Jack and Sarah – Mill at Sonning ★★★

Hard enough to capture on film, this emotional journey proves even tougher to present on a live stage. Despite writer Duncan Abel’s thoughtful attempts to reshape the material for theatre, the production never quite finds its feet. Too often it feels as though it should amount to more than it ultimately does.

Firstly, the positives. The characters are genuinely likeable, the tone is warm and everyone is unfailingly kind (which is more than most people would probably manage if they found a homeless man asleep on the sofa!). The humour is well-judged and suits the cast. There are some charming, quietly poignant songs, sung with clarity and feeling by Anya de Villiers as Amy (who also wrote the music). And the supporting characters bring some much-needed outside interest.

Much of the play, however, lacks the nuanced emotion of the songs, and it often feels in a hurry to reach its next plot point. George Banks’ (The Mousetrap, West End; Dial M for Murder, Theatre Royal, Windsor) portrayal of Jack’s grief tends towards the heavy-handed, relying on melodramatic outbursts rather than the quiet, insidious, almost physical ache that anyone who’s experienced profound loss might recognise. Jack’s mother-in-law, played by Sarah Moyle (Inside No. 9 at the Apollo Theatre, She Stops to Conquer at the NT) seems oddly untouched by the death of her daughter, focussing instead on nudging Jack back into his life, while trying to befriend William. Rufus Hound feels underused as William, whose significance to the story seems to have been diluted in the transition from screen to stage. And when Amy makes an accidental, deeply insensitive slip, it’s handled so matter-of-factly that what should have been a moment of excruciating tension between the two main characters simply evaporates.