The Ocean At The End Of The Lane

Neil Gaiman’s fantasy tale The Ocean At The End Of The Lane was released a decade ago and garnered a slew of awards and shot to the top of the New York Times Best Seller list. Since then, it has been given a new lease of life as a phenomenal play filled with visual magic and emotional depth. First staged at The National Theatre in 2019, Joel Horwood’s adaptation soon transferred to the West End and is now on a national tour.

After seeing a man attending the funeral of his father, we go back to his childhood days in 1982 where we meet his three-part family known only to us as Boy, Dad and Sis. Boy is a major fan of CS Lewis and, with his mysterious neighbour Lettie Hempstock, soon goes on his own adventure encountering terrible monsters and, in the form of human temptress Ursula, a demon who takes over his household. With the help of Lettie, her mother Ginnie and her grandmother, Boy defeats the evil creatures.

The original book was the third in Gaiman’s Portsmouth trilogy, a partly-biographical series which reflects on his childhood. As a seven-year-old, the author was given the Chronicles of Narnia and particularly enjoyed how Lewis spoke to his audience: "I admired his use of parenthetical statements to the reader, where he would just talk to you ... I'd think, 'Oh, my gosh, that is so cool! I want to do that!” Horwood’s adaptation does not have any overt meta-aspects but there are allusions to the era’s events, not least in how money is developed as a theme and the war between Boy and Ursula who believes she deserves her place in his world echoing the Falklands conflict.

The visual and sound designs are nothing short of spectacular. From the burning car at the beginning to the huge grotesque puppets and with an Olivier Award-winning lighting, this is a show which effortlessly drops us into this strange and bizarre world. The creature voices and music add buckets of atmosphere, drawing us into the tense confrontations. While it never veers into outright horror, several scenes leave us very much on the edge of our seats.

There is so much to praise here that, even for a touring production, we expected the acting to be about as hammy as a Golders Green deli. Unfortunately, Katy Rudd’s direction is badly misjudged: while this is a family-friendly story suitable for anyone 12 years and older, the actors go about speaking loudly and more slowly than would be natural. The first quarter-hour is barely watchable given how heavy-handed the exposition is; things only improve when the plot properly starts to kick in and we move beyond Boy’s household to meet Hettie and her family.

That’s not to say that there aren’t some enjoyable performances. Charlie Brooks (EastEnders) is a genuinely fearsome villain whose Ursula is a delight to watch, Trevor Fox as Dad does much of the emotional heavy lifting with a world-weary panache while Millie Hikasa as Lettie is a real dynamo in every scene she is in.

The Ocean At The End Of The Lane is at New Wimbledon Theatre until 15 April and continues on tour until 7 October 2023.
Photo credit: Brinkhoff-Moegenburg