Hilary Finch
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to The Sunday Times
The lofty Anglo-Catholic church of St Bartholomew is no stranger to theological theatricals. But this is probably the first time it has actually witnessed a Protestant being burnt at the stake. And it’s drawing the crowds. The Bootmaker’s Daughter, a new historical docu-drama about the 16-year-old Thomasina Wood, burnt with ten other townsfolk in front of Lewes Town Hall in 1557, is one of the Brighton Festival’s hottest tickets.
Very hot. The flames from torches, candles and braziers are blazing from the start, as the unsuspecting audience is instructed to process into the church and follow the action as it moves around the vast interior. One of the monks is carrying a fire extinguisher, which is encouraging.
But nothing can dampen the ardour of young Thomasina (Sara Lazzaro) who, to the grief of her parents (Keith Drinkel and Victoria Gould), defies the edicts of Queen Mary (Beth Fitzgerald) to follow the supreme demands of her own conscience.
We, the audience, become complicit in her fate: looking on as her case is argued, listening to those eternally renewing words about “a new war and a new enemy”, and watching, voyeur-like, as she burns, strung up on a ladder high above the choir gallery.
Oh yes, the choir. Although this is primarily a homespun, almost site-specific morality play, deftly written by Chris Dixon and powerfully staged in the long candlelit nave by Thomas Guthrie, it is the singing of the Cardinall’s Musick that provides the emotional kindling. Byrd, Tallis and Taverner were all pulled between the old religion and the new; and the first music we hear is the Kyrie from Byrd’s 1592 Mass for four voices. Thomasina croons Taverner’s Western Wind ditty, and her family sings Tallis’s If ye love Me round the table.
Further movements of the Mass ring out clearly and robustly from the voices of Rebecca Outram, Patrick Craig, Julian Stocker and Edward Grint, directed by Andrew Carwood, as the grisly denouement unfolds.
One more performance Friday 10 May 2008 at 8.30pm.
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