The Ocean at the End of the Lane by Joel Horwood (review)

The run of The Ocean at the End of the Lane, adapted by Joel Horwood from Neil Gaiman’s novel of the same title, coincided with at least two other London productions based on fantasy novels: Harry Potter and the Cursed Child at the Palace Theatre, and The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe at the Bridge Theatre. What distinguished Ocean at the End of the Lane, however, was that it was not targeted at children or families. Rather than inviting the audience to escape into a magical world, the production blended realism and nonrealism to highlight the potential for horror and magic in everyday life. Director Katy Rudd rendered the play’s magical elements through theatrical nonrealism, incorporating puppetry, physical theatre, and stage magic, while other, non-magical aspects of the play (particularly domestic family scenes) remained rooted in realism. In this way, the production discouraged escapism, insisting that the characters’ struggles with grief, loneliness, and rejection were exacerbated but not caused by encounters with magic.

The play centers on an unnamed Boy (Samuel Blenkin) who faces a range of challenges, some magical and some mundane. He is struggling with the recent death of his mother, a strained relationship with his Dad (Justin Salinger), and isolation from his peers. On his twelfth birthday he meets the Hempstocks, a daughter, mother, and grandmother who demonstrate that magic is real and the boundaries between worlds are more permeable than one might wish. While out with the Hempstock daughter, Lettie (Marli Siu), Boy somewhat accidentally lets a magical entity use him as a vehicle to enter our world. The entity takes the form of Ursula (Pippa Nixon), who uses her powers to step into the gap in Boy’s family left by his mother’s death. In order to banish Ursula, Lettie summons the ominous “Hunger Birds,” but must then protect Boy when they turn on him. Once this is resolved, the Hempstocks erase the events from Boy’s memory. The play is bookended by scenes in which an adult version of Boy (also played by Salinger) returns to the Hempstock farm and faces the sudden return of these memories. Old Mrs. Hempstock (Josie Walker) reveals that this is not his first visit to the farm as an adult; indeed, he has frequently instinctively traveled there while struggling with non-magical aspects of his life, including marriage, divorce, and parenting. Old Mrs. Hempstock provides some comfort, but as when he was a child, her ability to use magic to solve interpersonal and psychological problems is limited.

Justin Salinger (Dad) and Samuel Blenkin (Boy) in The Ocean at the End of the Lane. (Photo: Manuel Harlan.)

Samuel Blenkin (Boy) and Marli Siu (Lettie Hempstock) in The Ocean at the End of the Lane. (Photo: Manuel Harlan.)

Rudd used a mixture of realistic and nonrealistic staging to highlight this interplay between magical and quotidian. She rooted the magical elements of the play in a range of nonrealistic techniques. These were generally enacted by the ensemble, who became the puppeteers manipulating the giant, almost formless monster that would become Ursula; the Hunger Birds (more fully and frighteningly realized with each appearance); and even the magical terrain, impeding or assisting Boy’s progress depending on whose magic was in control. In one memorable scene, the ensemble acted as Ursula’s omnipresent doubles, blocking Boy from escaping through any of the suddenly multiplied doors.

The moment in which the characters were most enmeshed in magic coincided with Rudd’s largest divergence from realism. Late in the play, Boy and Lettie escaped the Hunger Birds by entering the titular Ocean (which appeared to the uninitiated as a pond), a space of indescribable power and knowledge. In this moment, the pair were replaced by small puppets and the ensemble used blue silks that had been secreted into the audience to expand...