Maureen Lipman stars in Rose, a forcefully lengthy one-woman play by Martin Sherman
“She laughed. And then she blew her nose. She had a cold. The bullet struck her forehead. It caught her in the middle of a thought. She was nine. I’m sitting shivah. You say shivah for the dead.”
First aired via the Hope Mill Theatre last year, Martin Sherman’s monologue Rose is an uncompromisingly tough and tender look at the twentieth century Jewish experience through the eyes of one woman. From childhood in a small village in Ukraine to navigating the American dream in Miami, with plenty of pitstops inbetween, incorporating tumultuous historical events too.
Scott Le Crass’ production is sensitively done, focusing on a straightforwardness to Maureen Lipman’s delivery that is hard to deny. A light touch of newsreel footage ushers us gently along the timeline and Sherman’s writing is always absolutely human, so that the epic becomes intimate, even as its injustices break our heart. Tough watching but dramatically powerful.
