Peter Gynt

by David Hare after Henrik Ibsen

seen at National Theatre (Olivier) on 16 August 2019

Jonathan Kent directs James McArdle in the title role of David Hare's adaptation of Ibsen's dramatic poem Peer Gynt, the story of a man consumed by the need to be and feel authentic, heedless of the effect this has on those around him. Pruned of the elevated poetry, and relocated from Norway to Scotland, the play proves to be compelling, touching and often very comic, though it certainly takes a darker turn as the evening progresses, as the irrepressible young Peter grows older and more disillusioned with life.

On the exposed Olivier stage almost every scene is set outdoors (designed by Richard Hudson), whether just outside his mother's hut, down at the village where a wedding is supposed to be taking place, even in the kingdom of the mountain trolls, and then on a golf course in Florida, or in the African desert after a plane crash, or at sea in a fateful storm. The restlessness of Peter's life is thus emphasised by the lack of domesticity: when he first visits his mother all the talk is outside the dwelling and he finishes up leaving her on the roof of her hut so that she cannot interfere with his plans, and even at her death she seems to be as much in the fields as on her deathbed.

A German Life

by Christopher Hampton

seen at the Bridge Theatre on 8 April 2019

Maggie Smith plays Brunhilde Pomsel in this dramatic monologue directed by Jonathan Kent and designed by Anna Fleischle. It is 'drawn from the life and testimony' of Brunhilde Pomsel and based on a film of the same name, constructed from 30 hours of interviews with her and released in 2016.

An elderly lady in a bland flat reminisces about her life - Pomsel had just turned 106 when she died in 2017. At first there are some ripples of knowing laughter in the audience, expecting perhaps another Maggie Smith performance of an eccentric woman with a wandering mind. But this is no elderly lady in a van causing havoc in the life of Alan Bennett. On the contrary, this is someone determined to remember what she can, and to speak frankly with courteous apologies when she gets sidetracked or absently loses her thread. Her story soon commands rapt attention, and the laughter when it comes is in response to barbed wit, or to uncomfortable observations which may sometimes be too near the bone.

The Height of the Storm

by Florian Zeller

seen at Wyndhams Theatre on 18 October 2018

Jonathan Kent directs Jonathan Pryce as André and Eileen Atkins as Madeleine, with Amanda Drew and Anna Madeley as their daughters Anne and Elise in Zeller's new play, in which he again addresses themes of love, loss, memory and grief. The translation is by Christopher Hampton , and the set is designed by Anthony Ward - each in their own way excellent.

In an ageing writer's country house (or at least, a house outside Paris), in which shelves overloaded with books to an impossible height dominate several visible walls, Anne is trying to gain her father's attention, but he seems lost in a reverie staring out through the kitchen windows to the garden beyond. We soon conclude that he is recently widowed and possibly succumbing to dementia - there is talk of resolving 'the situation' and realising that new arrangements must be made.

Young Chekhov

Platonov, Ivanov and The Seagull reversioned by David Hare

seen at the National Theatre (Olivier) on 13 August 2016

Anton Chekhov's three early plays - the first of which was not performed in his lifetime - were presented last year at the Chichester Festival as a unified insight into the dramatist's development. Most of the original cast have been reassembled to present the plays in London this summer. The three plays were directed by Jonathan Kent and the sets - variations on Russian country estates - were designed by Tom Pye.

In many ways the best way to appreciate this ambitious undertaking is to see all three plays on the same day. Patterns and themes emerge - there are references to Hamlet in each play; there is a significant part for a doctor in each play, though the three doctors are utterly different in style and personality; there is an idealistic but frustrated young man in each, colliding with an idealistic and frustrated young woman with painful consequences; surrounding the main characters are an assortment of hangers-on, older but not necessarily wiser relatives who are part of a wider and often stifling society. But the fascination of all this is that though the situations may appear similar in bald summary, the tone of each play, and the way the characters interact (or fail to interact) in each, makes for a wide and rich spectrum of human behaviour. Chekhov is revealed to be the master of social comedy and romantic melodrama just as much as his more well-known bittersweet examination of thwarted idealism and crippling ennui.