manifesting itself in the form of several grotesquely masked men (Paul Willcocks), all behaving in ways that Eva perceives as threatening, added an extra layer of sinister-ness, and gave one more of an understanding of Evelyn. The use of piano strings for the music was effective in a poignant and sinister way. Attention given to costumes and props was meticulous, as is customary for the Tower Theatre Company.

Kindertransport will be performed again by the Tower Theatre Company at Upstairs at the Gatehouse, on Saturday 24th - Sunday 25th June and Tuesday 27th June - Sunday 2nd July. I strongly recommend it!

photo credit: FarzanaL Kindertransport via photopin (license)

Next: Hopefully something equally good