Review | Jane Austen's Emma by Bench Theatre at The Spring Arts Centre, Havant: 'Back doing what they do best'

Okay, this time David Penrose has had a little help from Jane Austen, but his adaptation of her Emma owes as much to him as to the author. Simply set – a stage bare of practically everything bar four chairs – Penrose’s focus is on story and language, not the look of the thing. That said, the costumes are beautiful.

Austen’s language does not sit comfortably in the mouths of some of the actors – her phrasing is convoluted – and words have meanings that have subtly shifted in the 200 years since the novel was written, causing the odd strange inflection.

James Andrews takes George Knightley’s blandness and makes a virtue of it turning it into a repression that works nicely for the character. In contrast, Archie McKeown’s Regency party-animal, Frank Churchill, is a joy and his vocals are shiveringly good. Eels’ Emma – the character, not the performance – is unlikeable in the first act; I had difficulty connecting with her. This changes in the second act when Emma appears more rounded and Eels is able to open up the more genuine aspects of the character. It’s a mammoth part, she’s rarely off-stage, and she wears it well.

There’s excellent work from Natasha Ryszka-Onions as the naïve Harriet Smith, a part wildly open to caricature rather than characterisation, who keeps well on the right side of those two choices. And then there’s Bernadette Lomas as the vicar’s wife, Augusta Elton. Does she overplay it? Yes, she does. Does that matter? In this instance, it doesn’t. It’s joyous, over-the-top, well-observed and very funny. She’s worth your ticket money on her own.

And most impressive of all? There’s a scene where the main characters sit in the sun, enjoying the heat, enjoying the stillness. For the majority of the scene, only two people talk. The cast show here how doing nothing is often the best choice an actor can make. You can feel the thick heat of summer as they lie there doing nothing, saying nothing, just being.

Perhaps some trimming to the text would make for a slicker piece, particularly the first act, but that’s just being picky. Good stuff.

Until November 26.