AN Inspector Calls again at the theatre where it all began in 1989 as Stephen Daldry's landmark production returns to York Theatre Royal from September 14 to 22.
Daldry's reinvention of Bradford playwright J B Priestley's thriller was first staged in York, three years before its London opening at the National Theatre: a springboard to winning 19 major awards, most notably three Olivier awards in London and four Tony awards on Broadway. More than four million theatregoers worldwide have now seen the "theatrical event of its generation".
Re-wind to autumn 1989 when Daldry, then a 28-year-old freelance director, was invited by Theatre Royal artistic director Derek Nicholls to bring new life to Priestley’s repertory warhorse. Initially reluctant, he nevertheless answered Nicholls’ call and his production duly opened on October 19 that year.
Priestley's story finds the mysterious Inspector Goole calling unexpectedly one fateful night in 1912 at the house of prosperous industrialist Arthur Birling. The family’s peaceful family dinner party is shattered by his investigations into the death of a young factory girl Eva Smith.
A production picture from Stephen Daldry's first staging of An Inspector Calls at York Theatre Royal in October 1989
Daldry’s research led him to draw inspiration from the first production in 1945 by Leningrad Company in Moscow. At the core of the play was Priestley’s search for a new society, a theme mined in productions in Russia and war-torn Germany.
At the time Daldry told the Yorkshire Evening Press that he felt there was a misconception about what Priestley was trying to do with the play. “He saw the play in symbolic as much as emotional terms, but the symbolic side has been negated since the 1940s," he said.
"We need to find the real play, to see the play as he intended it to be seen, which, as far as I know, has never been done in this country. Until now his work was lost in a drawing-room thriller, but he was not really writing a thriller at all; that’s not the political driving force of the play. I hope people who have not seen the play will be shocked by its vitality and emotional virility.
"Priestley stood for Parliament on ‘an extremely left-wing ticket’. I think there is a need to rediscover Priestley as a radical experimentalist rather than an old warhorse."
The National Theatre's production of An Inspector Calls in 2017. Picture: Mark Douet
Without losing the thriller element, Daldry wanted to look at the play’s relevance to post-war Britain and a society divided by wealth and class, and the question of social responsibility.
"Basically the vision of society established in 1945 has lasted into the 1980s – the vision of collective responsibility. Now the last physical remnants are being destroyed, it is important we remind ourselves of that vision," he said. said Daldry.
Then in 1992 Daldry, together with designer Ian MacNeil – creator of the ingenious crumbling house design – and lighting designer Rick Fisher, revisited An Inspector Calls at the National Theatre, and the Inspector has kept calling ever since. Now the latest tour will open appropriately in York before taking in , in Cambridge, Wimbledon and Cheltenham and heading off to the United States to play Washington DC, Los Angeles, Chicago and Boston.
Such is the abiding popularity of Daldry's production that the Theatre Royal already has decided to add two extra performances: a 2.30pm matinee on the opening day, September 14, and a 7.30pm show on September 17, a rare Monday performance at a theatre where traditionally actors have the day off that day.
The best advice is don't delay, book pronto on 01904 623568 or at yorktheatreroyal.co.uk, as "there are very few seats left" according to the marketing department.
What Stephen Daldry did next
He went on to become world-renowned as one of the Britain’s leading theatre and film directors, receiving Academy Award nominations for his films The Reader, The Hours, Billy Elliot and Extremely Loud And Incredibly Close.
His West End theatre work includes David Hare’s Skylight, The Audience and Inheritance. His multi award-winning production of Billy Elliot The Musical ran for 11 years at Victoria Palace before touring Britain. He also produced and directed the Netflix television series The Crown.
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