Review: Uplifting portrayal of slowly uncovered kindness - Goodnight Mr Tom, The Priory Theatre, Kenilworth

Review:

Goodnight Mr Tom

Performed at The Priory Theatre, Kenilworth, Wednesday 02 September 2026 [to 12 September]

Director: Pete and Rachel Davis

Uplifting portrayal of slowly uncovered kindness.

Pathe News reels showed the pain and fear etched on the faces of child evacuees in 1939 in the backdrop at the start of this moving production about damaged people who slowly heal with kindness.  East London gutter snipe William [Jacob Reid] is placed with curmudgeonly elderly Tom Oakley [Stuart Lawson], the eponymous Mr Tom.

Jacob and Stuart convey wonderfully their two distinctly different personalities in their respective roles.  Jacob conveys William’s timidity and fearfulness as we get hints as to the cause of the multiple bruises on his body, especially when his sparse belongings include a heavy leather belt.  Tom’s initial gruffness is not quite as it seems as Stuart gives Tom a hint of caring which grows as the story evolves.  There is a wonderful depiction of a slow thawing by each of them of the protective walls they have built around themselves.

Young actors came to the fore with a lively and intentionally over-the-top performance of Zach [Jack Shenton-Thompson] from a theatrical family, misquoting Shakespeare, and George [Alex Prior], Carrie [Isla Coleman] and Ginnie [Erin Tompkins] as local children who also soften to William over time.  All the young actors projected well and were fluent in their lines, and looked comfortable on stage. 

Natasha Lea was stern but kindly in her role as Mrs Fletcher, and fierce as the nursing sister.  Nicky Main brought a lump to the throat if not tears to the eyes of many as William’s harsh and abusive mother, a role which must have been difficult to perform.  The phrase “it’s acting, darling” does not do justice to the emotions it conveyed.  The now clichéd phrase ‘mental health problems’ was truly applicable here, with her cruelty towards her children.  Puppeteer Connor Cunningham deserves special mention as Sammy the dog.  He manoeuvred Sammy so well that he was almost ‘invisible’ as one focussed on Sammy’s movements and vocalisations.

The scenery design, also by the directors, was a revelation, a case of less is more.  The plain beige almost empty set, apart from plain wooden boxes, interpreted the war time austerity brilliantly, with upstage flats turning like pages of a book to evoke Tom’s living room, the countryside with fields and clouds, and the burning buildings of the London blitz.  Tom Boulton’s lighting design and sound design of George Jones and Selina Davis cleverly evoked a number of scenes: the railway station; the blitz scene in the air raid shelter; and the hospital.  Smoke, sound effects and noise were very realistic, creating the chaos and fear with all the cast in apparent tumult in a crowd scene. 

The lighting of different parts of the stage also evoked different locations, although occasionally the actor(s) were not standing in quite the right places, and there were some first night hiatuses between actors entering.  However the conclusion is wonderfully heart warming as the hurt and misunderstood Tom and the traumatised William become the loving adoptive father and son.  Again The Priory has delivered a terrific production.

Tickets from Goodnight Mister Tom at Priory Theatre event tickets from TicketSource

Charles Essex