The Ocean at the End of the Lane Review by Nina Jervis

August 9, 2023

Thanks to Nina Jervis from www.ninathewriter.com for this review.

It’s hard to imagine just how a Neil Gaiman novel, well-known and well-loved all over the world for their elements of dark fantasy and magical realism, might translate to the stage.

This one: a short, lyrical story Gaiman originally wrote for his wife, “to tell her where I lived and who I was as a boy” is set in the strange, tumultuous space between childhood and adulthood. It should have been impossible to take all of the imagination, wonder, fear, loss, and disappointment contained within its pages and make all of them breathe. But somehow, that’s exactly what this show achieves.

The protagonist is an unnamed Boy (Keir Ogilvy, in an outstanding and energetic performance) whom we first meet as an older man. He’s revisiting the Domesday Book-mentioned farm whose inhabitants once saved his life… although he only sort-of remembers how.

We’re then taken back to the time in question, which is just after the death of Boy’s mother. The family’s reduced circumstances mean they’ve resorted to taking in a lodger, forcing Boy to share a bedroom with his little sister, with whom he squabbles constantly. Their father (Trevor Fox, who also plays the adult Boy) loses his tie and burns the toast, and Boy himself is a loner who has turned to books – particularly classic fantasies like Alice in Wonderland and The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe – to escape the real world.

Then, the lodger kills himself in the family car, which introduces Boy to the inhabitants of the farm: three generations of magical women known as the Hempstocks. The charismatic youngest Hempstock, Lettie (a heartfelt Millie Hikasa) is convinced that the farm’s duck-pond is really an ocean. Her wise, all-knowing grandmother (Finty Williams, whose performance is a captivating tour-de-force throughout) claims to have been around for so long, she can remember when the moon was made.

The arrival of a supernatural being – whom Lettie and Boy set out to find and bind – leads to the sudden, menacing presence of a new lodger, Ursula (a magnetic Charlie Brooks) in the family home. She effortlessly charms Boy’s father and sister whilst confining Boy to his room… an ingenious escape-plan later, and the real, often terrifying, adventures begin.

The show is visually arresting throughout: the mesmerising, shape-shifting scenery is plucked straight from a child’s over-imaginative mind, in such jaw-dropping ways that you might find yourself whispering “how did they do THAT?” every few minutes. Doors multiply, windows open out onto dense forest, props appear and disappear as if by magic, and fearsome monsters loom. Jamie Harrison, in charge of the show’s magic and illusions, has done a bang-up job.

The set is seamlessly manipulated by a deft, black-clad ensemble who drift across the stage like ghosts, and who occasionally (and cleverly) form part of the story. The music, meanwhile, is so well-timed and evocative that it gave me goosebumps on more than one occasion.

Be warned: this isn’t a show for very young children – the recommended age is 12+ - or perhaps anyone of an extra-sensitive disposition. Having grown up in a motherless house myself, and also having turned to books for comfort as a child, I shed more than a few tears as the story reached its compelling denouement (judging by the sudden chorus of sniffs from the surrounding seats, I suspect I wasn’t the only one!)

It's also the kind of show that each audience-member may take something different from. After we’d left, chatting with my companions (my fiancé and his 13-year-old niece) brought wildly different interpretations and reactions which were interesting to discuss and reflect on.

When the show ended, there was a brief moment of silence – as if the audience didn’t really believe it could be over – then a smattering of applause, then a standing ovation as the cast took their bows. This seemed to underline the fact that The Ocean at the End of the Lane isn’t really a show, but an experience… and a remarkable one at that.