At Lords, there is a women’s international between England and India that’s been interrupted by heavy rain. Kate Atwell’s play, first seen in San Franciso in 2019 and here getting its European première, begins as some of the players from both sides take shelter.
There is a tension behind the gossip and banter that is not just between the rival teams but within them. Irritation with Mia Turner’s England player No 2, who keeps going on about how much better in bed rugger boys are than cricket men, isn’t the only thing that leads England’s increasingly pent-up captain, No 1 (Bea Svistunenko), to lose her cool. She’s got a guilty secret. If the rain stops them playing on, she will lose out.
The Indians are desperate to play on too; they are feeling confident they can beat the English and prove their worth to the cricket world. England doesn’t rule the roost these days—and that applies to much more than cricket, for though the immediate reference is to the game, including the boyfriends (with a guarded reference to girlfriends), sponsorship deals and match fixing, Testmatch is about much more than a ball game.
That becomes much clearer after the interval, during which those who stay in their seats find themselves watching a couple of bewigged officials of the East India Company practicing their ball skills, perhaps even getting involved in a catch and throw.
The second act is highly stylised. Between barking orders at harassed housekeeper Abhi (Tanya Katyal), Bea Svistunenko’s One (they too have numbers rather than names) and his fellow Two (Haylie Jones) are reviewing the rules of cricket on request from London. They are fed up with the heat and mosquitoes but oblivious to the famine across India, more concerned with keeping One’s hysterical wife (Mia Turner an hilarious Memsahib) pacified with increased doses of opium and a trading agreement with Bangalore, which will line their own coffers. Meanwhile, peasant girl Daanya (Alyana Bartlett), who turns out to be Two’s daughter, demonstrates her bowling skill and women’s invention of overarm bowling—which the men set out to ensure will not be acknowledged.
Eventually, a messenger from Bangalore arrives, sole survivor of those who set out. He is played by Aarushi Riya Ganju, who tells of their disastrous journey through a stricken land in a speech full of feeling. It is a spark that ignites action in others.
This all-female cast deliver strong performances with both the naturalism of the first act, energy crammed into the circle of designer Cat Fuller’s white platform with its ominous cracks, and the boldly satirical style of the second half. Diane Page’s direction drives it along at a spanking speed while still allowing space to suggest subtle relationships between individuals, but its comedy elements are more successful than its critique of colonialism and misogyny, which needs sharper teeth.