Katherine Moar’s new play, Ragdoll, is inspired by the trial of heiress Patty Hearst, who was kidnapped and indoctrinated by the Symbionese Liberation Army in 1974.
Patty becomes Holly in Ragdoll but the references to San Simeon and Citizen Kane leave no doubt as to the source. The play concerns Robert Kelly, a lawyer in his 70s, and a 50-something Holly as they meet after forty years.
Moar weaves in scenes with their younger selves, The Lawyer and The Heiress, showing how events unfolded leading up to Holly’s trial for bank robbery. Eventually both timelines collide and mistakes made are bluntly revealed.
Ragdoll boasts an excellent cast of Nathaniel Parker, Abigail Cruttenden, Ben Lamb and Katie Matsell. Although its less likely that Lamb morphed into Parker, the women resemble each other and you can well believe them as the same person.
Directed by Josh Seymour and designed by Ceci Calf (set), Tom Paris (costume), Jamie Platt (lighting) and Lex Konsanke (sound), Ragdoll has some parallels with Moar’s first play, Farm Hall, in mining history for ideas.
Dominated by a symbolic white couch and flanked by numerous cardboard boxes, Robert’s apartment offers both intrigue and memories. A cracker calls up a Christmas past. A nook allows Holly’s prison to be revealed.
While The Lawyer and The Heiress have their early scenes together, their older counterparts observe. It’s hard to know what they are ‘thinking’ without much reaction, but it offers awareness of how it might be to replay our decisions.
Robert, in reputational trouble and needing Holly after years of silence, is sober and sanguine, yet we sense a self-serving nature at the start. Metaphors of him as an egg (brittle, vulnerable) and of young Holly as flat water (devoid of sparkle) are teased but not fully explored.
What Ragdoll tells us is a lot about karma, prejudice, misogyny, and ambition. It’s sharply written and expertly draws in factual embellishment to its fiction (Robert’s legal training and high-profile cases are those of F Lee Bailey).
Ragdoll‘s unorthodox structure might not appeal to everyone, but works well in the small space at Jermyn Street and leaves lots of questions around Holly/Hearst’s case.
3.5 stars.
Ragdoll continues at Jermyn Street until 15 Nov with tickets here.
Image credit: Alex Brenner