Author and journalist, Francis Beckett reviews the new political play, Little Platoons, which had the panel on Front Row talking last week.
Former Labour education Secretary Estelle Morris, often a voice of reason, got it completely wrong last Tuesday on Front Row, when she was sniffy about the new political play, Little Platoons. We've forgotten what radical political theatre is supposed to be like, and Steve Waters' play Little Platoons has arrived at the Bush Theatre to remind us.
First, it's bang up to date, getting to grips with the idea that most clearly sums up the new government's philosophy - free schools.
Second, it takes on the arguments. This is a writer who knows education debates, and who knows how heart-rending they are when your own children are involved. No cheating: no making the likeable characters take the view we wish the audience to adopt - in fact, the heart of the argument against free schools is expressed by one of the least likeable characters - and even he's a late convert to it. Morris was seduced by her far right fellow panellists into agreeing that Waters tilted the playing field, but he didn’t.
Third, it's a play first and a statement second. Too much of what passes for radical political theatre now, including work by big names like David Hare and David Edgar, are statements first and plays second. I don’t wish to go to the theatre to hear a political lecture, even when I agree with the politics. There's not one character in Little Platoons who is a cardboard cutout, created to express a viewpoint for the author. Every character is multi-layered, every character develops as the story progresses.
There are no simple, straightforward answers. The characters are parents, grappling with a problem that all parents face. A mother says to her husband: "What you fear about Mandela [the local comprehensive] is that the kids are all just a little too brown for you." And he denies it indignantly, but then, on the other hand, "just how many white middle class kids are there in there? Who's going to be Sam's buddies, his peers? Realistically?"
Here’s how the idealistic comprehensive school teacher is converted to selection when it comes to free schools: “If we don’t filter these applications in some way, we’ll have a world of woe coming through that door.”
It takes on the issues, it knows there are no easy answers, but it also knows where it stands. So when, finally, it comes out and says it, there's no sense of being preached at, just relief that someone is saying the simple thing that needs to be said:
"I want Sam to muddle his way through Mandela and for us to make that work for him. I want us to get off our knees, I want to fight for what we fought for, our parents fought for, I want to defend every benefit and every year at school and every free place at uni and every bit of social housing and every park and public holiday..."
Hurrah.
Francis Beckett's latest book, The Prime Ministers Who Never Were is available from 10 March.