Operation Crucible

B+

When it played at 59E59 Theaters last Spring as part of the Brits Off Broadway festival, this taut World War II drama about the bombing of Sheffield in December 1940 was selected as a Critic’s Pick. Now it is receiving an encore run at The Loft at the Davenport Theatre. The four blokes we meet are workmates at a steel mill that supplies armaments critical to the British war effort. Their strenuous work requires tightly coordinated teamwork which we see them perform. We learn about their daily routines and their lives away from work. The frequent German air raids had not targeted Sheffield until that horrendous evening when the sirens tell them to flee the factory. They head homeward, but only get as far as the local hotel where they take shelter in the basement. When a bomb hits the hotel, it collapses around them and they are trapped in a pitch-black tiny space hoping to be rescued. We learn what memories and worries each man is thinking of during the crisis. The cast (Salvatore D’Aquila; Kieran Knowles, who also wrote the play; Christopher McCurry and James Wallwork) are superb individually and as a team. Their ensemble work is brilliant. Bryony Shanahan’s tight direction adds much to the production. The simple set and costumes by Sophia Simensky are apt. Seth Rook Williams’s low lighting is effective and Daniel Foxsmith’s sound design is appropriately ominous. The only negative, and it is not a serious one, is that the thick Sheffield accent is occasionally hard to decipher. The program contains a helpful glossary of local terms. The play's title is a translation of the German's name for their bombing campaign against Sheffield.There has been so little publicity for the reopening of the play that the audience was unfortunately quite sparse. I hope word of mouth changes that. Running time: one hour 20 minutes, no intermission.