Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead

by Tom Stoppard

seen at the Old Vic on 29 March 2017

David Leveaux directs the 50th anniversary revival of Tom Stoppard's first great hit, playing in the theatre where it was first performed in London after transferring from the Edinburgh Fringe Festival of 1966, with Daniel Radcliffe playing Rosencrantz, Joshua McGuire playing Guildenstern, and David Haig the Player King.

The two main characters are mere extras in Hamlet, their fate sealed somewhat callously by the prince when he rewrites  letter leading to their undeserved execution at the English court. In Stoppard's play, everything depends on their chemistry, as they struggle with uncertainties about their past, with their entanglement in Danish court politics, with the significance of their own lives, and even with remembering their own names (not helped by the tendency of almost everyone else to confuse them).

In this production Daniel Radcliffe and Joshua McGuire make a great double act, the first a bit nervy but happy to try to ride the present moment, the second more speculative, more determined to try to impose meaning on what is happening. The players erupt into their lives with a stunning performance by David Haig of overwhelming theatricality, supported by a carnivalesque troupe who hardly say a word.

In Trevor Nunn's 2011 production with Samuel Barnett as Ros and Jamie Parker as Guil, I found the relationship between the two, and their final predicament, more moving. I think this is because Samuel Barnett played a more needy and dependent Rosencrantz. Where he was deeply frightened, Daniel Radcliffe is both more controlled and more panicky. Interestingly, he also comes across as intensely likeable. It's a wonderful performance, allowing for a really satisfying contrast with Joshua McGuire's more cerebral Guildenstern. Their physical confidence in one another, exemplified not least in the fact that almost all the coin tossing involves Radcliffe actually catching the coins, and their comic timing in the set piece routines such as the question-and-answer match, and in so much else, is a real joy to watch. 

Perhaps here the existential ruminations outweigh the more personal sense of waste and loss, accounting for the difference in my emotional reactions; but this is a very fine and at times hugely funny production of a modern classic.

My Brilliant Friend

adapted by April De Angelis from Elena Ferrante's novels

seen at the Rose Theatre, Kingston upon Thames on 23 March 2017

Melly Still directs Niamh Cusack as Elena and Catherine McCormack as Lila in this two-part adaptation of the four Neapolitan novels of Elena Ferrante, with a supporting cast of ten actors taking all the other parts. The set - an all-purpose and inventive use of the whole Rose Theatre stage and the galleries behind it - and costumes are designed by Soutra Gilmour.

This is a compelling piece of theatre with blisteringly good performances from the two women whose careers and experiences diverge drastically from their childhood in post-war Naples. The adaptation of four dense and complex novels into about five and a half hours of playing time is extremely ambitious, but it is triumphantly realised. It is clearly an adaptation from another medium, rather than a newly devised play, but nonetheless it is dramatically sound and intensely involving. I have not (yet) read the books, so I cannot comment on what has been sacrificed or simplified, but as a sheer piece of theatre I found it totally engrossing. I'm not entirely clear on the relations of some of the families - not helped here by the inevitable doubling of roles - but in the heat of the moment it was not much of a disadvantage.

Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?

by Edward Albee

seen at the Harold Pinter Theatre in 22 March 2017

James Macdonald directs Imelda Staunton as Martha, Conleth Hill as George, Luke Treadaway as Nick and Imogen Poots as Honey in a new revival of Albee's famous play. (I've seen two previous revivals - Diana Rigg and David Suchet in 1997, and Kathleen Turner and Bill Irwin in 2006, and also, of course, the celebrated Taylor/Burton film.)

The play's pyrotechnics demand the very highest stamina and skill from the cast, and these are in plentiful supply with these four. Imelda Staunton is magnificently fiery and mercurial as Martha, while Conleth Hill is the perfect foil, shambling, drily sarcastic, but finally proving to be just as formidable. Luke Treadaway as the handsome young biologist, hopes to use icy politeness as a shield against the maelstrom engulfing him, but finds himself completely outmanoeuvred, and Imogen Poots as his naive wife wonderfully portrays a rather sheltered and silly girl descending into drunken self-awareness.

The play remains immensely powerful, and the denouement, even when it is known (as it must be to anyone who has seen it more than once) is still deeply moving as George and Martha face a new day in quiet apprehension after a night of shattering argument and recrimination. Though the speechifying can at times seem just too convoluted and lengthy for modern taste - playwrights now are often more economical with words - in the hands of such brilliant actors one just watches the spectacle with horrified awe.

Limehouse

by Steve Waters

seen at the Donmar Warehouse on 16 March 2017

Polly Findlay directs Nathalie Armin as Debbie Owen, Tom Goodman-Hill as David Owen, Paul Chahidi as Bill Rodgers, Debra Gillett as Shirley Williams and Roger Allam as Roy Jenkins in a new play set on Sunday 25 January 1981 when the so-called 'Gang of Four' finally decided to leave the Labour Party and set up the SPD. 

The play is set in the open-plan kitchen of the Owens' Limehouse house, beginning in the early hours of the morning when Debbie persuades an irate David to host a meeting there, in part to repay the hospitality of the others and in part to avoid their catering arrangements. The guests arrive at separate times, allowing private conversations to take place before all of them try to thrash out their next move.

Speech and Debate

by Stephen Karam

seen at the Trafalgar Studios Two on 9 March 2017

Tom Attenborough directs Douglas Booth as Howard, Patsy Ferran as Diwata, Tony Revolori as Solomon and Charlotte Lucas as the teacher and the reporter in this play about three teenagers at school in Salem (Oregon) forming an unlikely partnership after stumbling across each other through social media and interest in the illicit behaviour of one of their teachers. The two young men, established film and TV actors, are making their West End debuts in this production and acquit themselves very well, while Patsy Ferran already has two prominent roles at the National under her belt.

Hamlet

by William Shakespeare

seen at the Almeida Theatre on 8 March 2017

Hamlet again - the fifth since I started this blog, and I think the twentieth stage production I have seen (plus three films). This time, Robert Icke directs Andrew Scott as Hamlet, Juliet Stevenson as Gertrude, Angus Wright as Claudius, Jessica Brown Findlay as Ophelia, Peter Wight as Polonius, Luke Thompson as Laertes, David Rintoul as the Ghost and the Player-King and Elliot Barnes-Worrell as Horatio, with sets and costumes designed by Hildegard Bechtler.

A modern Hamlet with video surveillance cameras first alerting the guards to the Ghost's appearance, TV newsreel footage of the old king's funeral at the beginning, and Hamlet's at the end (a really nice touch to have the running text at the foot of the screen in Danish), and a camera always ready to film coverage of public royal occasions such as the beginning of the marriage feast, the Royal party attending the play and the fencing match, and Claudius making various public announcements. 

My Country; a work in progress

prepared by Carol Ann Duffy

seen at the National Theatre (Dorfman) on 1 March 2017

Rufus Norris directs Penny Layden (Britannia), Stuart McQuarrie (Caledonia), Adam Ewan (South-West), Christian Patterson (Cymru), Seema Bowri (East Midlands), Cavan Clarke (Northern Ireland) and Laura Elphinstone (North-East) in a play comprising verbatim interviews with dozens of people in the various regions of the UK (pointedly excluding London and the South-East, apart from some politicians' statements spoken by Britannia) in relation to the Brexit referendum, with framing and connecting pieces by the Poet Laureate Carol Ann Duffy.

The play opens with Britannia calling the regions together for a meeting "as she always does" at critical moments of history - some previous occasions are referred to, going back to the fourteenth century. As the representatives of six regions arrive they bustle and chatter, the tensions between them veering between relaxed chaffing and more serious confrontation; Britannia is like a convener somewhat weary of the bickering.