Trigger warning: please be aware that there are brief references to self-harm and suicide in the second paragraph.
Hebden Bridge Picture House is a wonderful not-for-profit cinema and community asset owned by the local town council. This week, it was the venue for the “homecoming screening” of the first episode of Riot Women, the latest BBC series by Sally Wainwright (Happy Valley, Last Tango in Halifax, Gentleman Jack et al), followed by a Q&A with the core cast. And it was a packed house. Queues snaked along the street for (free) tickets, which were vastly oversubscribed. In the balcony, the VIPs took their seats. Dim the lights.
It’s not an easy opening scene. Beth (Joanna Scanlan) contemplates suicide. But the phone rings (twice) and eventually she takes Fate’s hint to reconsider. Meanwhile, across town, another would-be suicide Kitty (Rosalie Craig) rampages through a supermarket necking vodka and pills while wielding a knife. Arrested by last-day-in-the-job constable Holly (Tamsin Greig), things go awry, and blood is spilt. All in all, it makes for a pretty impactful first few minutes. And woven skilfully through the heavy dramatic scenes, are the punchy one-liners and wry, dark humour typical of Wainwright’s scripts.
Introducing the band
Some clever scene-setting fleshes out backstories through camera shots, background details and facial expressions. And with the cast, quality performances are pretty much guaranteed, especially as, impressively, all the actors learned to play their own instruments. Time will tell if snappy dialogue and detailed characterisation overcome some very minor early niggles, like Kitty’s stitches right by her mouth that don’t seem to prevent her singing at full welly.
This episode introduces the viewer to the main characters, sketching the outlines of their lives (to be fully coloured-in in future episodes) and the set-up of how these unlikely lasses come together. The conceit is them forming a band for a charity concert on the whim of publican Jess (Lorraine Ashbourne), where at least a punk band means that sounding terrible won’t matter.
Soundtracking the rage
Aside from the fact that Wainwright had always wanted to write a Rock Follies-type story, it could almost be less about what they do than why they do it. These are all women at a certain point in mid-life. Women whose perceived ‘usefulness’ (to their work, to their ungrateful-seeming families) seems to be in decline. Worse, their bodies are in open rebellion: peri-menopause and menopause have main character energy here.
It’s about the fear of becoming invisible, the struggle of remaining a sexual being in the face of physical and emotional changes, and it’s about rage. The long-suppressed rage of feeling taken for granted, of loss, heartbreak, anxiety – all of it just waiting for an outlet. As Wainwright has it, “music comes for them” and gives them a channel through punk: a raw music of anger and catharsis. And it’s also an exultation, a ‘what the hell, we’ve made it this far’.
At an hour an episode there’s plenty of scope for character development. At the end of episode one, ball-of-fury Kitty seems hell-bent on destruction (in fabulous gold trousers), Beth’s relationships with her adopted son and ex-husband may have collapsed but music has sparked a new purpose, Jess seems to be losing ground as the beating heart of a messy extended family, Holly hooks up with younger men on dating apps, and cares for her mum (Anne Reid), while her “party-pooper” midwife sister Yvonne (Amelia Bullmore) is the steady metronome, keeping time at the heart of the chaos.
All about the ‘hillage’
Asked why Wainwright chooses to set much of her work around Calderdale, she replies that it’s because it looks good on screen, has a strong sense of place, interesting nooks and crannies and, of course “all that hillage”. But there are other, more personal, ties, too. She has many old school friends here still, who often perform as background artists in her shows. It gives some idea of the loyalty to this remarkable and prolific woman whose acute ear for naturalistic dialogue is astonishing, a talent about which she’s extremely modest.
At the after party in the nearby Trades Club, the deputy mayor of Calderdale praised Wainwright for, among other achievements, bringing location filming and tourism to the area. However, welcome that might be (and it can be a double-edged sword for residents), it’s undeniable that the filming caused some businesses to suffer financially.
So when, in her pre-show speech, Wainwright had apologised for the disruption caused by filming and hoped Hebden Bridge in particular had forgiven her, it was the sole time of the night where she was met with an unsettling silence. “Or perhaps not”, she tailed off, sightly deflated.
Not an ending, but a new beginning
There is, rightly, a lot of love here for Wainwright and her work, and a hope that this show inspires women to make changes, be courageous and embrace “sex and love and HRT” as Ashbourne put it.
And yet, as Facebook temporarily bristles about the oversold cinema event, and the large numbers of people turned away, Hebden Bridge grapples with a much bigger major disruption. It faces the prospect of a four-year flood alleviation scheme that isn’t even guaranteed to stop future flooding, coupled with the threat to the upland peat bogs from an ill-conceived wind farm project. Tensions are running high. Many fear permanent damage to the town and its character. And would the film crews still come then?
It’s fantastic to see these far-from-invisible Riot Women in their full, messy, conflicted, menopausal glory, front and centre. Phoenixes rising. But another kind of rage is also going on here. The fire is growing in the belly.
We recognise that discussing suicide and self-harm can create strong emotional responses. We encourage anyone who may be affected by this issue to seek support and advice.
Riot Women is available from Sunday 12 October on BBC iPlayer.
