The Years review

Deborah Findlay, Romola Garai, Gina McKee, Anjli Mohindra and Harmony Rose-Bremner take turns performing and narrating the life of a single woman, born in 1940, and coming of age amid post-war France’s biggest social agonies: colonialism in Algeria, sexual liberation, the 1968 student protests and the growth of free-market capitalism. It sounds heavy – and sure, the much-publicised termination is – but there’s also a lot of joy, from a young girl discovering masturbation to her older self becoming reacquainted with sex. Not to mention a pastiche of 1980s home workout videos that provides a grateful audience with a moment of pure silliness.

An astute soundtrack helps situate us as we traverse the decades. Rose-Bremner’s astonishing, spectral vocals anchor one of the most haunting sequences: a well-deployed rendition of Pink Floyd’s The Great Gig in the Sky. Meanwhile, Juul Dekker’s design slowly unfolds to reveal more than just a suburban kitchen: without revealing too many of its surprises, nothing is left unexplored in this Russian doll of a set.

Each actor brings a unique quality to the table: Mohindra is curious and watchful, and Rose-Bremner joyfully spirited. Garai embodies defiance, with Findlay restoring a sense of equanimity. McKee, meanwhile, seems to charge the audience, as she embarks on an electrifying bender through the troughs and peaks of desire, grief, hilarity and hysteria.

This is a play quite happy to leave its audience in a wistful, questioning and slightly uneasy fog. But above all, it’s a joy to see such emphatically feminist theatre on the West End stage.