Plenty of challenges in post-war world

Jacqueline Nairn plays a disillusioned idealist back from the war

Jacqueline Nairn doesn't do adventure sports: "Nothing with sharks or bungy cords," she says. Given her shy smile, you might be tempted to judge her as quiet and unwilling to take risks.

Not so. It's just that rather than flinging herself off bridges or boats, Nairn prefers her adrenalin rush to come from being centre-stage.

For the next month, she will be in her element playing a role described by some British critics as "one of the best parts written for a woman by a post-war English dramatist".

Nairn has the lead role in David Hare's Plenty as the disillusioned former World War II Special Operations member Susan Traherne who returns to Britain after a death-defying tour of duty in France.

Traherne finds she is powerless in a brave new post-war world.

And instead of fighting with as much energy as she had mustered for the war effort, Traherne finds herself becoming a disillusioned idealist lashing out - however inappropriately - at any opportunity.

"David Hare first got the idea for Plenty when he read that something like 75 per cent of the women who worked behind the lines for the Special Operations executive divorced after the war," Nairn says.

"When you've experienced passion at its height, fear at its height, when all your emotions have been at the extreme, how can you possibly find yourself again in normal society?"

Whether Traherne is cruel or brave is debatable, but as she goes steadily - but not quietly - mad she seems determined to pull down her nearest and dearest as well. The actor playing Traherne's part needs to age 20 years during the two-and-a-half hour performance, to be in every scene, and to portray a large range of emotions. It is, in short, not a role for a shrinking violet. And Nairn can hardly wait for opening night. "It's an amazing role. Susan Traherne is an incredibly complex woman who always speaks her truth and never apologises for being who she is. As an actor, I get to express so many different emotions and put myself into situations I would never encounter. I expect I'll be exhausted by the end of every night."

It's a feeling Nairn is accustomed to because of her previous work. Graduating from drama school aged 27, she decided that as a "more mature" actor she had less time than others to achieve her goal so she decided to go straight for it.

She went to London's West End, spending three years in almost constant work alongside actors who included Felicity Kendal and Jerry Hall.

Then visa problems meant Nairn had to return home.

She did not act for 18 months - "I learned that who you are is not determined by whether you're acting" - but is now building up a reputation as an accomplished performer.

Katie Wolfe, who directs Plenty for the Silo Theatre, first worked with Nairn in The Women. "I said to Shane [Bosher, Silo Theatre director], you didn't tell me I had Judi Dench in my cast ... "

Nairn follows some of the world's most accomplished actors in Plenty. The role of Susan Traherne was made famous by Meryl Streep in a 1985 film, Canadian actress Kate Nelligan appeared in both the original productions in London and New York, and Cate Blanchett starred in a 1999 West End revival. When Plenty was first staged in 1978 by England's National Theatre Company, it offered what New York Times critic Frank Rich termed "a lacerating view" of English society.

Perhaps for this reason the critics were equally cutting. That prompted Hare - who also directed the production of his play - to leave England, vowing never to return.

At one point, the board of the National Theatre wanted to take the play off, but was dissuaded by the artistic director.

Hare's self-imposed exile was short-lived and when he returned six months later Plenty was receiving standing ovations from capacity crowds.

Wolfe says that although the play doesn't make overt political statements, it challenges audiences on their stance on subjects such as world power, colonisation and gender relations.

That these issues are never resolved proves the timelessness of the piece, Wolfe says.

"One of the big issues discussed is a crisis in the Middle East. However many years on, we are still dealing with conflict in the Middle East."

Both Wolfe and Nairn say that at half time audiences should be debating issues raised by the play, rather than making small-talk.

What: Plenty
Where and when: Silo Theatre, June 22-July 22