If the title sounds familiar, it’s because it was first used by Alfred Hitchcock for one of his most acclaimed films. Made in 1938, The Lady Vanishes was a suspense thriller based on a 1936 novel by Ethel Lina White called The Wheel Spins. The Genesian Theatre’s production uses a new stage adaptation by prolific UK writer, Derek Webb, which borrows Hitchcock’s title, but stays much more loyal to White’s novel.
On a train originating from somewhere in Europe and bound for Trieste are several passengers mostly unknown to each other. The play opens with characters standing in front of a white curtain. Props and the dialogue indicate they are on a platform waiting for a train.
Iris Carr is a spritely young British woman, travelling alone after visiting friends. She inexplicably collapses and falls unconscious on the platform. Various passengers tend to her and revive her as the train pulls in.
Iris goes to her compartment which she shares with a young, amorous couple whom everyone (incorrectly) assumes are newlyweds; an older woman travelling alone named Miss Froy; a sinister-looking, unsociable doctor; and a recently widowed baroness.
Other characters on the train include two elderly sisters, a reverend and his wife, a professor, a young engineer and a very odd waiter.
Iris befriends Miss Froy who, over a cup of tea, shares details of her previous employment as a governess to the children of a divisive political figure. After they return to their compartment, Iris has a nap. When she wakes up she discovers that Miss Froy has seemingly vanished into thin air. What’s worse, all the passengers who had definitely met or seen Miss Froy are now denying she ever existed.
The Professor and the young engineer, Max Hare, who board the train after Miss Froy’s disappearance are eager to help Iris; however, they gradually begin to doubt her sanity, finding little evidence to support her claim.
The audience, too, is presented with this dual dilemma: did Miss Froy really exist or is Iris indeed mad? And if she did exist, what happened to her?
After the initial scene on the platform, the white curtain parts to reveal a very clever set depicting three compartments of an old style train carriage. The first is a façade, the middle one is revealed by two sliding doors and serves alternately as a travelling compartment and the dining car. The third has a hinged door and blind on the window; within it is a patient completely wrapped in bandages that the Doctor is escorting to Trieste, (we are told this, we don’t actually see them).
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Along with a delightful set, which includes vintage furnishings, suitcases, signposts and more, are the sound effects of a train on tracks and the lighting design, all helping to take the audience onto a train carriage in the 1930s.
This is a fun piece filled with nostalgia, lots of comedy, a bit of absurdity and, of course, a devilish mystery.
The Lady Vanishes, Genesian Theatre
Writer: Derek Webb
Director: Emily Saint Smith
Assistant Director: Kate Stewart
Production Manager: Barry Nielsen
Lighting Designer: Cian Byrne
Set Designer: Emily Saint-Smith
Production Designers: Alex Wylie, Ellen Pope, Jelena Popovic
Costume Designer: Susan Carveth
Sound Designer: Kate Stewart
Stage Manager: Lisa Ellis-Timbery
Set Construction: Peter Curtis
Cast: Joss Chalmers, Jono Lukins, Ron Ringer, Gabriel Jab’bar, Penny Day, Brooke Ryan, Lynn Roise, Sandra Bass, Ben Pobjie, Billy Allagiannis, Liminka Panther, Anastasia Vokhmyakov, Susan Carveth
The Lady Vanishes will be performed until 26 July 2025.
