To Kill a Mockingbird theatre review: 'Aaron Sorkin drags Harper Lee’s classic into this century.'

The resulting court case is but one part of a dramatic summer narrated by tomboy Scout (Gwenyth Keyworth in dungarees), her brother Jem (Harry Redding in his stage debut) and their new friend Dill (David Moorst) a refugee from a loveless home modelled on Lee’s childhood friend Truman Capote.

The trial, which is set somewhat oddly in designer Miriam Beuther’s abandoned warehouse, dominates more quickly than it does in the book. Court room furniture gathers from the wings like magnets at the end of each instalment of the children’s adventures which centre on the mysterious hermit Boo Radley and Mrs Dubose, the sour old lady (Amanda Boxer) who lives down the road.

Also on trial here is Finch’s virtue. In Lee’s book his refusal to give up civility when confronted by the barbaric behaviour of others is a virtue. But to his African American house keeper Calpurnia (Pamela Nomvete) — whom Scout describes as more like a sister to her father than a servant— Finch’s tolerance should be viewed first with impatience and eventually contempt.

This reassessment of the book aside, what gives this show its urgency is the way Sorkin drags Lee’s classic into this century. When Bob Ewell and his KKK cohorts spew the opinions that drive their lynch mob mentality, they sounds like those who stormed Congress. This is no coincidence. Sorkin reportedly used material found from the notorious right wing website Breitbart News to articulate the more reactionary opinions in his play. And certainly, when Ewell’s wretched daughter (an excellent Poppy Lee Friar), the alleged victim in the trial declares that whites are superior to black people because “we built Europe” it sounds exactly the kind of tosh today attributed to the likes of Q Anon.

Spall is terrific as the man wedded to his moral compass. But this play has a blunter message: principle is all very well, but sometimes you just have to fight.