23/08/22

Assembly, George Square, (Studio 5), Edinburgh

We’ve been devotees of Alison Skilbeck since 2017’s The Power Behind the Crone, so it’s a real pleasure to see her back at the Fringe after the uncertainty of the last couple of years. Mrs Roosevelt Flies to London is written and performed by Skilbeck, and directed by Lucy Skilbeck (no relation).

The title pretty much sums up what this monologue is about: the famous First Lady’s account of her dangerous journey to England’s capital in 1942. But the play opens twenty years after that, at the time of the Cuban Missile Crisis, with Eleanor fast approaching the end of her life and asking herself if the world is about to end in nuclear annihilation. Has all her hard work been for nothing?

Then we are whisked back down the years to her preparations for the trip, and we’re given insights into the various characters who surround her: the famous husband she loved and who secretly betrayed her; his controlling mother; the female journalist who became her best friend (and, as the gossips of the time suggested, her lover).

And then she’s off on her whirlwind tour, where she encounters an assortment of different characters, all of whom the actor inhabits with absolute authority, switching from one to the next as effortlessly as she puts on and takes off Eleanor’s famous feathered hat. Her brief impersonation of Churchill is an object lesson. Many actors would venture into the realms of caricature, but Skilbeck nails it perfectly. She’s an associate teacher at RADA, and it’s easy to see why.

I leave the show feeling I’ve had insights into Eleanor Roosevelt’s life that I wouldn’t have got from simply reading a biography about her. But it never feels like a history lesson and it’s gratifying to note that, even early on a Tuesday morning, Skilbeck is performing to a sold out audience.

4.5 stars

Philip Caveney