It does seem to be true that England salutes gallant failure more than success, a point that comes up time and time again in Ted Tally’s Terra Nova at the Palace, Watford. The author, an American, probably finds this national trait more fascinating than we do, because the ability to “psych” ourselves up to face defeat has served us well in the past, whether it be Dunkirk, the World Cup or Scott’s expedition to the South Pole, the subject of this play.

Tally incorporates Roald Amundsen, the man who got to the South Pole first and never actually met Scott, into the action of  Terra Nova, suddenly appearing to tell Scott in ruthless Scandinavian fashion, that the English expedition, composed of gentlemen and amateurs, has no chance against Amundsen’s professionals, who are prepared to use their dogs as food to get to the Pole first. Scott, of course, did not use dogs at all, the party trudging to the Pole, battling blizzards and frostbite on foot. The end may have been inevitable, but it was very decent and British, with Evans, mad with pain from his injured hand, dying from a haemorrhage, Oates hobbling out into the Arctic wastes on his gangrenous foot, and Scott, Wilson and Bowers huddling together, drained of all strength, to await death. An example then, of the English character at its best and most foolish. But Terra Nova, for all its switches in time and place, has many intensely moving moments, deliberately wrapped up in a semi-delirious montage. One suspects that the play works better on the small Watford stage than it did on the wide-open spaces of Chichester, and it is cleverly directed by Michael Attenborough in Joe Vanek’s bare, glaringly white setting.  

Though possibly too young for Scott, Robert Powell gives a brave, thoughtful performance as a man whose polar obsession was caused by lack of progress in his naval career, and there are fine performances by Donald Gee, Bill Stewart, David Troughton and Neil Phillips as his colleagues, by Michael Culver as Amundsen and by Stephanie Beacham as Scott’s sculptress wife, firm in her belief in her husband’s qualities and strong in her acceptance of the final tragedy.