Review: The Half-Life of Marie Curie Alma Tavern Theatre

A truly exceptional production from the Alma Tavern Theatre’s in-house production company

The Alma Tavern Theatre’s in-house production company – Schoolhouse Productions – brought Lauren Gunderson’s The Half-Life of Marie Curie to its intimate theatre this week. It was a theatrical masterclass of acting, storytelling and direction, for this was an utterly flawless production that captivated its audience.

What actually is theatre? Does it entertain? Does it educate? Inform? Make us feel something? This production did it all.

It also made science feel accessible, something that any child could aspire to if they wished.

Watching actors who are experienced and confident with their choices is a joy. Georgina Strawson as Marie Curie and Erin Costello as Hertha Ayrton were utterly riveting as the two brilliant trailblazing scientists.

Twice Nobel prize winner for physics and chemistry, Marie Curie coined the term ‘radioactivity’, discovered polonium and radium and invented and drove the first mobile X-ray unit in the battlefields of WWI. Her list of achievements is both vast and incredible.

Her friend Hertha Aryton was every bit as exceptional as Marie though perhaps does not have her same level of fame – or at times, notoriety.

Hertha was an electrical engineer, mathematician, inventor and physicist. She was the very first woman to win the Hughes Medal from the Royal Society for her work on electrical arcs and ripple marks in sand and water. Those are the achievements noted in the play, but she is fully worthy of an internet deep dive for her life would have been remarkable with just one of these things in 2026, even without the societal barriers she faced at the time.

Photography: Edward Felton

In the First World War, she invented the Ayrton anti-gas fan to clear chlorine gas from the trenches. The Imperial War Museum in London has some within its collection.

Whilst the instigating factor of this autobiographical story is the publication of an affair Marie had with a married man leading to scandal in the gossip columns of the day, it is her relationship with Hertha that is the real story here. And perhaps, In many ways, it is Hertha’s story more than Marie’s.

The two-hander is well written with a witty and dramatic script that veers between the contrasting dynamics of two extremely close friends. The direction from Anna Friend and Holly Newton is outstanding, at times the pacing creating an edge-of-the-seat feeling.

The Half-Life of Marie Curie, is also a play on words. ‘Half-life’ in chemistry is the amount of the time it takes for half of a radioactive substance to decay or change into another substance. This echos the resilience Curie gains through the intervention of her friend. But it also echoes the changes her body is going through being in such close daily proximity to radioactive substances.

‘Half life’ is also a metaphor for the role women played in society at the time, though still always playing catch-up in 2026. For Ayrton was a strong advocate of social justice and suffrage, joining one of the more radical branches. Against the backdrop of Lloyd George refusing votes for women, she supported recovering suffragettes who took part in hunger strikes and she herself took part in demonstrations including the infamous Black Friday event of 1910.

Gunderson writes women being stifled by a half life forced on them by a patriarchal world, but also shows how those women rose up to be magnificent.

Schoolhouse Productions mirrored that magnificent on stage this week with one of the finest pieces of theatre that’s been on stage in Bristol so far in 2026.

The Half-Life of Marie Curie was on at the Alma Tavern Theatre this week.

You can follow School House Productions on Instagram to see their forthcoming productions: https://www.instagram.com/almaschoolhouse/

For more shows coming up at the Alma Tavern Theatre, visit: https://www.almatavernandtheatre.co.uk/

For What’s On In Bristol:https://backstagebristol.com/
Bristol Culture: www.tiktok.com/@chopsybristoltt
Bristol Theatre Updates: https://www.facebook.com/backstagebristol
Bristol Theatre Updates:https://www.threads.com/@backstagebristol
Bristol News and Culture: https://www.youtube.com/user/chopsy