A Small and Quiet Light review – fractured portrait of a remarkable wartime spy

Minerva theatre, Chichester A female secret agent’s extraordinary courage never quite comes to life in a drama that struggles to find tension in her high-stakes story Noor-un-Nisa Inayat Khan was a second world war spy codenamed Madeleine. A mixed-heritage British Indian and Special Operations Executive (SOE) agent in Nazi-occupied Paris who showed extraordinary courage, her story is ripe for dramatic retelling. So why does it feel so fractured and unsatisfactory in director Elin Schofield’s production? Perhaps because of the limited documentation of this medalled war hero’s life. That is not helped in the delivery of her story in playwright Stephanie Street’s non-sequential narrative, beginning with her interrogation in 1943, after being caught by the Germans, and shuttling back and forth across the years, from early family life to her death in Dachau concentration camp. Continue reading...