Straight Line Crazy

by David Hare

seen at the Bridge Theatre on 19 May 2022

Nicholas Hytner directs Ralph Fiennes as Robert Moses in David Hare's new play about the controversial and powerful New York urban planner whose projects were virtually unstoppable for nearly thirty years (1924 to 1963) despite increasing doubts about their efficacy or necessity. While proclaiming that his work was for the benefit of ordinary people he had no hesitation in destroying communities to implement his plans. Many of these areas were slums, but the relocations to outlying suburbs were nonetheless brutal. 

For many years Moses had the support of the New York State Governor Al Smith (Danny Webb) though the play suggests that Smith often (or always) felt outwitted by Moses. He also demanded absolute loyalty to his wishes and plans from his staff, here represented by Ariel Porter (Samuel Barnett) and Finnuala Connell (Siobhán Cullen). By the end of his effective career these two had devoted their lives to him and were practically burnt out; finally Finnuala resigns but Moses is incapable of understanding her reasons for doing so, or of realising that the new middle class activism already awakening in the 1950s is too strong even for him.

As a portrait of a masterful man in the early stages of his career (the first half of the play) and later as he fails to recognise the changed times and the increasing power of the forces opposing him (the second half) Straight Line Crazy offers an intriguing and often thrilling character study, brilliantly embodied in Ralph Fiennes's performance. The man is always restless, opinionated, certain of the correctness of his views both in the matter of town planning and in how to manipulate weaker people; Fiennes prowls around the stage barely able to contain his energy while his underlings learn to live and work with this force of nature, whether thrilled or appalled by his vision. 

This has to rank as one of Hare's better plays, and the production does it magnificent justice.

Antony and Cleopatra

by William Shakespeare

seen at the National Theatre (Olivier) on 2nd January 2019

Simon Godwin directs Ralph Fiennes as Antony, Sophie Okonedo as Cleopatra, Tunji Kasim as Octavius Caesar and Tim McMullan as Enobarbus in a production sumptuously designed by Hildegard Bechtler making inspired use of the famed Olivier drum revolve to resolve the difficult task of transferring quickly the scene of action across various sites in the Mediterranean world (though the programme informs us that the play is set in 'an imagined present').

Boldly, the play here opens with the final tableau of the text, Caesar pronouncing (most of) the final eulogy, and then Agrippa taking parts of Philo's opening speech as if commenting on the denouement rather than setting the scene. At this point the revolve reveals the Egyptian scene and the body of Cleopatra becomes the Queen lazily awaiting the arrival of her lover. 

Richard III

by William Shakespeare

seen by live streaming from the Almeida Theatre on 21 July 2016

Rupert Goold directs Ralph Fiennes as the eponymous king, with Vanessa Redgrave as Queen Margaret, Finbar Lynch as Buckingham and Aislín McGuckin as Queen Elizabeth. The set is designed by Hildegard Bechtler.

The play opens with a forensic excavation of a pit or grave, taking place while the audience enters. This is, it transpires, the famous exhumation of King Richard's remains from under a car park in Leicester in 2012. As the news broadcast of the DNA confirmation of the skeleton's identity fades, the play begins. The grave remains constantly visible, usually through a perspex floor; but it is occasionally used as the receptacle for executed or murdered victims of the king, before he himself is finally killed in it during the battle at Bosworth Field.

Man and Superman

by Bernard Shaw

seen at the National Theatre (Lyttleton) 4 March 2015

This production is directed by Simon Godwin with Ralph Fiennes as John Tanner, Indira Varma as Ann Whitefield, Nicholas le Prevost as Roebuck Ramsden and Tim McMullen as Mendoza. Though the text has been edited, the performance includes the third act dream/discussion known as 'Don Juan in Hell'.

The design by Christopher Oram wittily refers to the Edwardian era in which the play was published (1903) and first performed (1905) while enclosing the stage in a cloudy perspex box through which light is suffused in varying colours. For the scene in Hell the perspex walls are almost all that is present, glowing white to underscore Shaw's paradoxical views on lightness and darkness, hell and heaven. But there are quirky anachronisms all the more effective for being unexplained - the play opens with a Desert Island Discs episode featuring John Tanner, and later, although he has an old fashioned open topped sports car, and a chauffeur (as required by the text), he also receives text messages on a smartphone.