Theatre review: Tension builds in this challenging play at The Priory Theatre
When Darkness Falls
Performed at The Priory Theatre, Friday 23 October 2026 [to 31 October]
Director: Connor Cunningham.
Ghost stories are often Gothic in era or style or both. The Priory however gave a modern slant, with history teacher John [Ben Smith] recording a podcast in his shabby and untidy office. His guest, a paranormal researcher, was unnamed, simply listed as The Speaker [Guy Devine].
Set in Guernsey, a holiday destination but with a past steeped in violence, witchcraft, pitchforks and burning torches, the Speaker recounted stories covering four centuries and involving grisly murders. The first act included an embittered wife, the burning alive of five women deemed witches, and the murder of a captured British soldier when the Nazis occupied Guernsey. John and the Speaker circle each other warily, physically and verbally. Ben portrayed John’s scepticism with subtle facetiousness and Guy gave the Speaker a coolness in the face of his host’s cynicism. Perhaps because of this, the first half was laboured, but given colour when Ben and Guy took the roles briefly of some of the characters in the narrations.
After the interval, the pace quickened, and the play got to the nub of the matter. The Speaker argued that ghostly events were the result of horrific events that were ‘unfinished business’, and that we were never free of the past. He had brought cassette tapes of a boy being interviewed by a psychologist dealing with people who experienced paranormal events.
The Speaker had a too lengthy monologue, which Guy delivered well with increasing passion and rising tension, describing events from his own past. John was increasingly on the backfoot and the arguments became angrier as the characters revealed their true identities and connection. Ben expressed John’s belief that events were binary, black and white, while Guy fiercely argued The Speaker’s case that history was a set of lies agreed upon. Ben and Guy depicted the intensity of their grief superbly in the final scenes. No spoilers but the Great Storm of 1987 played a devastating role in the situation the two characters found themselves in.
Director Connor Cunningham and the technical crew maintained The Priory’s high standards with a script that was a slow burn, and a play that was not particularly scary but cleverly raised issues about the legacy of memories that we all carry.
By Charles Essex