★★★★☆
You might have thought that Toby Jones had the last word when he played Neil “Nello” Baldwin in a Bafta-winning BBC version of his autobiography eight years ago. Well, not quite. Theresa Heskins’s gently humorous stage adaptation adds a playful, meta spin to a story which, in the wrong hands, could easily turn cloyingly sentimental.
Now in his seventies, Baldwin is a celebrity in the Potteries. Born into a working-class family, he overcame learning difficulties to find a place at the heart of the community. As well as working as a clown at a circus, he became a mascot to students at Keele University and footballers at Stoke City. His list of VIP contacts includes no end of Church of England bishops. If he wasn’t so childishly unselfconscious, you’d be tempted to call him a ruthless networker.
The screen account of his life has lots of charm, with Baldwin himself making occasional appearances as he swaps notes with Jones. Heskins’s production takes that self-referential aspect a step further. On a bare, in-the-round space, we are confronted with several versions of our hero, the multitasking cast burrowing into different aspects of his character. Michael Hugo, who begins the evening sitting in the stalls, enters the fray to give what he believes is the definitive version.
The script — a collaboration between Heskins and Baldwin — nimbly juggles perspectives. Sometimes, the narrative is almost as broad as a panto; sometimes the actors quibble over phrases like “narrative ownership”. Amid the laughter, there are passages of raw emotion. The death of Neil’s mother (winningly played by Suzanne Ahmet) who watches over her son until she is well into old age, is marked by a tender four-voice arrangement of the hymn How Great Thou Art.
Gareth Cassidy adds a string of sharp impersonations of the luminaries who have succumbed to Neil’s charms, from the football legends Lou Macari and George Eastham to Tony Benn. James Earls-Davis’s sound design paints detailed sonic pictures. Daniel Murphy, Jerone Marsh-Reid, Charlie Bence and Alex Frost slip effortlessly from one role to another. Apart from an over-extended bout of slapstick cuisine in the second half, the pace never flags.
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In another life, Baldwin might easily have been a con man. A churchgoer, he dons a dog-collar on a whim and seems capable of swearing eternal friendship with every stranger he meets. He does not even acknowledge that he suffers from any kind of disability. Like a cleric, he sees goodness in everyone. No wonder people love him.
To April 9, newvictheatre.org.uk
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