Life opportunities of children on sink estates revealed in this touching play
Children who had never seen the sea, who thought that milk came from bottles, children born and raised – or dragged up – on a sink estate in the late 70s. This was the starting point for Mrs Kay [Amelia Webster] to take her remedial class children on a day trip to the seaside. Amelia wonderfully portrayed this teacher’s affection and optimism for ‘her children’ in the face of the reality of their lives and future prospects, or lack of them.
Our Day Out
Performed at The Priory Theatre, Friday 05 September 2025 [until 13 September 2025].
Director: Nicky Main
Life opportunities of children on sink estates revealed in this touching play.
Children who had never seen the sea, who thought that milk came from bottles, children born and raised – or dragged up – on a sink estate in the late 70s. This was the starting point for Mrs Kay [Amelia Webster] to take her remedial class children on a day trip to the seaside. Amelia wonderfully portrayed this teacher’s affection and optimism for ‘her children’ in the face of the reality of their lives and future prospects, or lack of them.
Mrs Kay’s enthusiasm and trust was not shared by the sceptical head teacher [Ruth Jones], who dispatched Mr Briggs [Ben Smith] to ride shotgun on the bus and maintain discipline. Ben depicted throughout a man who had anger issues, burnt out and resentful at his job and therefore the children. The open-sided bus was cleverly constructed by set builder Becky Young, with moving scenery projected on the rear wall. The choice of music of songs between scene changes was superb, as they epitomised the era and many had poignant lyrics.
The scepticism and mistrust were seemingly well-founded with the children shoplifting at the sweet shop, trying to steal animals at the petting zoo, and largely being unruly, rude and misbehaving. From overheard comments during the interval, this was clearly ‘triggering’ for some teachers in audience. Yet the inconsistency between the contrasting approach of the two teachers inevitably led to uncertainty among the children.
Director Nicky Main showed her experience as the director of a theatre school by skillfully using nine young actors as the school children, giving an ideal demonstration of how youth theatre is the foundation from which good amateur, and possibly later professional, theatre will continue. They projected their lines clearly and maintained their different characters. Several of them had backstories which they revealed in short conversations with each other or the teachers. Molly Dearing gave Carol, an older girl who did not want to return home, a despondency which left us wondering what was happening there that meant that she was prepared to risk staying at the seaside alone.
Willy Russell’s script rather too obviously raised their almost hopeless life chances, as Amelia finally expressed Mrs Kay’s anger at Mr Brigg’s attitude, saying these children were rejects on the day they were born. More subtly, one of the children believed that the animals wanted a better life even though they were caged in the zoo. Russell’s play is still relevant to highlight the plight of some children, but brings hope too.
Tickets from Book — Priory Theatre