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The play is called “Our Day Out” and it was written by Willy Russell. The play is about Mrs Kay and her Liverpool remedial class going on a school trip to Conway Castle in Wales and is based on the author’s own experiences as a teacher. It features an understandable but eventful storyline that makes use of real social issues such as deprivation and contrasting teaching styles to deliver an impressive story. However it does have flaws with the most notable being its short length and lack of unique feature to make it stand out.

                The environment the children live in is a harsh, underprivileged area where the best that is expected of you is to work in a factory and earn just enough money to survive. Most people cannot afford more than one set of clothes as this quotation shows, “Carol rushes along the street wearing a school uniform which doubles as a street outfit and her Sunday best,” Even more examples of how poor the children are found in this quotation, “…clutching a supermarket carrier bag.” This shows that Carol could not even afford a school bag. In addition, Les the lollipop man says, “They’re all bloody backwards round here.” This obviously suggests that people are not very smart in the area the play is set. This could be the result of bad education of just the fact that people are not very smart?  This is not the kind of environment I would like to live in because the quality of life, education and overall happiness is so far below the average it is unimaginable. Conway Castle is a large stone castle overlooking the sea. Grand buildings and lush countryside are found there. Compared to the children’s environment the castle is very different in its beautiful buildings, countryside and landscape as well as freedom, unlike their run down environment in Liverpool.

                Characterisation is important within the play. One of the most important characters is the children’s teacher, Mrs Kay. I think Mrs Kay is restrained because of this quotation, “Mrs Kay stares at him. She could blow up but she doesn’t.” This clearly shows that she can restrain herself when angry. She is also quite positive as shown by this quotation, “Ah well we’ll just have to deal with him the best way we can.” This accurately portrays her sense of optimism in the form of a make the best of what you got attitude. An obvious trait of Mrs Kay is her mother-like affection for the children she teaches as shown by, “She always reminds me of a mother hen rather than a teacher…”. This clearly displays that she would rather see her pupils happy and safe than educated. The quotation, “Kevin Bryant come here,” successfully presents the fact that she can be firm with her pupils. Indeed, she not only cares for her pupils but gets involved in their games and activities, which is strongly illustrated by, “A game of football is in progress. Mrs Kay is in goal.” The quotation “…do you could educate these kids my remedial kids,” accurately conveys her opinion that there is no hope for her pupils and of them will do well. I feel Mrs Kay cares very much for her pupils because she feels that they have no chance of success in their life and instead of educating them to give them a better chance she makes sure they have fun before what she believes is the unavoidably miserable years that lie ahead.

                Another very important character is Mr Briggs who provides contrasting attitude to Mrs Kay throughout the play. I think Mr Briggs is threatening because of, “(leaning in close, threatening) Now listen here young lady – I don’t like your attitude one bit!”. This strongly portrays his threatening stance and choice of words. He can also be quite grumpy, “(begrudgingly) Morning,” He is quite insulting behind people’s backs as is clearly shown in, “We’ve got a right head case of a driver.” The quotation, “You’ve got some real bright sparks here,” successfully conveys a sarcastic statement which is likely a common part of his personality. The quotation, “Don’t you mean try and find her,” cleverly exhibits the suggestion he has a negative view on the world but a logical one, so he always expects the worst but not without good reasons. I felt Mr Briggs finds it difficult to show affection for any of his pupils for a prolonged period of time and believes that education and showing the children little affection will in later life give the children their best chance of success which is the opposite of Mrs Kay’s view.

                An important character for seeing the situation through the children’s eye is Carol. I think Carol is unobservant of her full surroundings as displayed by, “How do you know that a truck or car isn’t gonna come speedin out of that side road.” The quotations, “…places on the telly. Where they have gardens an’ trees outside an’ that,” and, “We did have them til last bommy night – the kids chopped em’ all down an’ burnt them all,” strongly conveys that Carol lives in a badly underprivileged area by the fact that she believes have a garden or even just trees is amazing. She is not very smart, “Will we have t’ get a boat?” “Carol we’re going on a coach. Look it’s there.” This quotation displays the fact that she they might have to get a boat to Wales, even a bus is beside her. Carol does realise the bleakness of her future and as such becomes prone to suicidal thoughts, “Try an’ get me an’ I’ll jump over.” She has a negative view on the future and because of that she can find it hard to enjoy herself because she is always thinking about when it will end, “When do we have to go home?” I felt Carol was underprivileged like all the other children, but she had the added curse that she realised how it was and tried to take drastic action in the form of refusing to leave the beach at Conway, believing that was and will be the best time of her life and it will never be as good again.

                A main theme is social deprivation. The area the children come from can be described as socially deprived because the area does not have the same kind of facilities, like schools, leisure, etc and the quality of life which is obviously poor because of education, opportunities, etc. The children are socially deprived because of their environment being deprived, their education being poor, their family are poor and very few people want to help them. The children do not seem to have a positive future ahead of them. Indeed, because of Mrs Kay’s affection they will go into the world uneducated, with the idea that life will be quite easy and unprepared for the truth. Their deprived environment meant they did not have a great future ahead of them, but Mrs Kay has just made it worse.

                Another theme is the conflict between traditional education and liberal education. Mrs Kay is a liberal teacher who wants her pupils to have fun, even if it is at the expense of learning, “I get the impression she sees education as one long game.” She is also willing to give the pupils full control, “In another part of the castle the kids are rushing about playing medieval cowboys and Indians. Mrs Kay sits in a bench overlooking the scene.” She might be a nice teacher to have because she puts the needs of the pupil before the teaching. Indeed, she preaches that first a pupil should have fun and be shown affection before education is even mentioned. The disadvantages in having Mrs Kay as a teacher are that although the pupil’s childhood will be more fun and bearable, by the time they leave school they will not really have had an education and it is very likely that their futures will be bleak and miserable. Mr Briggs teaches in a traditional style which involves not showing the pupils love and kindness and instead enforcing education and discipline, “It might look like love and kindness  but if you ask me I don’t think it does the kids a scrap of good,”. These two quotations, “Sit down! We don’t wander up and down the aisle. We talk quietly to our neighbour, not shout at our mates,” and, “Briggs with a group of ordered school children,” illustrate further the traditional teaching idea of rules, militaristic discipline and control. Mr Briggs might not be enjoyable as a teacher because he believes he must avoid allowing the pupils to enjoy themselves so that they can leave school as educated, disciplined and rational people. He might be more beneficial as a teacher because you would get a proper education which would vastly increase the chance that you would get a good job and a bright future because of that.

                The drama is a mixture of both tragic and comic moments. One example of a tragic moment is when Mrs Kay asks the children who did not pay for the trip to follow her and they all did. This is tragic because it shows just how poor and deprived these children are if not one of them can afford the trip. Another moment is when Carol threatens to commit suicide. It is a tragic moment because firstly she might kill herself, but also because she even considers it an option, showing just how bad she thinks her life is. A third tragic moment is when Mr Briggs destroys the photos of him having fun with children. This is tragic because he has just spent the day becoming kinder and more loving of the children to just suddenly at the end pretend it did not happen. I think he does this because he feels that if he changes his ways to be more like in the photos then he will do more bad than good for the children by having fun with them instead of educating them. One example of a comic moment is when Mrs Kay lies so that the children can get on the bus without being searched for ‘lemonade and chocolate. It is comic because she decides to talk rubbish about the children making them seem a lot more deprived that they really are. Another comic moment which is a running joke throughout the story is Reilly and Colin’s conversations about the relationship between Colin and Susan. This is comic because Reilly has freedom to make any comment and Colin has no way to stop him. A third moment is when Colin spots Reilly trying to hide a cigarette from him and instead of reporting it he just tells him to put it out. It is comic because Reilly seems to believe that he is doing well at hiding it and probably found it slightly humiliating to be caught so easily. The play is episodic and events happen in the order that they should.

                I felt the play was reasonable but nothing that made it particularly good or bad. It had a simple but eventful story which featured many different concepts (teaching styles, social deprivation, etc) but did not try to feature too many which would be likely to overwhelm the audience. Mrs Kay and Briggs work well in the story by providing absolute opposites to see the event in two different lights. However, there are things that downgrade the play such as its short length which is never good in most types of writing unless of course making it long would reduce the quality but I think this play could have been easily extended without a reduction of quality. Another bad point is that it does not try to be better than the rest by including unique features to try and rise above the rest. My favourite episode was when the children were in the sweet shop stealing from the shopkeepers who were trying to exploit them by raising the prices. I liked this episode because it is an example of comedy that emerges from the fact that the children are too poor to afford the prices and the shopkeepers were too greedy to see it. The play did not make me think of much because when I read fiction I think more about the story and not the real issues it raises. Some concepts like social deprivation I did think about, but mainly when I was reading examples of it in the story not after I had finished the play.