WHEN John Haddrell dies of a heart attack at the wheel, the woman in the passenger seat isn’t his wife but his business associate Julia – who also happens to be his mistress.

So when John’s widow, Margaret, extends the hand of friendship to the injured Julia, what are her motives?

Does she know about the affair? Or is she simply trying to connect with the person who happened to be with her husband when he died?

The chilling scenario is at the heart of this demanding four-hander, with especially wordy roles for Sylvia Holmes as the hapless Julia and Liz Turner as the multi-layered Margaret.

Several line prompts for both did hold up the flow on first night, but these were convincing leads, with Sylvia creating a
pretty unlovable, arrogant Julia and Liz shining as the middle-aged woman whose passive-aggressive relationship with Julia is
full of pithy observations about rejection.

John Lomas made a terrific home help, the emotionally vulnerable Gary, who behaves like a kicked dog when Julia casts him away. And Jo East, as counselor Ann, is appropriately nice but ineffectual.

In such a dialogue-rich, one-set play, I’d have liked to have seen greater contrast in Julia’s misery. There is only the occasional glimpse of the confident career girl she must have been, and I’d have liked a greater sense of her being stripped of all that.

This was a brave choice for Riverside, with some strong performances to make a virtue out of this pretty chilly May.

– Marion Boden

Dead Guilty, by Richard Harris, Riverside Drama Company at St John’s Church Hall, Canal Street, Long Eaton.