‘There are about 70 pages of dialogue. It’s like playing Hamlet. I never shut up’
The stage version of The Girl On The Train is pulling into Nottingham and Leicester. SIMON BUTTON speaks to the director and stars I T has even more twists and turns than I’ve ever had to juggle before,” admits director Anthony Banks. Scripted by Rachel Wagstaff and Duncan Abel, The Girl On The Train is an adaptation of Paula Hawkins’ 2015 bestselling novel.
The 2016 film version starring Emily Blunt relocated the story to the United States but the stage version returns it to its UK roots.
It revolves around Rachel Watson, an unhappy alcoholic who thinks the couple she sees from her commuter train every day are perfectly in love. Then the wife Megan disappears and, as Rachel inveigles her way into the life of Megan’s husband Scott, she finds herself both a witness and potential suspect.
Banks believes the fact that The Girl On The Train is set in the present day, in familiar but unspecified locations, is an extra lure for theatregoers. “It’s instantly recognisable for that reason, and it could be your street, they could be your neighbours, this could be happening to you.”
Lead character, Rachel, played on stage by Samantha Womack, is losing her grip on her identity because of the effect heavy drinking has on her short-term memory.
Banks says he was intrigued by the visual potential of Hawkins’ plot: “Because she can’t remember what happened last night or last week she starts to forget who she is.
“Her identity is eroding and she describes it as a black hole so the design is also a black hole in which appear domestic spaces, a train, a police cell, an interrogation room and also the wasteland by the train tracks where the body is found.”
Rachel is a dream role for Samantha Womack, who recalls being gripped by the novel when she read it, and also a
challenging one.
“There are about 70 pages of dialogue for me to learn,” says the former EastEnders actress. “It’s like playing Hamlet. I never shut up.”
But Brighton-born Womack isn’t as worried by all that dialogue as she is about playing a convincing drunk.
“It’s a really hard thing to do. Drink is like a truth syrup that removes all the boundaries so rather than a comical element, with the slurring and slipping up,
“I think Rachel’s just completely unpredictable. It’s about what happens when she’s drunk and where does her brain go?”
Womack is chatting during a break from rehearsals in an East London studio where she and co-star Oliver Farnworth (who plays Scott) have been running through an intense scene where tensions flare up between the two characters.
Oliver, a former Coronation Street star, added: “Throughout the play you’re drip-fed more information about him so the audience gets to build up a case file.
“Has he been left by his wife? Has something happened to make her run away?
“Roles like this are more interesting to me as an actor rather than playing the prince charming, nice guy, boyfriend-nextdoor sort of thing. I like roles that have a bit of meat and a bit of weight to them.
“All the characters in the play are multifaceted and complex and it’s not a goody/ baddie story. All the characters are slightly flawed and that makes for interesting, exciting drama.”
“People just like a good detective story, simple as that. Audiences like gasps and to be on the edge of their seats and they like to second guess. In the interval everyone will have their opinions and that’s brilliant.”
Anthony Banks feels even audiences familiar with the novel will be surprised by The Girl On The Train on stage. They haven’t changed key plot points but in the book there are three character narratives – those of Megan, Anna and Rachel – while on stage Rachel is the focal point.
He says: “In the novel, the way that facts are revealed and the sort of drip-drip of that is through three fragmented chronologies. Here it’s more simple, told across six chronological days, but the scenes withhold information from the audience in hopefully a similarly experiential way to how the novel withholds information from the reader. It’s the same story but the presentation is different.” Rachel doesn’t leave the stage for the entire show.
“And that terrifies me,” Womack admits. “I don’t always take things in at first and it wasn’t until the middle of rehearsals that it hit me that ‘Oh, it’s basically just one long scene for me’. I never get to leave the stage and regroup. One scene leads me straight into another and it’s like a dance.”
The actress agrees that the show has jolts and surprises whether or not you’ve read the novel. “Yes we’re replicating the story but there are changes and nuances that are very different. I hope that by the time they leave the theatre people been shaken about a bit.”
Farnworth adds: “There are more twists than you can shake a stick at. Be prepared to be twisted!”
Leicester Curve, Monday, March 4-Saturday, March 9. curveonline.co.uk or 0116 242 3595. Prices £10-£32.50; Theatre Royal, Nottingham, Monday, May 20 -Saturday, May 25. trch.co.uk bor 0115 989 5555 Tickets £15-£35.50.