”Of Mice and Men” at Birmingham Rep and on tour review – ‘thoughtful and thought-provoking’

Birmingham Rep has had a hugely successful relationship with John Steinbeck’s Of Mice and Men over the past 20 or so years. Its 2001 production transferred to the West End and won an Olivier and its 2014 show was revived after two years.

Now it is the turn of Rep associate director Iqbal Khan to direct a new production which premieres in Birmingham before touring.

Khan, whose East is East and Tartuffe have been critically acclaimed and commercially successful, may be working with a story from nearly 100 years ago but this dramatisation is very current, bringing together an inclusive cast, with many of the actors having lived experience of disability.

This delivers both a richness to the relationships on stage and a depth to the story which hinges very much on the friendship between two itinerant farm hands, George and Lennie. This relationship is portrayed with real chemistry and understanding between Tom McCall as the super-stressed George and Wiliam Young as the giant-but-child-like Lennie.

There is a subtle empathy between the two men which is portrayed not just in their dialogue but also in their physicality as Lennie closes in on himself when distressed and Tom’s touch reassures him. While the characters around them fail to comprehend why these two men travel together, the audience see that the deep connection between them is a tie that binds.

Steinbeck’s play focusses on people on the edge of society and that is brought very much to the fore with Khan’s production where so many of the characters are detached from each other. When the two men arrive at Curley’s Farm in search of work, they find a group of individuals rather than any form of integrated society.

Lee Ravitz’s aged Candy, who is no longer able to undertake heavy farm work, is tolerated by the fellow farm hands but clearly separate. Ravitz also brings humour to the show with his wry, even bitter, outlook on life but the frustration of his performance is that many of his lines are hard to hear so we sometimes miss his keen observations on life.

Then there is Crooks who is banished from the bunkhouse because he is Black. Played by Reece Pantry, this is a Crooks who is angry at his segregation and who initially sees all the white men as homogenous – until he learns that exclusion can take many forms when he opens his door to Lennie.

One of the difficulties with Steinbeck can be his portrayal of women and this is nowhere more in evidence than in his novella Of Mice and Men in which Curley’s Wife is denounced by the men around her for bringing trouble on herself. Khan and performer Maddy Hill ensure the character is given space to explain her need for friendship, playing down any sexual element to that desire. Hill’s Curley’s Wife is a woman isolated in a world full of men who dismiss and judge her rather than trying to understand her.

Songs created by Elizabeth Purnell and sung by the cast help to set the story in its American Depression location and time, evoking not only the roaming lifestyle of these itinerant workers but also their dreams of a better future. Ciarán Bagnall’s sets are spare and harshly lit, with sparse bunkhouses and empty landscapes reminding us of the threadbare existences of these characters.

Produced by Birmingham Rep, Leeds Playhouse and Fiery Angel, the production is both thoughtful and thought-provoking, reminding us of both the need and the power of human connection even in the most challenging of times.