Bellringers is written by Daisy Hall (a finalist in this year’s Women’s Prize for Playwriting) and produced by multi-award winners, Ellie Keel Productions and Atticist in association with Hampstead Theatre. This play already has a pedigree and expectations are high. Fortunately for this audience, we were not disappointed. We are treated to 65 minutes of tense, character-driven script where nothing occurs but everything happens. Even if we feel a little adrift and unsettled about the world the characters inhabit, we can’t help but be sucked into their relationship and dilemma.
Both actors are magnetic to watch. Aspinall, played with a wonderfully manic yet sensitive air by Luke Rollason, and Clement, played with great intensity by Paul Adeyefa, arrive in the bell tower of the church. The storm is coming and they need to ring the bells but only at the right time. Over the course of the story, we start to realise that this is not the same world we live in; mushrooms grow as they talk, fish fall out of the sky, and the storms get ever bigger and more dangerous. Maybe Bellringers could be classed as science fiction, an apocalypse drama, but it feels too rooted in the everyday, with delight in the names of small villages and everyday concerns like fixing an old boat or scrumping apples. The dislocation between the two close friends joking and mucking around, the strangely altered world, and the ever-present dread and anxiety about their purpose in the bell tower gives this piece urgency and drive.
Bellringers is staged with economy; lighting and sound provide the atmosphere along with the hanging bell ropes. The Roundabout at Summerhall provides not only the intimacy of ‘theatre in the round’ but the perfect setting for the round bell tower. Directed beautifully by Jessica Lazar to ensure the pace and use of space is maximised. As it builds and builds as the storm grows, we lean closer to the action, desperate to know the outcome. Possibly the play feels too short, like an introduction to a different world, and we are left hanging with no resolve. However, this is a masterclass in acting where every pause counts and we fall a little in love with the characters. Bellringers deserves all and every award that could get heaped upon it and I’ll be looking out for Daisy Hall’s next script with anticipation.
