Taken At Midnight @ The Minerva, Chichester
It’s always fascinating to delve into a well known period in history and go beyond the world changing events into the life of an individual. Chichester Festival Theatre have dedicated a season to just such an idea and they end their run of ‘Hidden Histories’ with Taken At Midnight, the story of Hans Litten a lawyer who, in 1931, subpoenaed Adolf Hitler and made him answer for the crimes of the burgeoning nazi party.
Two years later Litten was swept up along with thousands of other liberals, communists and free thinkers as the Nazi movement gained power. Locked away and moved from one concentration camp to another, Litten’s story was forgotten by most but Mark Hayhurst has become taken with it, producing a documentary and writing a TV drama and now a play all focusing on the story from a different angle.
For the stage Hayhurst has focused on the resolve and determination of Litten’s mother Irmgard who campaigned relentlessly for his release. Penelope Wilton is a formidable figure, underplaying the emotions that run riot in the way a mother might hide her emotions so as not to startle her children. When the constant persecution finally causes her to erupt it’s a powerful moment that leaves the hairs stood up on the back of the neck!
She bristles with barely contained energy when faced with the outwardly refined gestapo officer Dr Conrad (John Light), their relationship is a fascinating one, and at times you almost warm to the black suited young man behind the desk.
Martin Hutson gives Litten a sense of constant movement even when stood still, and his interactions with his cell mates the pessimistic liberal newspaper publisher von Ossiesky (Mike Grady) and the impish, childlike anarchist Erich Muhsam (Pip Donaghy) as they try to maintain their humour and humanity are strangely heartwarming.
It’s difficult to describe the effect Taken At Midnight had on me, I emerged from the Minerva feeling emotionally drained, but it was at the same time a hugely rewarding experience to be reminded of the lengths people will go to for the people they love!
