Theatre Group Trip to LABOUR OF LOVE at Bromley Little Theatre

Doing reviews of productions at BLT can be frustrating. I’m running out of synonyms for fantastic and brilliant, etc! Labour of Love is of a standard we expect and even take for granted from BLT. 

The storyline of this James Graham comedy follows the career of a Labour MP representing a northern town and starts in 2017, goes back in time to 1990 before going forward again. David Lyons (Simon Holland) is very much concerned about doing what is necessary to be electable while his constituency agent Jean Whittaker (Hilary Cordery) is a principled old school socialist wanting what is best for the constituents. David’s ambitious wife, Elizabeth (Kate Somerton) cares only that her husband does whatever it takes to get to the top! Smoothly interspersing live action with actual newsreels at various points in time we see how the relationship of the two main characters develops against the background of true-life events. Although as indicated all the cast are great, the two main characters are played brilliantly, and I’d go as far as saying Hilary Cordery’s portrayal of Jean is exceptional. 

Contributed to Pat Ward