Brighton Fringe 2025

Jekyll and Hyde

Brighton Little Theatre

Genre: Adaptation, classical, Drama, Fringe Theatre, Short Plays, Theatre

Venue: Brighton Little Theatre

Festival: Brighton Fringe

Low Down

Review

It’s not often another Jekyll and Hyde is a must-see, but this, being Brighton Little is different. First, it’s Neil Bartlett’s singular and quite brilliant 2022 adaptation of R. L. Stevenson’s Jekyll and Hyde now playing at Brighton Little Theatre till May 10^th. It’s directed by Leigh Ward, with Tess Gill as Assistant Director and Patti Griffiths blocking movement.

Instead of a lonely narrator, we‘re introduced to Dr Stevenson (Joana Dos Passos, making an assured and memorable debut): a woman doctor in 1880s London, trying to piece together the story of the corpse of Dr Jekyll, after a harrumph from a chorus of fellow-physicians who regard her graduation with disdain, muttering and slow-clapping from a serried row of medical theatre-seats. Bartlett’s devised a Greek chorus with walk-ons; as the narration unfolds we’re introduced to them.

Katie Ford, the Girl assaulted by a stomping monster and lucky to survive, later features as a slinky Landlady in corsets. Ford too makes her BLT debut, and also makes a vivid impression in a world of men. Patti Griffiths as taciturn landlady (bringing one feels a hint of Edinburgh with her) startles in black. The six numbered Gentlemen in turn apparate with individual roles. Mr Enfield, in Craig Hearns’ assured bluster, is the straight-down late Victorian with anxiety eating his assurance. Steven Adams, as Dr Jekyll’s friend Mr Utterson calibrates watchfulness, warmth, panic and moral outrage in one of his finest performances at BLT.

Richard Fisher, as Dr Lanyon is pressed to death with the weight of what he’s finally seen, and it carries him to his grave. It’s a performance written on Fisher’s face, lit in Beverley Grover’s spectral effects with a kind of horror of its own. Grover’s and Ward’s selection of modern generic music – etiolated strings, a washed-out keyboard effect – fits perfectly.

Chris Middleton’s Inspector Newcombe etches sanity and bafflement, again in a sterling genre role. Rosalind Caldwell too shows adamantine blankness as the Office Clerk. In all, this is an outstanding ensemble play and these actors in chorus and individually, are strikingly good.

Daniel Carr, a Sixth Gentleman lowers at the back of Steven Adams’ set.  Superbly functional, it’s both a medical theatre where a corpse is wheeled on and off downstage, and with three changing doors upstage-right, morphs into streets and interiors. Centred, these rows of seats literally plant the chorus; and in Grover’s effects, spotlights the Sixth as first: Carr who as in a Hitchcock film, where the villain unlike everyone else fixes his eyes on just one tennis player and never swivels his head, is striking. Carr looks the part too, handsome and debonair as Jekyll, graunched to a snarl as Hyde with a rough Bill Sykes mien and accent.

With the modulation there’s several explosive transitions. Carr possesses a strong voice; the only drawback is that he doesn’t recognise how good it is: he can afford to rein it in a little. Physically he’s a writhe of agony and agon: the struggle with himself printed on his expressive face; which can blank from a frown and wrench up again.

This production only underlines how consummate BLT are. Beyond even the Little Theatre brand they maintain a de facto repertory company, always informed with new members and an ever-evolving aesthetic that takes in the new and works it into the language of their productions. As ever, they seek out the rare and (as here) brand-new, yet make it appear effortlessly attractive to any audience.

On a tiny but world-sized stage, it’s not even a wonder that nine actors absorb us in a new take on once-threadbare territory. As Dos Passos teases out the speaking corpse, sexisms, Victorian values and the very notion of identity are shredded finely, and finally. In just 97 minutes with interval this is unmissable, a must-see.

Set Design, Construction Painting & Décor, Steven Adams

Lighting and Sound Design, Beverley Grover,

Stage Manager Claire Prater, ASM Orla Jones,

Set Design Steven Adams, Painting Tom Williams, Alison Williams, Set Construction the Cast & Crew

Lighting and Sound Operation Beverley Grover, Costumes Myles Locke, Make-up Patti Griffiths, Photography Miles Davies

Special Thanks to Gladrags, Frankie Knight.

Published May 5, 2025May 5, 2025 by Simon Jenner