“I don’t play golf”, says Inspector Goole early on in the play, to which there is a slow ripple of applause from pockets of the audience. At first, I think it is part of the show, but as it oddly dissipates, I am unsure and confused until I turn to my GCSE-aged son, who quietly informs me it is “a thing” and he will tell me later. An Inspector Calls is a classic play whose message remains relevant.
The National Theatre, directed by Stephen Daldry, powerfully brings it to the stage at the Liverpool Empire Theatre until Saturday, November 23. Hurrying into the stalls on a chilly November evening, we open on the eerie streets of Brumley, an industrial town in the Midlands. I was immediately impressed by the staging and the way this production cleverly creates rain and mist that, coupled with Stephen Warbeck's tense score, makes for an unsettling start, apt considering the glass house play we were about to witness.
An elevated upper middle class home is aglow through the fog as the characters toast an engagement, until, well, until an inspector calls. Dunelm's cosy buy that gives 'extra boost of heat' Dyson Airwrap price slashed by £220 for limited time TV regular Tim Treloar plays Inspector Goole and does well to personify an anger, a quest for truth and understanding many want to believe is at the heart of socialism in his lovely Welsh accent while he spars with the Birling family over the parts they have played in the death of a young woman, Eva Smith. Mr and Mrs Bi.
