Returning to The White Bear Theatre after a hugely successful run in December 2024, we are invited to enter the weird, dystopian world of Liz Truss; the shortest serving Prime Minister in history, her tenure lasting only 49 days.
As the audience file into the theatre, she is already sitting at her desk, her office bedecked with the trappings of any and every Tory politician, a towering Union Jack, and a prominent portrait of Margaret Thatcher.
Liz is pensive and contemplative, awaiting the inevitable bad news following the vote of confidence in her leadership.
Whilst we all know how this ends, what we are not prepared for is the exhilarating, roller coaster journey into the psyche and belief systems of the woman whose brief tenure at Number 10 created turbulent ripples of social, economic, and political change whose consequences we are still living with.
The production is a melange of comedy and tragedy, laying bare the contradictions between ambitious vision and hard-boiled reality.
This one-person play is a searching examination of the technical ability of the actor to hold interest for 90 minutes, alone on stage, covering heavy political and economic topics and reliving key events which are very much within the memory of the audience.
Emma Wilkinson Wright rises to the challenge effortlessly. Her performance is energetic, pacy and perfectly pitched. In her hands, Liz Truss is back with us, (which some may find disturbing). Her characterisation is faultless, expertly capturing Truss’s awkward, stomping walk, the nasal and breathless staccato vocalisation interspersed with occasional enthusiastically delivered shouty declarations.
Truss’s absolute conviction of the essential rightness of her opinions is well portrayed; of particular note is a snippet from her first day at school, where she refuses to use her first name, Mary, insisting that she be called Elizabeth. Her insistence upon not bowing down to any authority figure, with the petulant use of the word “Shan’t,” is a motif that runs throughout the narrative.
Wilkinson Wright’s Liz Truss is not a woman assailed by any sense of self doubt and is always convinced of the essential rightness of her beliefs and actions, even when she is the only person who is.
Assisting Emma Wilkinson Wright with portraying Liz Truss’s life and times is the talented Steve Nallon, for a long time the go to voice of Margaret Thatcher. As well as reprising his depiction of the original Iron Maiden, Nallon’s off stage vocal characterisations include Jacob Rees-Mogg (trying to teach Truss to curtsey), Kwasi Kwarteng, Truss’s Oxford friends and her Westminster allies.
Greg Wilkinson’s writing gives us a mix of amusing comic moments interspersed with more serious reflections on political, social, and economic belief systems, and sprinkled with a series of strategic plans to drive forward the ultra-ambitious Truss road map to power and influence, explicitly written out on the ever-present whiteboard.
Adroit use is made of a lectern at one side of the set, where actual extracts from Truss’s various speeches are seamlessly integrated into the narrative.
The liberal use of Karaoke is utilised throughout the play, providing moments of hilarity and, when Truss gives us a rendition of “Our Day Will Come”, the occasional chill.
The Last Days of Liz Truss? does not shy away from the failures of her government and the mockery that ensued. The lettuce is given due prominence. However, the clever sensitivity of the writing is exemplified by the feeling that, as it all falls apart, human nature kicks in and the audience is faced with the genuinely puzzling sensation of feeling slightly sorry for Truss. It is worth recalling that, amidst the chaos, turmoil, confusion and anger, there is a human being beneath it all.
The essential crux of this story is not so much Truss’s final downfall, (although the slow realisation of what the markets and the established political and economic bureaucratic structures will do to her is well drawn), but the pivotal moment of the Queen’s death.
Suddenly, Truss is plunged into something bigger than politics, and her unshakeable belief in the correctness of her own ideological constructs; concepts of nationhood, ritual and the sudden hegemony of entrenched Crown and military interests, supersedes her ability to shape events.
Fundamentally, and despite the many humorous moments, this is a dark morality tale, examining how untrammelled ideological obsession can take advantage of a confused and strained social, economic, and political system to create a toxic environment holding potentially dire consequences for ordinary people.
These are important and serious issues, but the play’s running time of 90 minutes feels a little too long. There is a case to be made for the judicious trimming of some of the lengthier musings on economic policy and political strategy which would not impinge negatively upon the flow of the piece.
The arrival of a short interval also did not help the development of the narrative structure. After the break, it took a while for both audience and actor to reset and refocus on the ramping up of the satirical bite.
However, nothing should detract from Emma Wilkinson Wright’s bravura and mesmerising performance. A superbly pitched and accurately delivered recreation of a curious period in our history.
The title of this production has an intriguing question mark to it. Is what we have witnessed really the last days of Liz Truss and her specific ideology, or might she, or a variation of her ideology one day return?
Whatever one’s opinion of the eponymous heroine of this production, we can all agree that the return of this thoughtfully crafted, entertaining satire to the circuit is a cause for celebration.
Review by Johnny Oxford
Prime Minister Liz Truss is navigating her last morning at Number 10. But can a fighter ever quit?
A tragic-comic exploration of the tensions in politics between ambition and ability, vision and reality, going short and playing it long, the play also takes a much broader look at broken systems and the tensions and contradictions at the heart of British and global politics.
By Greg Wilkinson, directed by Anthony Shrubsall, with Emma Wilkinson Wright as Liz Truss, and Steve Nallon of Spitting Image as the voice of Margaret Thatcher
THE LAST DAYS OF LIZ TRUSS?
White Bear Theatre
18 to 29 March 2025
