A fascinating curiosity at the National Theatre
Helen Edmundson has given her new play an ingenious title, Some Woman. The phrase may be admiring, ‘that is some woman’, or dismissive, ‘she’s just some woman’. The central character, Julie, is a timid domestic drudge who reinvents herself as a plucky feminist heroine. The storytelling is a little amateurish at times and the long opening scene feels like an artless parade of personalities. One by one, Julie’s ghastly relatives walk into the kitchen. Her prickly daughter, Kate, plans to emigrate to Spain with her insufferably talkative boyfriend Nathan, who dresses in a brown pin-stripe suit and boasts of his powerful contacts. Next comes pale little Ginny, a poetry-writing teenager, who holds the family to ransom by refusing to eat.
