If you’ve never been to Jermyn Street Theatre before then the trip is worth it purely for the marvellously intimate theatrical experience: only a few rows of seating surround a performance space that you actually have to walk across in order to get to the toilet. Unsurprisingly this isn’t allowed during the performance, and as there is no interval it’s probably best to steer clear of too much liquid refreshment in order to avoid disaster.

The physical intimacy of the space is enhanced by James Perkins’ stark and beautifully minimal set to contain a cast of only four people, which director Derek Bond (whose previous couple of shows have been two-handers) says is great for, “getting to know each other, how everyone works, their strengths and personalities”. Jeffry Kaplow plays Johan, a wealthy academic who has retreated into the near total isolation of his summer house in Sweden’s deeply wooded countryside. Johan is visited by ex-wife Marianne (an elegantly understated Eileen Nicholas), a woman he has not seen for over twenty years in spite of the fact that they share two children and an obvious, if complex, affection for one another. Johan’s grief-stricken son Henrik (played with moving intensity by Philip Rham) and granddaughter Karin (a highly-strung Augustina Seymour) live nearby, having moved closer since the death of Henrik’s wife and Karin’s mother, Anna. The play unfolds as a study of the relationships between these characters and their experiences of love, grief, parenthood and death.

Adaptations can be tricky to pull off, but the size of the cast and the venue help to avoid any temptation to reproduce the film onstage. Instead, Bond went back to the original screenplay and worked from there, saying that he wanted to "treat the screenplay as if it were an original text of which the film is one adaptation, and the play another". The cast opted not to watch the film, which, according to Bond, helped to “create a production that stands alone as a piece of theatre” due to the “untainted” input of the cast.

Bond did, however, use the film as a “palette of visual references” from which he has taken “key images” as inspiration. Bond cites the example of one scene in the film in which Karin plays the cello as the camera pans back to reveal a growing expanse of empty space. Bond finds this scene “particularly striking” and he attempts to recreate it through lighting and “the movement of props away from Karin leaving her alone in the centre of the stage”. The film is, therefore, referenced, but never allowed to dominate as the master text.

Bond’s confident approach to the adaptation process is perhaps the result of the working methods of his production company Paper Scissors Stone, which he runs with set designer James Perkins and lighting designer Sally Ferguson. The trio work together in a process by which each aspect of the production informs all the others: set, lighting and direction all work together in a relationship whereby all three members have “points of contact but come from different viewpoints”. Similarly, the theatrical performance of Saraband is informed, not only by the film, but by the actors, the production team, the physical space and the audience. Engaging and moving to the end, and funny in more places than one would expect for such heavy subject-matter, Bond and his team have produced a tender yet powerful piece of theatre which is well worth seeing.

For more about Paper Scissors Stone, visit www.paper-scissors-stone.org.uk

All photos by Steve Ullathorne