Finding love, life and laughs in the Geordie apocalypse
A dystopian drama set below the streets of Newcastle is underway. Sam Wonfor talked to co-directors, Lucy Curry and Paula Penman as they prepared to bring their latest production into the open air.
The rehearsal room where Subterranea was being prepared for its premiere run couldn’t have been further removed from its setting - aside from the fact that Lucy Curry and Carl Wylie’s new play is located in Newcastle.
Peachplant Productions’ sprawling and light-filled HQ sits on the fourth floor of the old AA building off Scotswood Road… but the latest story they’re telling comes from the claustrophobic confines of disused Metro trains and underground tunnels.
Set a few years after an apparent nuclear strike sent the have-nots below ground level to seek safety, Lucy describes Subterranea as “a dystopian look at the class system… told through a very human story”.
“It feels very current and we feel like people will watch this and see themselves in elements of it,” she adds.
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The latest play out of the Peachplant stable, which opened at Laurels Theatre on Tuesday (September 10) follows Whale Of A Time, a two-hander, which charmed audiences at Alphabetti Theatre in 2022 and was directed by Paula Penman who is also sharing directing duties with Lucy on the current production.
While ‘Whale’ - as the pair affectionately call it - met two men as they met each other, in Subterranea, the trio of characters couldn’t be closer.
“There’s Sophie and Charlie who are a couple and then there’s Sophie’s mam, Jean,” says Lucy.
“They’ve got these long standing relationships so it was a different challenge to get the audience up to speed and invested without the characters having conversations that they would have already had.”
“We’re being parachuted into their lives which are very closely intertwined, given the pretty intense situation they are living in,” adds Paula.
While Sophie and Charlie go ‘out’ to work to earn credits for food and bills in The Below, Jean is a bit more of a maternal wheeler dealer type - sorting out the food parcels as well as sourcing and trading what she can from The Above.
Veteran North East actor, Judy Earl plays Jean while Adam Donaldson (recently seen in Underdog: The Other Other Brontë at the National Theatre and Northern Stage) portrays Charlie.
Subterranea has also tempted Natasha Haws back to the stage after a lengthy break.
“We feel very lucky with the cast we’ve assembled,” says Lucy. “Judy is simply a North East legend, Adam has just come off the back of a play for the National and Natasha just blew us away at the audition. We’re delighted she’s chosen to come back to help us tell this story.”
“The chemistry between them all - Sophie and Charlie as a couple; Sophie and Jean and mam and daughter; and Charlie and Jean as son/mother-in-law is really wonderful to watch,” adds Paula.
Alongside the main cast are a rotating supporting cast ensemble of young drama students from Sage Academy in Byker who will take their turns dancing in the underground Northern Soul nights and making sure the set changes go without a hitch.
Telling ordinary stories in extraordinary ways has been the mission of Peachplant, since Lucy set it up with her husband, Carl in 2021… whether that be two men contemplating life inside the belly of a whale, or a young couple finding their way through love while navigating a repressive post-nuclear regime from their share of a knackered Metro carriage.
Lucy laughs and says of the latest set up. “Yeah, it’s not your average setting for a family drama… but while the situation is unusual, we find them having found a way to adapt and live it as their new normal while still obviously dreaming and planning about what the future could look like.
“Basically they were told that they’d have to stay down there for about a month,” she continues, while being clear she’s not going to be able to reveal too much detail about the story.
“Now it’s years later they’ve never been allowed to resurface - always being given false promises and hope. Their lives have basically become about surviving… but their patience is reaching its end.”
Recognising the parallels which some will draw with recent memories of lockdowns and accusations of a ‘one rule for them’ governing strategy, Lucy says she expects audiences to find the familiar in Subterranea, despite its incomprehensible setting.
“I mean it’s not a play about Covid or anything like that, but I think people may relate to it in a different way, since the pandemic… and there is a line in it about the people in The Above ‘dancing all over us’.”
If all of the above sounds a bit bleak, both Lucy and Paula are very keen to assure us there is much light among the darkness.
“It is one of those situations you can see would breed the darkest of comedy,” says Paula. “Anytime sh** happens in life… if we just lean into the darkness all the time, we'll lose ourselves in the hole.”
Lucy agrees. “Just as in real life, you have to have the humour - that’s often what gets us through. So there is lots of comedy and joy.
“The beauty of this play is that by being stuck together in this nightmare scenario, they find the thing that gets them through is community, people, love and being in it together.”
A shortlisted entry to Laurels Theatre’s inaugural Richard Jenkinson Commission playwriting prize last year, Subterranea received development support while Laurels have also co-produced the play. The project has also benefited from an Arts Council grant.
“We’re really thrilled to be telling this story at Laurels, who have been really supportive and we’re grateful for the financial support from the Arts Council,” says Lucy.
“We’re looking forward to welcoming everyone to our underground world.”
Which you can find in an attic in Whitley Bay until September 28. For tickets, visit the Laurels website.