The Memory of Water at Octagon Theatre Bolton – review

The Memory of Water at Bolton Octagon floods in like rising damp in a decaying childhood home. Familiar, slightly uncomfortable, and quietly revealing, the longer you sit with it. Shelagh Stephenson’s 1996 play remains a keen study of sisterhood, grief and the emotional archaeology of family life.

The premise is deceptively simple. Three sisters return to their childhood home following their mother’s death, gathering before the funeral like survivors circling the same wreckage from different angles. These women are united by blood but divided by memory, resentment and long-practised self-mythology. Stephenson’s writing understands that grief rarely arrives as a single clean emotion. Instead, it leaks sideways through sarcasm, bickering and half-buried accusations.

At the centre of this production is Vicky Binns as Vi, bringing the whole production vividly to life with her portrayal of the dead mother. Her performance is precise, never showy, and quietly devastating when the cracks finally appear. In scenes where the sisters’ versions of the past collide, Binns listens as actively as she speaks, giving the play its pulse and human credibility.

Around her, the production is thoughtful rather than revelatory. The sisters’ dynamics are well drawn, though some exchanges feel overly familiar, like well-worn grooves in a family argument that never quite tips into danger. Victoria Brazier and Polly Lister, as Teresa and Mary, are believable as two sisters navigating very different lives, but Helen Flanagan’s portrayal of the self-absorbed Catherine risks simply reprising her role as Rosie Webster in Coronation Street.

Stephenson’s script, sharp as it is, shows its age in moments where revelations arrive on cue rather than erupt organically. There are flashes of humour, dry and recognisable, but the comedy sometimes softens the play’s bite instead of sharpening it. Moments that should be raw and explosive often end up fizzling out like the disappointing indoor fireworks from the ’70s.

The Octagon’s staging is restrained and serviceable. The childhood home is evoked with a sense of lived-in realism as designer Katie Scott adds metaphorical depth to the emotional terrain with an eroding foundation that reminds us this home, its family and memories could disintegrate at any point.

In terms of the directing, Lotte Wakeman seems to favour clarity over risk. This ensures the story is accessible and emotionally legible, but it also means the play occasionally settles for comfort when it might push further into discomfort. Given how merciless memory can be, a little more volatility would not have gone amiss.

Still, The Memory of Water endures because it understands something painfully true: that families do not share the same past, only overlapping drafts of it. This Bolton Octagon and Liverpool Everyman co-production honours that truth with care, if not always with daring, reminding us that memory is unreliable, grief untidy, and family love often inseparable from long-standing irritation.