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Jack Shepherd’s Holding Fire! is nearly a great play. It so almost gets there and only falters in its last stride. What a shame! For Shepherd and up-and-coming young tyro, Mark Rosenblatt (keep a good eye on him, he’s destined to go places, mark my words) have together produced a terrific piece of popular political and social theatre that despite its Victorian setting, suits the Globe perfectly.

Shepherd’s theme – and a timely one – is Chartism, a subject most of us will remember from school and which usually makes the eyes droop and glaze over. But the Chartists and their six-point Charter are important as our suffrage forebears. They fought to gain the universal vote – well, for male suffrage, women had to wait until after the First World War. At a time when voter turnout in this country has sunk to its lowest level, Shepherd’s drama could not be a more useful reminder of those who put themselves on the line to win the right for us all to have our say.

Holding Fire! is no In Extremis, artistic director Dominic Dromgoole’s other barnstorming new-writing commission (by Howard Brenton) from last year. But what Shepherd and his play do have is passion and popular appeal: this epic drama that takes us from the Chartists’ humble beginnings and William Lovett, its leader, proclaiming the need for the rights of the ordinary worker to have a say in the running of the country, to the same man, 35 years later, imprisoned by the establishment but undimmed in his vision of a better, more equal society.

In between, Shepherd weaves the story of Lizzie, rescued from poverty on the streets of London by philanthropic northern grandee, Mrs Harrington (Kirsty Besterman) as illustration of the reality of the working poor. It’s far too much to cover, but Rosenblatt’s wonderfully fluid production and able cast ensure that what emerges is a remarkable piece of social history – not least in the political debates, thrillingly staged throughout the whole of the Globe arena.

The effect is electric - like watching 1789 and the ferment of the French Revolution – and a groundbreaking use of the theatre itself, which practically becomes a People’s Parliament in which vital political issues regarding equality and social justice are engaged with an urgency we seldom get to hear these days.

Louise Callaghan as the unfortunate but determined Lizzie is outstanding as is Peter Hamilton Dyer as Lovett. But all deserve praise here in a production that shows the Globe once again as a perfect cockpit of the imagination.

- Carole Woddis

** Don’t miss our Whatsonstage.com Outing to Holding Fire! on 23 August 2007 – including a FREE programme & EXCLUSIVE post-show Q&A – all for just £22.50!!! - click here to book now! **