Director Wils Wilson casts a number of tall actors in Caroline Bird’s play, but one performer towers above them. Like her character, headstrong, passionate and driven, Bettrys Jones is the gravitational force around which all else revolves. This, despite being the shortest on stage.
Playing Ellen Wilkinson, the “thumb-sized” Manchester-born MP who rose from prewar activism to postwar minister of education, Jones is a theatrical life force. The centre of attention throughout a three-hour production, she is rooted and calm, commanding without grandstanding. She captures the enthusiasm and contradictions of a politician who, as Bird presents her, put the fight against injustice ahead of friends, lovers and her own wellbeing.
