By contrast Sheila Birling objects to her father’s attitude. She does not see employees like Eva Smith as ‘cheap labour’, but emphasises their humanity by referring to them as ‘people’. However, Priestley also makes Sheila a complicated character. Ironically, her unjust complaint at Milwards store leads to Eva Smith losing her job; the last regular job she has. When Sheila recognises her own link in the chain, she is horrified. The Inspector’s words impact on her as she realises that there are wider ideas of justice, since there are ‘millions … of Eva Smiths’ in society and that our lives are all ‘intertwined’.

Facebook 0 Tweet 0 LinkedIn 0 Goole by name, ghoul by nature: Liam Brennan’s stern Inspector Goole in An Inspector Calls. Picture: Tristram Kenton, 2019 Evlyne: “If I had to be someone out of all the characters, it would definitely be the inspector, because I’m obsessed with crime documentaries and serial killers, everything to do with murder, unsolved murder, unsolved mysteries, death row, all of that! I’ve pretty much seen everything and I re-watch it to go to sleep.” I like storytelling and I like the creative and artistic aspect of it. With this production, it has enabled that part of acting, and it’s been a really good creative process.” Evlyne Oyedokun’s Sheila Birling and Simon Cotton’s Gerald Croft in the rehearsal room for An Inspector Calls. Picture: Mark Douet Frances Campbell’s theatrical career includes JB Priestley’s Music at Night, Blithe Spirit, Hedda Gabler, The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie and Hobson’s Choice. As a performer of historical dance, Frances has appeared with Commedia Dell Arte. He thinks that the future is just fine, with ‘increasing prosperity’ ahead. Eric is less certain, but his father dismisses him. This is a tragedy when you consider that Eric (and Gerald) would be the right age to fight in the First World War, when millions died, something Priestley would have known about.Evlyne: “I’m really bad at this stuff! A lot of people tend to make their dressing rooms cosy with nice blankets and things. I just bring everything that I have in my bag and that’s pretty much it. Investigating the death of a young woman in poverty, he is the ultimate outsider, exposing something rotten in the state of the Birlings/England. Goole by name, ghoul by nature, the Marley to bilious Arthur Birling's Ebenezer Scrooge, he is also Priestley's still prescient prophet on stage (JB foreseeing the need for change in GB that will sweep Labour to power in 1945). The voice of moral conscience, the harbinger in the moonlight, demanding a turning of the tide.

In the 30-years since its first performance at the National Theatre in 1992, Stephen Daldry’s production of An Inspector Calls has won a total of 19 major awards, including four Tony Awards and three Olivier Awards, and has played to more than 5 million theatregoers worldwide. An Inspector Calls is the most internationally-lauded production in the National Theatre’s history. Daldry’s staging of An Inspector Calls has been entertaining audiences for over three decades, and I don’t foresee that ending any time soon. The Mousetrap recently celebrated its 70 th anniversary, and it’s not inconceivable that this production might one day achieve a similar level of longevity.Priestley explores ideas about justice by showing how the fate of the poorly paid Eva Smith is in the hands of the wealthy Birlings and the aristocratic Gerald Croft. They make a series of choices, creating a ‘chain of events’ that leads to her downfall. Inspector Goole is Priestley’s mouthpiece and Priestley gives him a commanding voice as the Inspector interrogates each of the characters in turn. Writer-director Daldry’s ground-breaking production has accumulated 19 major awards, including four Tony Awards and three Olivier Awards, and played to more than five million theatregoers worldwide, en route to becoming the National Theatre’s most internationally lauded show. In 2018, Inspector Goole’s final speech, with its wish for collective responsibility and someone, anyone, willing to say sorry, rubbed against an age of austerity, intolerance, division and worsening working conditions. George: “I’m sharing a room with Simon [Cotton] who’s playing Gerald. I don’t know…I think a bottle of water goes a long way. A bottle of water and some Vaseline is not a terrible idea – for the lips, obviously! I get chapped lips.” Written at the end of the Second World War and set before the First, An Inspector Calls is a compelling and haunting thriller. The story begins when the mysterious Inspector Goole calls unexpectedly on the prosperous Birling family home. Their peaceful family dinner party is shattered by his investigations into the death of a young woman.

JB Priestley’s brilliantly constructed masterpiece powerfully dramatises the dangers of casual capitalism’s cruelty, complacency and hypocrisy. Stephen Daldry’s epic production highlights the play’s enduring relevance.If there is no Inspector, then there can be no Eva Smith. This allows Mr and Mrs Birling and Gerald to sigh with relief, as if the events they have been through didn’t happen, like waking from a nightmare. Evlyne: “One of the sayings at RADA was, ‘plan it, know it and forget it’. It’s the hardest thing to do, but it’s the most rewarding thing to do.” Some people put up fairy lights and flowers, but for me I’m very simple. With autism, as long as I’ve got really comfy clothes, a phone charger and headphones to cancel out sound, I’m all good.”