Last chance to see: Light Shining in Buckinghamshire

Kobna Holdbrook-Smith, Helen Lymbery and Michelle Terry in Light Shining in Buckinghamshire Photo: Robert Workman

London has been occupied and the king is in custody. Fundamentalist Christian soldiers are fighting to establish heaven on earth in England. Two warring factions struggle to gain power.

 Set during the political turbulence following the first English civil war, Caryl Churchill’s play dramatises the Putney debates of 1647 in which ordinary soldiers faced down Cromwell and his officers to decide how the country should be governed.

Performing in a giant earth-filled crucifix, six actors, uniformly dressed in puritanical black and white, switch from character to character in a series of short scenes: an earnest young man falls to his knees to seek God’s forgiveness for his sins, a vagrant woman is sentenced to 50 lashes for begging outside the parish in which she was born, a rabble-rouser exhorts the crowd to join the battle against the antichrist represented by the wealthy landowners. Revolutionaries struggle for the rights of the ordinary man, with the Bible as their manifesto. 

But in the second half the introduction of some contemporary costumes and props reflect a more post-modern take on religious and social questions. The revolution is over and a group of Ranters are seated around a table drinking beer. Certainty and fervour has turned into irreverence and disillusion. Sober piety has been replaced with drunkenness and free love. Communal religion has been replaced with an individualised spirituality.

The central question here revolves around how a country should be governed. Who should rule and on what authority? By force, or by the winning of hearts and minds? Who should be entitled to vote? It is also an exploration of faith and fundamentalism, and the power of religion both to liberate and oppress. 

Although interspersed with moments of comedy and pathos, the play is dense and complex, and does demand some awareness of the historical context. This is one for those who like their subject matter weighty.

Light Shining in Buckinghamshire
Arcola Theatre
27 Arcola Street E8 2DJ
14 July – 7 August at 8pm and 31 July, 7 August at 3pm
Box office: 020 7503 1646
Tickets: £16/£10 (concessions)