Lifelike Theatre's production of Annie Baker's Circle Mirror Transformation ran from 18 – 21 February in the Main Hall at St James's Church in Hampton Hill.

And as someone with a background in theatre and as a BA English Literature graduate, I was intrigued to see how Baker's play, which is about five people attending weekly drama sessions in their local community hall, would embody the theme of meta.

Circle Mirror follows five people who meet every week in their local community hall for drama classes. Mostly strangers, they connect through games, releasing their imagination, and reenacting moments from their past.

The stage setting was simple, using minimal props, yet with the intimate, sold-out audience setting, surrounding the acting space, it felt like a real-life community hall where drama classes would be held and as though we too were in the room with the characters.

In fact, the production's Director, Ben Clare, previously told Nub News: "We're staging it in the kind of room it's set in. Our venue is the hall next to St James's Church in the middle of the community in Hampton Hill. It will feel like you're there with them - although there's no audience participation!"

The cast consists of only five characters: Schultz (Charles Golding), Lauren (Olivia Jackson), Marty (Kirsty Macdonald), Teresa (Catherine Overstall Roche), and James (Daniel Wain).

A cast of mixed ages, each portrayed their characters incredibly authentically and adopted amazing American accents, - the play is set in Shirley, Vermont.

Starting at 7.45pm on a cold Friday evening (20 February), with the characters beginning the play by engaging in a drama game reminiscent of my GCSE Drama days, I could already tell the plot would come with some dark undertones, despite initial laughter from the audience.

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As with the setting, the costumes were also simple, just ordinary outfits that any ordinary person might wear to a drama workshop, but fitting to the individual character, and that, matched with the setting, helped make the whole production incredibly realistic.

The game that the cast begins with consists of them lying in a circle calling out numbers, a perfect mimic of the play's title, before evolving into James pretending to be his wife and fellow character Marty, and sharing what he has learnt about her in the workshops thus far.

Now, I have seen Wain in a production and Hampton Hill Theatre before and thought he was an excellent actor, so upon seeing him in Circle Mirror's lineup, I was excited to see him transfer his acting skills to this production.

I can say that from the minute he began talking, he did not disappoint.

Daniel Wain plays James and Kirsty Macdonald plays Marty (Image supplied)

This game of mimicry appears frequently throughout the play and actually took me until halfway through the first Act to workout which character was who, believing that they were the character they were mimicking and thus believing that there were some LGBTQ+ relationships at play.

However, with the play being set in 2009, this was not the case, but I found the confusion over which character was which exciting, and this proved that the workshop leader Marty's idea for the characters to properly get to know each other through drama games worked.

Throughout the play, the audience was sent into bursts of laughter, but as the workshops evolved, it was clear that each character was struggling with some past trauma, and that perhaps Marty only started the workshops as a way of sharing and working on her own trauma herself.

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The workshops seemed more like group therapy than drama classes.

Character Lauren even asks Marty: "Are we going to be doing any real acting?...Like acting out a play?"

While each character's traumatic past is revealed as a kind of bombshell and left on a cliff hanger with no real resolution provided, the play proves the power in talking and how important it is to talk about mental health rather than keeping it in – a perfect message for a cold evening in the middle of winter.

Each scene is short and follows the simplicity of the setting and costumes, with each scene ending with a mere light switch off and beginning with an announcement from a pre-recorded speaker, making the whole production even more realistic.

While I enjoyed the first Act, the second is definitely much better as this is where the drama unfolds and we get to understand the characters on a deeper level. For example, we find that Marty is not just your usual hippy thespian but has actually experienced deep trauma and just needs a little guidance in life.

This, I believe, is how Baker makes the ordinary extraordinary.

While I believe that the characters' dark pasts could have been explored further, the play ends with some resolution as Schultz and Lauren reunite years after the workshop ended and share how each character has moved on over the years, presenting strong character development.

Olivia Jackson plays Lauren (Image supplied)

Although, the ending did leave me in a slight existential crisis as Schultz explains that the workshop, as with many stages of life, feels like just one part of his life separate from all the others.

As I have already mentioned, Clare's casting for the production was excellent, but I was particularly impressed by Golding, who adopted an amazing American accent and produced excellent facial expressions, and Jackson who played the perfect shy, depressed teen.

I also think that Overstall Roche was perfect for the role of Teresa, who despite appearing to be a bit of a 'Karen', clearly has a good heart and always brings light to dark situations.

Charles Golding plays Schultz and Katherine Overstall Roche plays Teresa (Image supplied)

Overall, Lifelike Theatre's production of Circle Mirror was incredibly authentic to real life and worked perfectly to get the audience thinking.

Despite creating uncomfortable moments, including a scene in which Teresa performed a racist monologue, it always managed to turn this around and create laughter among the audience.