20 Dec 2021
Our New Girl
Ebook
£10.99£8.79
Lyric Theatre, Belfast
From Tue 8 Apr 2025 to Sun 4 May 2025
A startling psychological drama about the darker side of modern parenthood.
Behind the shiny door of Hazel Robinson's immaculate London home, things aren't as good as they look. Her plastic surgeon husband, Richard, has embarked on his latest charitable mission to Haiti, leaving the heavily pregnant Hazel to cope with a failing business and a problem son. When a professional nanny arrives unannounced on her doorstep, Hazel finds her home under the shadow of a seemingly perfect stranger, and one who has an agenda of her own.
Nancy Harris's play Our New Girl was first performed at the Bush Theatre, London, in 2012.
The play is also available in the volume Our New Girl & Little Dolls: two plays.
'Mercilessly accurate... this fiendish little play is spot-on'
Daily Mail'A tightly wound drama of domestic noir... sharp observations and crackling dialogue... so tense that the audience was audibly inhaling'
Guardian'Both gripping and deeply unsettling'
Daily Telegraph'A wonderful sly, sharp humour and thematic subtlety'
Independent'Gripping... a stealthy, see-sawing psychological drama... Little by little, multiple layers of guilt, blame, recrimination and loathing emerge, simmer and eventually boil over into a domestic storm from which there is no refuge'
The Stage'Bold, modern and unmissable... A psychological drama that sinks its teeth into the messy realities of modern parenthood, domestic power dynamics, and the unsettling presence of an outsider... unfolds with a slow-burning intensity that neatly balances dramatic tension and narrative ambiguity... Harris skilfully plays with familiar tropes (the sinister nanny, the disturbed child), but she twists them into something fresh, avoiding cliché through sharp dialogue and a balance of humour and dread... left the press night audience gasping in shock'
No More Workhorse'Truly shocking... keeps the balance of comedy and anxiety teetering on a knife's edge... Razor-sharp in both thrill and wit'
Arts Despatch20 Dec 2021