REVIEW: ⭐⭐⭐⭐ - Tales of a Jane Austen Spinster

Thursday 29 May [also runs Friday 30] - The Mission Theatre

Lilliana, as she swiftly unburdens to us, is a lost character, protagonist of an Austen novel that our Jane never completed, so she never got to be happily matched - nor did the great novelist herself, we are reminded - and she feels unfulfilled.

What Lilliana has in common with a ‘real’ Austen heroine is that she is well portrayed, a believable human being; sensible, thoughtful, self-analytic, self-reliant, likeable, even relatable. A proper fictional heroine.

Staying away from the meta-fictional games of lost-character narratives like Flann O’Brien, Calvino, or Jasper Fforde, to be honest not much of the set-up and plot mechanics hold much water, but that’s really not a problem, they are enough to create the character, to give her story some shape, and sustain her and us for 50 minutes, job done.

That we don’t have time to think too hard about the absurdities is of course a tribute to the devising, writing and acting of American [unbetrayed by her accent] Alexandra Jorgensen. Of course it’s a monologue, but the various vox ex machina incursions break up the chatter when it risks becoming soporific, and though the museum room remains central, she does get to leave it a couple of times, rendered well with only sound, some simple but effective lights, and the mobility of Ms.J.

The piece works well in The Mission, with its classical echoes, popular repertoire, but contemporary possibilities - Jorgensen makes good capital from directly approaching audience members. The piece works well in Bath, where we do actually have a Jane Austen museum of sorts, and it would do some of our tourists some good to see this. It also works well as a Fringe piece, 50 minutes with plenty of time to go on to a gig or a dinner, yet time enough time for Alexandra to make some points and raise some laughs, reflecting on matters of romance that are superficially simple but also quite profound [Austen again], and having us look sideways at ourselves for a moment.

The piece runs twice today [Friday]. You do have time to see it, there are tickets for sale, and I’d certainly recommend.

Dr Zeno