a small and quiet light

by Stephanie Street

seen at the Orange Tree Theatre, Richmond on 29 September 2026

Elin Schofield directs Priyanga Burford as Noor-un-Nisa Inaya Khan and Caoilfhionn Dunne as Vogt with a supporting cast of five taking all the other parts in a small and quiet light, a play about Noor-un-Nisa, a cosmopolitan woman of mixed heritage (Indian father and American mother) who became an SOE/ resistance operator in occupied Paris until she was betrayed to the Germans, interrogated and eventually deported to Dachau.

The play opens with the beginning of the interrogation by the Gestapo officer Ernst Vogt, and it employs numerous flashbacks to earlier episodes in Noor-un-Nisa's life: born in Paris, but moved to Britain once her father had departed to India; recruited by the SOE despite some reservations concerning her suitability, and finally a hectic time evading capture when again in Paris, until the fateful betrayal. With an all-female cast taking all the parts, it requires concentration by the audience: there are very few costume changes, so context, mannerisms and accents are of vital importance, and there are helpful projections of the dates of each scene. However, the requisite attention is well repaid as the story unfolds and the complex personality of the principal character is revealed.

Priyanga Burford brings a clear-cut intensity to the principal role: Noor-un-Nisa is passionate, at times wayward, fiercely patriotic and unexpectedly resilient under pressure: a reckless bravery, verging on foolhardiness, enables her to resist the psychological pressure exerted by the insistent and apparently friendly Vogt, though ultimately there is no escape from the degrading rigours of the concentration camp (thankfully reported rather than depicted). 

Such a career seems almost quaint, and certainly hard to fathom, in this modern more cynical age, and there is an element of the "derring-do" of the classic war movies of the 1950s and early 1960s, though with a salutary reminder that much of the work involved was performed by women as competently as by men (if not more so, depending on temperament).That Noor-un-Nisa's story is relatively unknown is partly due to the general secrecy of the whole enterprise, but also to the ease with which non-whites and women are casually erased from the picture when broad strokes are painted. This play shows us a woman who was far more than a two-dimensional hero of the resistance, reminding us that such careers were often suited to quirky people who were prepared to take what most of us would consider insane risks for their ideals.