Despite staging flaws and an inert script, this historical whodunnit finds its footing thanks to committed performances and period charm.
To the surprise of a modern audience, the NHS in 1950 apparently afforded a patient a spacious room, a brace of sassy nurses, use of the good stationery and endless weeks of convalescence – all for a broken leg.
Admittedly, the broken leg is attached to a bona fide hero – Scotland Yard detective Alan Grant (Rob Pomfret) who is bothered, bored and self-pitying, having acquired the injury in a failed chase.
At 50, he is staring down the barrel of an enforced retirement. What he needs is a challenge to prove his worth.
Backs to the wall
It arrives in the form of a postcard of Richard III. Is he the villain of Shakespeare’s imaginings or is he the most wronged monarch in history? Grant begins gnawing on the 400-year-old mystery, dragging in acolytes and helpers who indulge him for reasons that are never entirely clear.
In the meantime, the audience of M Kilburg Reedy’s adaptation of Josephine Tey’s classic novel has their own set of challenges.
Firstly, the staging. The bed which contains our hero is right at the back of the stage. Pomfret does some great head-and-neck acting but there are obvious audibility and distance problems. This timorous cowering becomes so pronounced that the actors appear to have a Pavlovian aversion to entering the 12-foot buffer zone at the front where most other productions would do their best work.
Secondly, there’s a lot to remember. Such is the extent of the exposition, characters end up reading from textbooks, dropping in long speeches about Plantagenet politics (where others might discuss the weather or the cricket) and pinning pictures on boards that we, the audience, cannot see.
A matter of time
The programme comes with a family tree which – what? – we’re supposed to learn before the curtain rises? Cue chilling flashbacks to history exams with cold sweat trickling down collective spines and key dates written in biro on shirt cuffs.
Thirdly, all this takes time. So much time that if you were to see all the plots and subplots laid out as a menu – including some Shakespearean romantic fandango – you might dispense with the minor dishes and opt for the classic main course/dessert combo and get the thing done. But writer Reedy will insist on you seeing the product of her thinking as she tussles with evident problems of staging a history lecture.
All this is not to say director Jenny Eastop’s production is not ultimately enjoyable. Time eases the last two of these problems. In the second act the questions become more focussed – did Richard III usurp the throne, and did he kill the princes in the tower? – allowing for some graspable curiosity to arise. And the problem of length, while not entirely dissolved, becomes less obdurate because the actors are earnest in their commitment to the production and reside in settings and costumes (Bob Sterrett) which are sumptuous.
Cast is well drilled
Rob Promfret as Alan Grant is solid; Rachel Pickup injects glamour into lovelorn actress Marta Hallard, inexplicably besotted with the curmudgeonly Grant; Noah Huntley has fun with closeted stage darling Nigel Templeton; and Harrison Sharpe – the Shaggy of this Scooby Doo gang – is lithe limbed and kooky as amateur investigator Brent Carradine.
Elsewhere the ensemble is curiously well-briefed about English culture and history but disguise their learning with a straight-faced charm.
The whole thing ambles along like a Wolseley 6/90 – reliable, well-upholstered and stately in its way. If time is not an issue, be assured, you will arrive at your destination eventually.
The Daughter of Time runs at the Charing Cross Theatre until 13 September, 2025
This review originally appeared on The Spy In The Stalls.