The Secret Garden at Regent's Park Open Air Theatre. Credit Alex Brenner.Our story begins in India where petulant 10 year old Mary Lennox (Hannah Khalique-Brown) is orphaned by a cholera outbreak and despatched to live with an aunt and uncle at a remote house near the moors in rural Yorkshire, England. On arrival, the huge and imposing Misselthwaite Manor is a sad and lonely household where we discover that Mary’s aunt has already died due to complications in childbirth some ten years earlier and that her maudlin and crippled husband Archibald Craven (Jack Humphrey) has grown stony-hearted and distant by her loss. As Mary learns to lose her haughty manner and is coached in this endeavour by the more familiar, no-nonsense servants, she also discovers the secret garden of the title, a robin helper, a local nature-whisperer Dickon (Brydie Service) and that the nightly wailing sounds are not “…just the wind on the moors” as everyone insists.
To convey the back story whilst ensuring the over all pace never flags, the writers have deployed multiple character delivery of the narrative with single lines spoken by the various members of the on-stage cast throughout. They have also maximised every opportunity to teach the audience not to judge a book by its cover, that it is better to ask than demand, and that forgiveness and understanding are strengths to be embraced. Whilst the slightly didactic approach may not be perfect, the device works effectively in conveying the book’s life lessons and thankfully, affords opportunities for entertaining moments of levity. In particular, Amanda Hadingue strikes the perfect balance as frazzled and exasperated housekeeper Mrs Medlock, newcomer Molly Hewitt-Richards as junior housekeeper Martha is blissfully endearing and naturally playful, whilst veteran Richard Clews as gardener Ben Weatherstaff is possessed of the kind of timing which would render him an outstanding and noteworthy Touchstone or Feste in Shakespeare’s canon.
Perhaps the set design lacks a little oomph (given the story’s grand house and magical garden setting), but this is a minor gripe in an otherwise delightful staging of an old favourite. As the audience heads-off into the London evening, each will be reminded that nature has much to teach us, that human beings also need sunshine to grow, and that patience and kindness can act as potent antidotes to fear and sadness. Lessons worthy of reconsideration at any time of life.
