🎭 Theatre Review: Just Between Ourselves

A review of Alan Ayckbourn's 'Just Between Ourselves' at The Theatre Royal Windsor. Directed by Michael Cabot. 5th April 2025.

There are evenings at the theatre that make you feel uplifted, reflective, entertained, even pleasantly unsettled, and then there are evenings like Just Between Ourselves, which leave you wondering whether you should have stayed at home and re-stacked the dishwasher.

Alan Ayckbourn is often lauded as the master of middle-class misery, and to be fair, misery he delivers. But while his usual cocktail of dark humour and suburban despair can be sharp and unsettling in the right proportions, this particular brew tasted mostly flat and of structural misogyny.

Set in the cluttered garage and garden of Dennis (Tom Richardson) who thinks fixing a car counts as the highest display of masculinity and good husbandry, the play follows the slow emotional unravelling of Vera (Holly Smith), a housewife whose primary crime seems to be existing quietly while married to the most oblivious man in the Home Counties. Her husband, Dennis, is a self-centred misogynist, focused only on his tinkering and with no emotional bandwidth. Not helped by his mother, Marjorie (Connie Walker), who is an odious woman, who seems intent on inflicting and enhancing Vera's misery through gaslighting her repeatedly. Their friends Pam (Helen Phillips), a frustrated modern woman, and her husband Neil (Joseph Clowser), a naive and irritable man,

The problem isn’t the subject matter. The dissection of domestic neglect, male entitlement, and the invisibility of women in 1970s Britain is ripe for satire or serious drama. Indeed many comedies of the time were born from this concept. Just Between Ourselves does neither convincingly. It meanders. It sulks. It dares you to find it funny and then, when you don’t, punishes you with more scenes of Vera trying to put on a brave face while everyone ignores her mental health like an old lampshade.

Pam is a refreshing character in the despair of the others, but perhaps this is because she was the only rounded and relatable character. That said, none of them could be considered likeable. Dennis is so self-centred and blind even to Neil's positive assertions of the modern woman. Neil is trying to be supportive of his successful wife, and yet cannot hide his own discomfort and insecurities. Marjorie is an objectionable woman who is overbearing and controlling of all; she is one of those mothers with an unhealthy controlling nature regarding her son, and nothing and no-one is good enough for her son. Vera, who suffers at the cruel nature of Marjorie and dismissive and mocking tones of Dennis, is weak. She had such potential to be an interesting character but lack depth of writing.

The performances were earnest, the cast did what they could with the emotional inertia of the script, but the tone never quite knew what it wanted to be. Bleak comedy? Social commentary? Domestic horror? It had been billed as a dark comedy, but I struggled to find the humour.

The costume, set, and technical design were all to be admired. It was carefully done with clever use of the set in particular. Unfortunately, the technical aspects were the few redeeming features of this play. I stress that the fault cannot be laid with the cast nor director, I fear it was mainly the writing which let it down. In 2025, even taking into consideration that this play is set in the 1970s, the tone was off. In this the director must take some responsibility as it was not addressed in full, and felt off. Certainly in its original release in 1976, I am sure Just Between Ourselves would have been groundbreaking, shocking and wildly humorous to an audience who enjoyed misogynistic stereotypes and cruel family dynamics; in 2025 it simply feels dated and tone deaf.

Verdict: Unless you have a nostalgic fondness for emotional repression and the smell of metaphorical mildew, I’d suggest giving this one a miss. Or at least bring a crossword.

⭐☆☆☆☆ Not Ayckbourn’s finest hour, unless you enjoy slow-motion heartbreak in a garage.