The End of History at The Royal Court

The majority of us have some kind of issue over our parents and their parenting, but it’s another matter entirely to write a play based on them and admit to doing so.  Jack Thorne, the very successful playwright and script writer has done just that with The End of History at The Royal Court.  Alongside his frequent collaborator, Director John Tiffany, Thorne has produced a very intimate play, the title of which is taken from Francis Fukuyama, the political theorist who coined the phrase in 1989.

David Morrissey and Lesley Sharp play David and Sal, parents to Polly (Kate O’Flynn), Carl (Sam Swainsbury) and Tom (Laurie Davidson) and the action takes place in their overcrowded kitchen in Newbury.  The nonconformist, very left-wing couple’s raison d’etre has always been equality.  Their kids are now adult and so they feel their work with regard to passing on their values, is now accomplished. The utter conviction that their beliefs are the right ones and how this has shaped their family is brought under the microscope in three acts (no interval) at ten-year (1997 to 2007 to 2017) intervals.

Morrissey and Sharp are excellent at radiating the couple’s commitment, imbuing David and Sal with great gusts of passion and humour.  Sharp, in particular, is very funny, especially when discussing anything sexual. As far as she (well actually both of them) is concerned anything goes; there is no filter.  This directness isn’t moderated even when son Carl introduces the family to new, rather smart and rich, girlfriend, Harriet, (well played by Zoe Boyle).  This isn’t to say that Sal is at ease with the visitor and the fidgety Sharp is able to convey a mother’s nerves that perhaps this time she’s overstepped the mark. Underneath the bravado she has become anxious as to what her children think of her.

As with most, if not all, families, each child is different.  The always excellent Kate O’Flynn gives the Cambridge educated Polly an ungainly air and shows her inability to disguise any uncharitable thoughts she may be harbouring.  Laurie Davidson as Tom is superb as the gay, waggish younger son, who is a little too fond of dope and is inclined to give into suicidal thoughts.  Meanwhile, Sam Swainsbury as Carl, portrays a shy, rather depressed older son, all too aware (as are his siblings) that his parent’s judgement of him is not altogether favourable.

Taken as a whole, David and Sal come out as rather daunting parents with a capital D.  Not that we don’t get the sense that, despite the criticism they heap on their children and their strange decision with regard to leaving their inheritance to charity, this Leftie pair do love their brood.  Sal isn’t afraid to show it from the offset, and at the end of the play we get a glimpse of a gentler, less judgemental David as he quietly sits upstage reading a very poignant letter.

It may seem that not much happens in The End of History, and nothing does really.  Just round the table truth telling and sweary banter.  But there is much humour, John Tiffany stages the whole thing with aplomb and he and Movement Director, Steven Hoggett ensure that the ongoing domestic life between the three scenes is beautifully realised.

Perhaps not one of Jack Thorne’s best works but an interesting insight into his background and an homage to his parents, Mike & Maggie who he describes as, ‘ They’re tricky, amazing and brilliant.  I want to shake them sometimes, but I love them very much’.