REVIEW: TRANSPORTS

FOREST ARTS CENTRE, NEW MILTON

This new play, written and directed by Jon Welch, is compelling, heartbreaking, and cuttingly thought-provoking.

Transports tells the story of Dinah, a troubled and difficult 15-year-old who is shunted into her final foster home in the 1970s.

Her new foster-mum Lotte has a foreign accent, verbal diarrhoea, and a trunk full of secret memories.

The two characters try to adjust to each other, but their lives and histories intertwine, collide and splinter with shocking consequences.

The atmospheric set design by Cornwall’s Eden Project’s Alan Munden – featuring two vertical railway lines symbolising the characters’ journeys and parallel problems – includes subtle living rooms, bedrooms and the secretive loft.

Shifting seamlessly between Lotte’s Kindertransport from Nazi Germany to England in the 1940s, and Dinah’s foster homes and schools in the 1970s, the period details are utterly convincing, particularly the use of radio programmes from Forties favourites to Tony Blackburn’s breakfast show.

Mesmeric acting from Juliet Welch and Hannah Stephens in multiple roles, blends with riveting overhead visuals, provocative crowd vocals, and movingly poignant piano sound effects.

The narrative is pacy, onstage costume changes creatively effective, lighting extremely evocative.

Yet this powerful drama also resonates with today’s refugee crisis, as Europe struggles with mass migration from Syria, both trying to cope with geographical, cultural and emotional displacement.

Transports, produced by Pipeline Theatre Company, is currently touring the UK.

Catch Transports at Fareham’s Ashcroft Arts Centre on March 23 and Salisbury Playhouse from March 24 to 26.

Brendan McCusker