Interview: Stephen Daldry, Director of An Inspector Calls

Following a sell-out tour in 2022, Stephen Daldry’s multi award-winning National Theatre production of JB Priestley’s An Inspector Calls is back touring the UK for 2024-25.

We spoke to acclaimed director Stephen Daldry about reviving his seminal production, which runs at the Grand Opera House from 15 - 19 October.

When you were first asked to direct An Inspector Calls for the York Theatre in 1989, in a previous production, you weren't sure about it. Why was that?

It was pretty much a staple of amateur theatre companies at the time. It took some time of researching Priestley, where he wrote it, why he wrote it, where it was first performed, how it was first performed, before I realised that it was much more of a radical piece than it had become known as.

JB himself was a little uninspired by the original London production in 1946. It had originally been done in two theatres in Moscow, and those productions were quite radical. So I tried to bring it back to his radical roots and tried to do production which I thought JB might be more interested in.

Did you ever meet JB Priestley, who died in 1984?

Sadly I never met JB, but I was lucky enough to meet Jacquetta Hawkes, who was his wife and a very famous archaeologist. I went to see her and talked her through this production, and got her blessing. I did say to her at the time - I'm trying to do a production which reveals the play as it was meant to be written, and do tell me if you think I've gone off beam. And she loved it.

Tom Priestley, his son, was involved in this production from the very early days. Tom was a great friend to the show, and to me. We talked him through it almost every time, in terms of casting, and Tom would always come and see how it was doing. I felt incredibly supported by Tom. But it was because Jacquetta supported the production, I think that I carried on.

This production has toured almost every year since 1992. Did you imagine at the time that it could be a long runner?

Not at all. It was originally programmed for quite a short run at the National, and then they had a tour booked. I think there was a certain nervousness at the National about what I was doing. We had some leading actors of the day in the show, Barbara Leigh-Hunt and Richard Pasco, for example, who were not to be revealed straightaway. And there were cobbles, and there was rain, and it was quite - it is still quite - a demanding show for the actors.

I think there was a nervousness about a radical reworking of a classic. But in the end, it all worked fine. And then it just carried on - we transferred it and transferred it again. I can't remember off the top of my head how many West End theatres we've been in, but quite a few.

What changes have you made over that time?

Remarkably, very few. It's pretty much the same production as it was when we opened at the National. It's interesting to watch a production that you did all those years ago, that's almost exactly the same production, of a young director grappling with this play. I'm not sure now if I would have done quite the same production, or been as bold as I was in my late twenties. I'm 64 now, so it's a long time ago. It’s a work from a younger version of yourself.

What is it like returning to something as opposed to working on something new?

What I love about the play is how it is perceived each time it's done; how the audience reacts. It always seems to be a play for today - a play of our times in one way or another. And it does often intersect with issues of the day. So the issue of the day, for example, would be a young mother, who's living on her own, about to have a baby, and can't find any means of economic support for that. That thing about mothers, about single mothers, about who's meant to support them, what is the role or responsibility of the father, of the family, of the state, still feels like a very current conversation.

Is that why it is being revived again now?

When we first performed it, it was very much in the world of Margaret Thatcher's Conservative government, and Thatcher herself was saying there's no such thing as society, there's only men and women and families, and so this was, in a sense, a broadside against that mentality and against that Edwardian idea.

The original idea of the production was to have a conversation between three time zones - [it’s set in 1912], Priestley was writing it in 1944-45. It was about trying to create a social debate. There was a Labour government almost inevitably coming in, but the conversation in 1945, about what kind of society we wanted after the war, what is Britain, what sort of society do we want to be a part of now, was very current and very important for JB, who himself was an MP. He stood for the Common Wealth Party; essentially a socialist independent.

That conversation still feels as current today as it did when we first did the play in ‘92, and indeed, when JB first wrote the play in the great Labour landslide of 1945.

It’s a sort of modern morality play - is that something that we do much of these days?

No, I don't think we do. It is a morality play and it's a little bit agitation and propaganda. You have a character who stands in front of the audience and says what he thinks and what we should be doing, and I love that. I think it's thrilling to have a political play that's directly in conversation with his audience.

When we did it in New York, a lot of the audience felt that it was verging on communist. Some people would leave, saying I don't like this, it's preachy, and so on. It wears its morality on his sleeve.

Can art inspire social change?

I think that's the reason why we do it. I've always believed anything you make that's in a genuine conversation about the world we live in, shifts the conversation, and even if it makes just one person think or change, then yes. Trying to make the world a better place and trying to have a conversation about the world we live in is, I think, the point of doing any piece of work.

An Inspector Calls was a sort of call to action when it was written, that prefigured the welfare state. How do you think it's going to land now?

The welfare state is in crisis in every possible way, from the NHS, to social care to an ageing population. How we, as a society, wish to embrace those changes that are happening to our population and embrace our health service, what the solutions are - can we afford it? Who's going to pay for it? What is care in the community these days? How do we look after our old folk, how do we look after people in poverty, how do we get people out of poverty? All those questions are, I think, more acute today, perhaps than they've been at any time in my life. So I think the play speaks radically to the audience right now, about what sort of society we want to be a part of.

The play is sometimes thought of as a ghost story, but it's actually a ‘time play’. What does that mean?

JB Priestley had this theory, as I remember, that we have parallel lives in parallel time zones. So your behaviour, and your attitudes can determine the life that you are living now in this world, and there are multiple universes. It sounds like The Matrix.

In this particular play, time stops for a moment, and you see the future. The Inspector comes in, to interrogate what is about to happen. It is, I believe, to give the characters an opportunity, so that when the thing happens, they're prepared, morally, for the responsibility that they have. He gives them a dry run.

Have you directed any of JB Priestley’s other plays?

No, but I've always wanted to. Time and the Conways is a fantastic play, and hasn't been seen for a while. Dangerous Corner is another great play. I think it’s the time plays that I've always been most fascinated with. It’s such a wild idea. It's a theory that he genuinely believed.

An Inspector Calls runs from 15 - 19 October 2024 at the Grand Opera House. Get your tickets here.