Category: Fringe Productions

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Theatre review: The Price with Henry Goodman

Veteran actor steals the show

Marylebone Theatre


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Henry Goodman in The Price. Photo: Mark Senior

What a coup for the 270-seat, three-and-a-half year old Marylebone Theatre, managing to attract theatrical great Henry Goodman to perform in Arthur Miller’s The Price. Director Jonathan Munby has put together a marvellously tense production populated by a  perfect cast.

In the first minutes, we meet Vic and his wife Esther and find out pretty much everything we need to know about what is going to unfold. There’s the obsession with placing a monetary value on everything- Vic has cinema tickets: “Better be great” he says, “Two-fifty apiece”. It seems everything has a price in a country built on capitalism, as the socialist Miller saw it. Even the unhappiness explored in the play stems from the financial crash of 1929.

The questions are already there- how much was Vic forced to do what he did with his life, how much was his choice? Now he’s turned 50 and can retire and pursue a more satisfying career, will he have the confidence to do it? They could do with money but will he accept help from his brother? He’s here to sell their late father’s possessions to a dealer, but will he drive a hard bargain? We suspect not.

Enter Gregory Solomon. He is there to assess the furniture and other objects, but this wily salesman is clearly also assessing who he is dealing with. So, let me tell you about 75 year old Henry Goodman as 89 year old Gregory Solomon. About a quarter way into the play, he comes on stage, wheezing and coughing. He appears frail but is full of life.  His character is fully rounded and we can’t help but be charmed by his stories and homilies, even when his eyes shiftily scan the room, or when he stiffens as he refuses to let go of the opportunity to make one last deal. Once Esther is out of the room, he laughs and ingratiates himself with Vic. By the end of act one he has taken charge and undoubtedly conned the other man out of what he should rightfully be receiving. I could be talking about how Henry Goodman steals the show.

It’s almost a shame for Elliot Cowan, who plays Vic, because he is so good at conveying his character’s weakness, stubbornness, and love. His expressive face glowers or smiles, his eyes stare into the distance in suspicion or pain, almost begging the audience to empathise.  So convincing was he that I could hardly restrain myself from calling out in frustration: “Stop being so pig headed.” Mr Cowan should be getting all the accolades at the end of the show, but Henry Goodman is so phenomenally good, that he dominates a play in which he is barely on stage for more than a quarter of the time.

In 1968, when the play was first produced, the USA was mired in the Vietnam War, and alternative ways of thinking about how to value life, other than by monetary price, were being considered.  ”We worry about it, we talk about it, but we can’t seem to want it.” says Esther about money. What’s bugging her and Vic is, when the brothers grew up, Walter went to college and pursued a successful career as a surgeon, while Vic stayed home to look after his widowed father. In doing so, he took on a relatively low paid job as a cop, which he hates. The resentment has led to an estrangement between the brothers. Esther, played by Faye Castelow, supports her husband but berates him too, in a nicely balanced expression of marital love and frustration.

Riveting dialogue

Henry Goodman & Elliot Cowan in The Price. Photo: Mark Senior

All the action takes place in an attic that was once the impoverished family’s home after the father’s wealth was wiped out. Among the furniture are two chests. One was Vic’s, one his brother’s. Significantly, they are on opposite sides of the room. Jon Bausor‘s naturalistic set is just as depicted in Miller’s script: no clever interpretation by a director trying to make their mark.  It makes full use of the Marylebone Theatre’s large proscenium arch stage and crams it full of old furniture, dusty, dimly lit, claustrophobic. It’s so overwhelming, you feel you’re in the room with these people.

Having shown how Vic’s lack of a killer instinct is manipulated by Solomon in the first act, the second act concentrates on the confrontation between Vic and  Walter, with Esther periodically supporting her brother-in-law and jabbing at her husband, and Solomon popping in occasionally to make a conciliatory comment.

The brothers’ conversation is riveting, as they go round in circles, edging nearer and nearer to the facts about what happened to shape both their lives. In this respect, the format is typical Miller but no less engaging for that, even if the dialogue is overly portentous at times. What separates it for the earlier classics like Death of a Salesman, All My Sons and A View From The Bridge is that there is no devastating revelation, more a profound reflection on the paths we take.

Each brother has a different view of past events. They learn from each other the truth about the price they have both had to pay for choices they did or did not make. How each took “different roads out of the same trap”, as Walter puts it, but became unhappy in the new traps they found themselves in. Walter has reached a clearer view than Vic about the past, and John Hopkins conveys brilliantly his broken dreams and  desperate wish to reconcile with his brother.

We also learn that, in relation to his wife and sons, their father may have been a con man, not dissimilar to Solomon.  Walter says of their parents: “What was unbearable is not that it fell apart, it was that there was never anything here.” And (back to money): “There was nothing (…) but a straight financial arrangement.”

There is no sense in which their lives will greatly change, only perhaps that they may live more comfortably with themselves in the present, much in the way Solomon does. For him, the past is like a dream, and the present rewrites the past. As he says, “Good luck you can never know until the last minute.”

Arthur Miller, despite having strong political views, is not a writer to lay things out in black and white, as good or bad. Each character is a complex human being with complicated relationships and, like all his great work, The Price gives no simplistic analysis of the brothers’ lives. Repeated viewings are rewarded with ever deeper understanding of human nature and society, especially when performed by actors who can plumb those depths.

Elliot Cowan should be a contender for Best Leading Actor awards but, if there’s any justice, Henry Goodman has Best Supporting Actor in the bag.

The Price can be seen at Marylebone Theatre until 7 June 2026. Buy tickets directly from the theatre

Paul was given a review ticket by the theatre.

Read a roundup of other critics’ reviews here

Click here to watch this review on the YouTube channel Theatre Reviews With Paul Seven

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Theatre review: John Proctor is the Villain

A joyous celebration of young women

Jerwood Downstairs at Royal Court Theatre

John Proctor Is The Villain at the Royal Court Theatre Photo: Camilla Greenwood

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It’s set in rural America. It’s about teenage girls in a high school. It has a point to make and it makes it. There are many reasons why I shouldn’t like  Kimberly Belflower‘s play John Proctor is the Villain. And yet I loved it.

Why? Well, let’s begin at the end: an uplifting, liberating finale for the young women whose world we have inhabited for the last couple of hours. The previously mundane classroom lighting becomes a euphoric light show as the girls dance to Green Light by Lorde, defiantly in unison ,and unified behind the abused women of The Crucible. I had a tear of joy in my eye.

If you’re anything like me (old white male), it may be a world you’ve scarcely encountered before. For women, the girls’ friendships, their passion and their early encounters with sex will likely resonate more. It doesn’t matter. One of play’s defining strengths is the authenticity with which it draws these young women, compelling you to care about them, regardless of your age, gender or background. The dialogue is believable, and often very funny, inviting us to laugh both with and at the girls. It captures the angst and rapture, the confidence and vulnerability, of standing on the brink of adulthood.

So where does the play begin? The year is 2018. We’re in a high school classroom in a ‘one-stoplight town’ in Georgia. A class of four 16 to 17 year old girls, and a couple of boys, are studying Arthur Miller’s The Crucible under the guidance of a charismatic teacher called Carter Smith. He’s approachable, affable and speaks their language. Unsurprisingly, they adore him.

Momentous events unfold, but don’t expect subtext and intricate layers. The girls are who they are and don’t really change. They are affected not by internal transformation of the kind John Proctor undergoes in The Crucible, but from the external circumstances that confront them.

What evolves in the play is their perception of society- both their immediate environment and the wider world.  This is the time when the #MeToo movement is at its most visible and influential. The girls form a feminist group. All is going well until Shelby returns after several months of unexplained absence. Tensions rise. Raelynn is far from pleased: the two had been best friends until Raelynn’s boyfriend Lee cheated on her with Shelby. Lee remains in the class. Oh, and Ivy is in a predicament because her father, whom she reveres, has had an affair with his secretary.

Through the prism of #MeToo and their own lived experiences, they begin to recognise both the ways in which a male-dominated society seeks to diminish them and the power inherent in their identity and friendship. To Mr Smith, The Crucible‘s John Proctor is one of the great heroes of literature, admired for defying the Witch Trials, until Shelby prompts a re-evaluation. Does this married man’s affair with a young servant, who he later calls a ‘whore’, make him less a hero, more a villain? The subsequent discussion ends in a bombshell.

Miya James and Sadie Soverall in John Proctor is the Villain. Photo: Camilla Greenwood

The young women deliver remarkable performances. The future of British acting is safe, if they are anything to go by. A standout is Sadie Soverall as the troubled but clever Shelby. Miya James brings a rare stillness and intensity to Raelynn. Lauren Ajufo is Nell, the girl who comes from a big city, Holly Howden Gilchrist is the swot and ‘teacher’s pet’ Beth, and Clare Hughes is the straightlaced Ivy. Much credit is surely due to director Damya Taymor (who also directed the Broadway production) for eliciting such nuanced work.

The other actors complete a formidable ensemble. Dónal Finn is entirely convincing as the smiling, superficially charming teacher. He’s a magnetic actor, who seems ubiquitous at the moment, having appeared on stage in Hadestown, is also currently to be seen on screen in The Other Bennet Sister and Young Sherlock. Charlie Borg makes the most of the smaller role of Lee, a representative sexist male. Reece Braddock as the dopey but sympathetic Mason and Molly McFadden as the inexperienced young counsellor are both making their professional stage debuts, but you really wouldn’t know it from the quality and confidence of their acting.

The design, by AMP featuring Teresa L. Williams, initially presents a naturalistic classroom complete with blackboard, fluorescent lights and daylight filtering through the windows. Yet appearances are deceptive. Natasha Katz‘s lighting isolates characters in moments of revelation, while the ecstatic final sequence, when the girls challenge the male hierarchy, plunges the room into chaos through jarring projections and a striking mauve wash.

It’s sadly true that #MeToo doesn’t seem to have made more than a small dent in the ways of the world. We remain surrounded by stark examples of male toxicity: figures such as Harvey Weinstein, Jeffrey Epstein and Mohamed Al Fahed are high profile examples, but far too often, in everyday life, those in positions of authority- teachers, fathers and other men take advantage of women and girls. In a city near me, a number of male teachers at a girls’ school have recently been prosecuted for sexually abusing their students.

There may be an element of wish fulfilment in the rapid ideological awakening of these girls (and one of the boys) to feminism. Ordinarily, I would resist a drama whose message hammers me so hard on the head, but this joyous play is irresistible.

This year marks the 70th anniversary of the Royal Court Theatre, which in 1956 became the first British theatre to stage The Crucible. While John Proctor is a Villain may not possess the same depth and complexity as Miller’s masterpiece, it offers something equally valuable: a thought-provoking and thoroughly enjoyable night out at the theatre.

Paul was given a review ticket by the theatre. The review was slightly revised for clarity on 7 April 2026.

John Proctor is the Villain can be seen at Jerwood Theatre Downstairs at The Royal Court Theatre in London until 25 April 2026. Buy tickets direct from the theatre

Click here to read the roundup of other critics’ reviews of John Proctor is the Villain

Watch this review on the youtube channel Theatre reviews With Paul Seven

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Theatre review: When We Are Married

Dull Yorkshire comedy rescued by cast

Donmar Warehouse

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John Hodgkionson, Marc Wootton & Jim Howick in When We Are Married. Photo: Johan Persson

Bah ‘eck, I’m puzzled as to why director Tim Sheader chose to revive J B Priestley‘s When We Are Married. In its day, it was a very popular comedy, but that day has passed. Three couples celebrating their silver weddings find they were never legally married. There’s much potential for comedy but little of it is developed. Most of the fun seems to derive from puncturing the pomposity of these people, and having a laugh at their Yorkshire dialect. Fortunately, the cast are exceptional and they can generate laughter from the smallest facial flicker or vocal inflection, despite the mediocre script.

John Hodgkinson plays Joseph Helliwell, a domineering, self-righteous community leader, with relish. As his wife Maria, Siobhan Finneran is a delight: a snob who appears to be permanently sniffing something unpleasant under her nose. Mark Wootton is perfectly cast as a bombastic loudmouth, his beard almost as outsized as his voice. Sophie Thompson, as his submissive wife Annie, steals the acting honours with her exquisitely contemptuous looks and increasing confidence.

The final couple, Clara and Herbert Soppitt, are played by Samantha Spiro and Jim Howick. Herbert is a textbook—by which I mean clichéd—henpecked husband, but the dynamic is handled with real finesse: his repeated attempts to speak, only to be briskly cut off, are timed to perfection. Herbert’s tender moment with Annie is a rare hint that more could made of this marital crisis.

Instead, although all the couples are forced to reassess their relationships and view their partners afresh, the socialist J. B. Priestley concentrates on satirising the two pompous businessmen, while advancing a broader message about the need to value and respect women.

Director Tim Sheader has streamlined the play by cutting and consolidating roles: the maid and housekeeper, for instance, are merged into a single, gloriously disruptive character, played with gleeful, mischievous cackling by veteran performer Janice Connolly. Likewise, a newspaper reporter and photographer are combined, allowing Ron Cook to deliver some superb physical comedy as his increasingly inebriated character stumbles out of control—an act that may evoke fond memories, for those of a certain age, of the great Freddie Frinton.

The remaining supporting roles are all convincingly cast. Tori Allen-Martin brings far more nuance than expected to Lottie, who arrives to claim her newly single lover. Reuben Joseph and Rowan Robinson acquit themselves well in the thankless parts of the rather bland young couple, whose marriage-for-love is held up as a moral counterpoint. Leo Wringer is engaging as the priest tasked with untangling the marital chaos, beginning with calm authority before becoming progressively—and amusingly—exasperated. The reduced cast lends the production focus and momentum, sharpening the pace throughout.

That said, the script itself feels dated, and I’m not convinced it would survive without such a skilled ensemble to carry it over the finishing line. Comic sensibilities have shifted: contemporary audiences tend to favour sharper wit over broad humour and an exploration of transgression over a reliance on funny accents.

Imaginative production

Jim Howick, Sophie Thompson, Siobhan Finneran & Samantha Spiro in When We Are Married. Photo: Johan Persson

Even so, Sheader’s production is peppered with thoughtful and imaginative touches. I particularly enjoyed the way each half opens with a period song and closes with a contemporary one. The Biggest Aspidistra in the World, written around the time of the play, speaks to pride and status—and is echoed visually by the enormous aspidistra dominating Peter McKintosh’s largely naturalistic set. The first half  ends with Beyoncé’s feminist anthem All the Single Ladies, signalling the freedoms now beckoning the women.

The second half opens with the music-hall number A Little of What You Fancy (Does You Good), written at the time the play is set and rich in a sexual innuendo sadly absent from Priestley’s text, hinting at possibilities that ultimately remain both unrealised and largely unaddressed. We depart the theatre to the strains of Bruno Mars’ celebratory Marry You, neatly puncturing the pomposity of the powerful. These musical bookends add a layer of commentary that the script alone mostly lacks.

I also have a fundamental problem with staging a play like this on a thrust stage. Too often, you experience a sense of theatrical FOMO. Sitting in one of the side blocks, I had my view completely obscured by an actor, for what must have been five minutes of Ron Cook’s comic business—quite possibly some of the funniest moments. I’ll never know.  I might well have enjoyed the production more from a central seat.

While audience-surrounded staging can heighten intimacy—as demonstrated recently by The Lady from the Sea at the Bridge Theatre—in this instance I can’t help feeling the play would benefit from a traditional proscenium setup, with a single, shared viewpoint. It would certainly make life easier for the actors, who currently have to accommodate multiple sightlines.

Perhaps the production will transfer to a more conventional West End theatre. Judging by the largely enthusiastic reviews, it may well do so. Tim Sheader has an impressive track record from his time at the Open Air Theatre of successfully reviving classics and sending them on to the West End, much to the benefit of the balance sheet. He may repeat that success with this Donmar production. That said, I hope revivals of dated plays remain the exception. There is a place for revisiting a genuine classic but I don’t believe the Donmar is it. I hope Mr Sheader concentrates on the new work and inventive revivals of more recent plays that have characterised his time in charge there, such as Natasha, Pierre & the Great Comet of 1812, The Fear of 13, The Maids, and, one of my favourite plays of 2025, Intimate Apparel.

When We Are Married can be seen at the Donmar Warehouse until 7 February 2026.

Click here to watch this review on the YouTube channel Theatre Reviews With Paul Seven

Click here to read a roundup of other critics’ reviews of When We Are Married

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Theatre review: Porn Play at the Royal Court

A moving insight into addiction and pornography

Royal Court Theatre


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Ambika Mod and Lizzy Connolly in Porn Play. Photo: Helen Murray

Sophia Chetin-Leuner’s new play is about addiction. Unexpectedly the addiction in question is to violent pornography and the addict is a woman.
In case you’re thinking this is a little recherché for the subject of a play, we’re told almost straightaway that more women than men search for violent porn. Even so, she seems to be something of an outlier in the world of porn addicts, the clue being she’s the only woman at a porn addicts anonymous group.
It may be about a niche subject, but the play presents a moving portrait of addiction and poses an intriguing question as to why a woman would become addicted to violent pornography.  

If you’re easily shocked, this is one to avoid. Ambika Mod’s character Ani spends a significant chunk of the evening playing with herself. She also gives us enough vivid descriptions of what she watches to leave us in no doubt that we are talking about nasty stuff, even if she insists, in that addict’s self deceptive way, that it’s fake.
You might also want to avoid it if John Milton isn’t your thing. She’s an academic specialising in the great poet and we learn a lot about paradise, for which read sexual pleasure, and paradise lost, for which read the pain of grief. It may make you want to pick up a volume of his verse and look at it with new eyes, or not.
Ambika Mod is exceptionally good in this part, communicating desperate need, and the shame, fear and helplessness that go with it, all the while presenting a public façade of normality as she pursues her career as a university lecturer and academic. This actor has such an ability to communicate complex feelings that she is surely heading for the top.
Josie Rourke directs with precision.
Yimei Zhai’s set compliments the action superbly.  We the audience are given shoe covers to wear before entering the auditorium. This  is because the entire area is covered in soft pale carpet. The circular stage area and its softness may suggest a woman’s gentitalia but also, because of the whorls that take it down through a number of levels, it may signify a downward spiral. In a stroke of genius, the set is designed so the cast can reach between the joins in the fabric to retrieve props, such as a phone, a tablet or larger items like a pillow, much as you might look for a lost coin down the side of your settee, . This is wondrous in itself, but it mainly reinforces the idea that Ani’s addiction is hidden.
Not that it stays hidden for long. She takes out her phone or laptop at every opportunity to masturbate while looking at porn. This could be when someone leaves the room for a moment, or even when they are asleep in the same bed. Those close to her- her boyfriend, her best friend, her father all realise she has a serious problem. Soon her life starts to fall apart. Her exasperated boyfriend leaves her, her job is in jeopardy.

Will Close portrays with sensitivity the boyfriend’s struggle between love and disgust. He also gives us other examples of masculinity in the course of the play: a male porn addict’s macho mansplaining, a young student’s rampant hormones.
The arc of Ani’s addiction is depicted well.  She maintains the violence is not really that shocking because it’s ‘fake’, but after trying it for herself she acknowledges that her enjoyment is in watching the women get hurt. She is, after Milton, a ‘brutal woman’. Eventually she reaches a point where she knows she needs to stop. Her addiction seems sad for much of the play. However, when she reaches the end of the road, sitting at one corner of the stage stroking herself robotically while the one person who cares enough to help her is in the opposite corner, it is heartbreaking.
Someone commented on The Fifth Step, another play about addiction, that while the subject is no laughing matter, it can be very funny. Sophia Chetin-Leuner seems to take this view. A couple of scenes spring to mind. Because of her continual rubbing, she has made herself sore and succumbed to an infection. She visits a gynecologist, played by Lizzy Connolly who cloaks her in that brisk matter-of-fact indifference, not even looking at Ani, that many patients will be familiar with.
Ambika Mod & Asif Khan in Porn Play. Photo: Helen Murray

During an event at which she is to receive her award for her book on Milton, Ani is approached by an old man who thinks she’s a waiter simply because she’s a young woman. Women are not expected to win top academic awards any more than they’re expected to be as sexually active as men. The old man is played by Asif Khan, who also gives an exquisitely gentle performance as Ani’s father.

In her mind, people begin to say sexual things to her. A woman seems to say to her: ‘I don’t know how you do it, spend all your time giving head’ which is then corrected as ‘in the head of that vile old man Milton.’ Milton crops up frequently when Ani addresses the audience. She talks about his poems at length, that he identified the way good and evil live in parallel, and pleasure masks pain. This does perhaps explain how her addiction arises from grief. And how Eve, the first woman, is a rebel against the patriarchy but also submissive to it. But it does start to feel like a lecture.
There are other moments when it seems the author has not entirely relevant axes to grind. For example, there’s a scene between Ani and one of her students, another fine creation from Lucy Connolly. To an extent it illustrates the gap between millennials and Gen Z. The ‘woke’ student has been triggered by Ani talking about a rape scene in one of Milton’s poems. Ani representing an older generation (that of the author) is tolerant of different times and wants to study a great poet warts and all. The younger generation has no tolerance and wants to cancel Milton. ‘Why would you want to read him and analyse all these horrible men?’ She asks. It’s a bit of a cliché and doesn’t really add to the story.
Porn Play tries to cram too much in but it is a play well worth seeing for its moving, insightful portrait of the effect of easily available pornography on 21st century sex and relationships.
Porn Play can be seen at The Jerwood Theatre Upstairs at The Royal Court until 13 December 2025. Buy tickets direct from the theatre
Paul paid for his ticket. He saw the last preview before the Press Night.
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Theatre review: Nicola Walker in The Unbelievers

Nicola Walker carries the story of a missing son

Jerwood Theatre Downstairs at The Royal Court


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Nicola Walker in The Unbelievers. Photo: Brinkhoff/Moegenburg

A boy vanishes without a trace just before his sixteenth birthday. His mother, Miriam, played by Nicola Walker, is devastated. We witness her and her family’s unravelling in the days immediately after his disappearance, one year later, and then seven years later. It’s a harrowing experience for them — but does it make for compelling theatre?

The point of the play is also the problem with it. While the boy’s two siblings and his father gradually attempt to reconcile themselves to his absence, Miriam refuses to accept that her son will not return. The timeline jumps back and forth, as if to show that she never changes, that time has stood still. The family find it increasingly difficult to coexist with her, despite their evident compassion. Their struggle stems partly from her obsessive focus on her missing son and partly from her perpetual anger. Unfortunately, this unchanging emotional state eventually alienates us as well, or alienated me at least.

Nick Payne’s play examines what happens when someone is psychologically unable to move beyond trauma. It’s a fascinating concept in theory, yet as drama, it can feel repetitive — despite the best efforts of the superb director Marianne Elliott, who injects pace and passion into the production.

Nicola Walker delivers an intense and characteristically nuanced performance, complete with her familiar tics and stutters, and emotional authenticity. However, and I hate to say this, after a while her sarcastic giggling at others’ perceived absurdities and repeatedly saying people should go fuck themselves become somewhat wearisome. Convincing as she is, it becomes difficult to remain emotionally invested.

The supporting characters remain sketchily drawn, defined mainly by their reactions to Miriam. Paul Higgins, as the husband, spends much of his time shouting. Alby Baldwin, portraying the elder sibling, grieves in silence. Miriam’s ex-husband, a priest played by Martin Marquez, flounders helplessly. Only the younger daughter (Lucy Thackeray) develops — she finds a partner, becomes pregnant, and tries hardest to reconnect with her mother. “I just want my mum back,” she pleads poignantly.

The Unbelievers at The Royal Court. Photo: Brinkhoff-Moegenburg

Walker is on stage almost continuously, while other actors, when not in a scene, sit silently in a dimly lit upstage area. Ordinarily, performers would exit, allowing the illusion that their lives continue offstage. Here, however, the visible ‘waiting room’ seems to symbolise how, for Miriam, her missing son Oscar remains ever-present, whereas everyone else is out of sight out of mind. Defending her attitude, she says that if any of them had disappeared, she wouldn’t give up on them either, but ironically she has. The spare set, designed by Bunny Christie, effectively mirrors Miriam’s single-minded preoccupation.

We glimpse Miriam’s experience over the course of the seven years: the early dealings with the police, subsequent false sightings and internet trolls, and the desperation of spiritualism and prayer. These should-be heart-wrenching moments but they failed to resonate with me, because I never felt sufficiently connected to the characters.

Because there is no story arc, no character development, and no resolution (we never know how or why Oscar disappeared, or whether he is alive or dead), I found the journey a little monotonous and felt deflated rather than emotionally drained by the end. On the other hand, it was interesting and unexpectedly humorous. And, as always, Nicola Walker delivered good value.

The Unbelievers can be seen at The Royal Court until 29 November 2025. Click here to buy tickets direct from the theatre.

Paul paid for his ticket.

Watch Paul’s review on YouTube

Read a round up of other critics’ reviews here

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Theatre reviews roundup: Dealer’s Choice

Revival of gambling play pays off

Donmar Warehouse
Alfie Allen and Hammed Animashaun in Dealer’s Choice at The Donmar. Photo: Helen Murray

To celebrate its 30th anniversary, Patrick Marber’s first play returns to the Donmar. The story of a regular all male poker game in a restaurant basement resonated with critics who enjoyed the tension and humour in its depiction of insecure masculinity.  They praised the cast which includes Alfie Allen and Brendan Coyle but Hammed Animashaun’s performance stole the show.  Such criticism as there was centred on the contrived plot.

[Links to full reviews are included but a number are behind paywalls and therefore may not be accessible]

5 stars ⭑⭑⭑⭑⭑

Laurie Yule for The Stage called it ‘A gripping production of a play that’s as brilliant as it is enduring.’

4 stars ⭑⭑⭑⭑

’What a blisteringly good play Dealer’s Choice is!’ proclaimed Sarah Crompton at WhatsOnStage. ‘A sharply funny, acutely insightful study of male insecurities, of the toxic relationships between fathers and sons, friends and colleagues, of the impulse to gamble a life on the turn of a card.’ She found the revival ‘beautifully cast and the direction taut’.

The Standard’s Nick Curtis felt it ‘holds up extremely well as a savagely comic study of compulsion.’ He was pleased with the latest cast: ‘Allen is good as the underwritten Frankie, a cocksure wide-boy who suddenly snaps. Barklem-Biggs is full of barely suppressed fury as Sweeney, while Coyle has a sleepy menace as Ash…Animashaun’s Mugsy is a delight from start to finish: charming, hilarious, irrepressible even when slighted.’

Claire Allfree for the Telegraph found, ‘Three decades on, Marber’s brutal comedy remains a masterclass portrait of lonely little men wishing themselves into being better people than they are…Dunster’s muscular production gives full reign to Marber’s blokey banter and apparently off-the-cuff wit.’

LondonTheatre’s Marianka Swain called it ‘a gripping portrait of male relationships at their base, competitive level: in order to win, you must destroy.’ ‘Go all in on this darkly entertaining gem,’ she recommended.

The Times’ Clive Davis described ‘On Moi Tran’s sleek set, a revolve allows us to study each player in turn.’ He pointed out ‘Coyle’s body language is extraordinarily eloquent: he may seem a calculating operator on the surface, but his sagging frame and weary glances tell another story about the precariousness of his trade.’

3 stars ⭑⭑⭑

Steve Dinneen for City AM felt it was a bit predictable: ‘It looks fantastic, with a rotating poker table and dramatic lighting but it plays out pretty much as you imagine, all macho outbursts and bitter recriminations.’

2 stars ⭑⭑

There was one dissenting voice: Ryan Gilbey for The Guardian. Having described the play as ‘superficially dazzling’, he went on to explain, ‘Two-thirds of the characters have no inner life, and half are prone to sudden outbursts which resemble artificial attempts to raise the stakes.’

Critics’ Average Rating 3.8★

Dealer’s Choice can be seen at the Donmar Warehouse until 7 June 2025. Click here for tickets direct from the theatre. 

If you have seen Dealer’s Choice at the Donmar Warehouse, please give your review and rating below

 

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Theatre review: Backstroke with Tamsin Greig & Celia Imrie – Donmar Warehouse

Debut play prises open mother-daughter relationship

★★★★

Amiddle-aged woman and an old woman sit opposite each other at a kitchen table
Tamsin Greig & Celia Imrie in Backstroke. Photo: Johan Persson

Backstroke is a debut play receiving its premiere at the Donmar Warehouse. It’s about a daughter remembering and reassessing her relationship with her dying mother. And when this particular mother and daughter are played by Celia Imrie and Tamsin Greig, you know you’re in for a treat.

It’s not a usual occurrence to have your first play premiered at the Donmar Warehouse with Tamsin Greig and Celia Imrie as the stars. Then again, Anna Mackmin is not your usual playwright. She is steeped in theatre. Having been to acting school, she became a director and for the last twenty years has been behind some of the most memorable productions on the London stage, including Dancing At Lughnasa, The Real Thing and Hedda Gabler at the Old Vic, and Di and Viv and Rose and The Divine Mrs S at Hampstead. And who better to direct her first play than Anna Mackmin herself?

This is not her first piece of writing. Her 2018 novel Devoured, inspired by her childhood with a hippy mother, was well received. So, perhaps the first thing to say about Backstroke is that it is a beautifully written drama. It uses the stage well, it gives the actors plenty to get their teeth into, and it tells a good story as it prises open the oyster of their relationship to reveal the unexpected pearl within.

We first encounter Beth, played by Celia Imrie, in a hospital bed, symbolically at the highest, most central point of Lez Brotherston’s set. She is being visited by her daughter Bo, played by Tamsin Greig. After about ten minutes of Bo talking to her silent mother, who has had a stroke, and to the various medical staff, I began to think ‘Celia Imrie’s got an easy role’. Then we got into the nitty gritty of the drama.

Triggered by the possibly imminent death of her mother, Bo’s thoughts travel to the past. As they do, Celia Imrie slides out of bed and walks down to the front of the thrust stage, into the kitchen where so many encounters between them took place over the years. We begin to learn about the tempestuous relationship between a mother who is very needy and a daughter who is expected to cater for those needs. There is love, there is attachment, and there is conflict as the play gradually unravels their complex ties.

No mothers are perfect but Beth is self-centred, avoids intimacy, and doesn’t really want to acknowledge that she is her child’s mother (‘don’t call me mummy’) even though this would-be free spirit needs the stability and companionship of her daughter. We experience Bo’s frustration when, for example, Beth hasn’t woken her, as promised, and she will be late for her first day at college. Then we, along with Bo, realise that it’s because she doesn’t want to part with her.

Parallel to this, Bo is tied up with the challenge of being a mother herself to an adopted daughter who is finding it difficult to settle into family and school. So, she is attempting to balance the needs of her daughter, her career and her dying mother. Beth, by the way, is hundreds of miles away, which means Bo has the guilt of not being able to visit often enough, and the guilt of being away from her daughter. A feeling which I’m sure will be familiar to many in the audience.

Uplifting and heartbreaking

Part of the power of this play is Anna Mackmin’s ability to take you inside the heads of these characters. Celia Imrie’s larger-than-life Beth talks in florid language that has the effect of creating a shield to keep her daughter at bay, but often there is a look of fear behind her eyes. Tamsin Greig’s Bo develops from childhood to middle age, her enthusiasm gradually dampened, her youthful protest turning to a whine. But always there is a nervous need to understand what’s going on in her mother’s brain. She frequently pauses to process events. Used to feeling frustrated, she is almost permanently open-mouthed, but has a warm smile that refutes her inherited dislike of the intimacy of touching.

Backstroke at the Donmar. Photo: Johan Persson

All the while, fragments of Bo’s memories of both her mother and daughter play on a large backdrop. I’m not normally a fan of mixing film with live drama but in this case the video designed by Gino Ricardo Green is highly effective in showing how memories are always with us and shape who we are.

When Beth’s brain starts to be affected by dementia, although some of the things she says are humorous, like ‘You’ve made your bed, now you can lie about it’, Bo, and we, soften in our feelings about her. Beth has never been able to help being the way she is.

The first act is a little too long but after the interval the play explodes into life. We learn that the relationship was not as one-sided as it first appeared. The episodes in their life together show us how the bond is mutual, and how Bo has much to be grateful to her mother for. When they dance together, choreographed incidentally by Anna Mackmin’s sister Scarlett, it is a joyous moment.

The ending is both uplifting and heartbreaking, as the most intimate moment between them when Bo was a child is resurrected in Beth’s last moments. A circle has been completed and, in an epilogue, Bo speaks movingly of what her late mother did for her. Tamsin Greig’s emotional delivery brought a lump to my throat.

Although her mother’s mortality is what prompts Bo’s memories of her, the play also touches on the process of dying itself. There is consideration of how we treat people at the end of life. The hospital staff shows us three approaches to patients who to them have no history, and, more to the point, no memory: there is the objective indifference of Georgina Rich‘s matter-of-fact doctor to whom Beth is just another unit; a nurse Carol, given a terrific sour-mouthed performance by Lucy Briers, who tries to impose her own moral agenda on the treatment; and there’s nurse Jill, convincingly played by Anita Reynolds, who reveals the heart beneath her patronising chirpiness. Inevitably, the mainly absent Beth is frustrated that the staff don’t understand her mother’s care needs in the way she does.

This is an extraordinarily good debut play.

Backstroke can be seen at the Donmar Warehouse until 12 April 2025. Buy tickets direct from the theatre.

Paul attended a preview and paid for his ticket.

Click here to watch this review on the YouTube channel Theatre Reviews With Paul Seven

 

 

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Reviews Roundup: Cymbeline

Shakespeare misses but the production hits

sam wanamaker theatre at Shakespeare’s globe
Nadi Kemp-Sayfi and Gabrielle Brooks in Cymbeline at Shakespeare’s Globe. Photo: Marc Brenner

William Shakespeare’s Cymbeline is one of his lesser known works for the very good reason that it’s a bit of a mess but director Jennifer Tang has made a good attempt at making it work, according to the critics, especially by swapping the genders of the eponymous lead and some of the other characters. Even so, some remained unenthusiastic about the play itself.

Matt Wolf for LondonTheatre (4) praised ‘Tang’s ability to find an emotional throughline to a sometimes wayward text’ ‘The vagaries of romance between Gabrielle Brooks’s superb Innogen and Nadi Kemp-Sayfi’s impassioned Posthumus, raised within the royal household, drive the newly queer narrative.’

Nick Curtis in The Standard (4★) found it ‘gets a bold, vivid production from Jennifer Tang that matches its hectic mix of comedy, horror and absurdity. ‘

Miriam Sallon writing for WhatsOnStage  (4★) declared ‘if a lesser-loved, mishmash, three-hour, tragi-comic Shakespeare isn’t going to sell it for you, you should absolutely just go for the music. Led by composer Laura Moody, the musical trio, completed by Heidi Heidelberg and Angela Wai Nok Hui, are mesmerising all on their own.’

Alexander Cohen for BroadwayWorld (3★) said, ‘Tang’s directorial vision alone charges it with the momentum it needs. She has a solid grasp of a slippery play.’ Dave Fargnoli in The Stage (3★) seemed to agree, ‘Although the production’s bold ideas don’t all gel, this is an original and engaging reinterpretation that offers thought-provoking new perspectives on Shakespeare’s contrived historical drama.’

Dominic Maxwell in The Times (3★) opined, ‘while you’d be pushed to say that the director Jennifer Tang’s female-led sometimes resexed retelling of this romantic mishmash is either very tragic or very funny, even at almost three hours long, it keeps stubbornly finding ways to be interesting.’ The Guardian‘s Arifa Akbar (3★) wasn’t sure what to make of it: ‘it felt like a play trotting from one plot-turn to another to reach its exhausting end.’

Critics’ Average Rating 3.4★

Cymbeline can be seen at Shakespeare’s Globe until 20 April 2025.  Buy tickets direct from the theatre.

If you’ve seen Cymbeline at the Sam Wanamaker Theatre, please add your review and rating below

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Reviews Roundup: The Good House

Royal Court Theatre

Satire on race and class is fun

Two couples, one standing, one seated, are talking in a scene from a play
The Good House at the Royal Court

David Byrne‘s first season as Artistic Director of the Royal Court continues to impress. His latest offering is Amy Jephta‘s play is set in South Africa where a middle-aged white couple enlist wealthy black neighbours whom they’ve previously ignored to improve the effectiveness of their bid to remove an unauthorised shack in their enclave. The critics mostly liked it but were split between those who thought it was ‘perceptive provocative fun’ and those who thought it didn’t quite convince.

[Links to full reviews are included but a number are behind paywalls and therefore may not be accessible]

Arifa Akbar in The Guardian (4★) found it was a play with layers: ‘Do they want to be insiders at all or remain wilful outsiders, keeping a connection to the imaginary invaders in the shack – and their own past geographies? How does being on the “inside” compromise the integrity of their identity politics, as well? The layers to this line of questioning are what gives this play its depth.’

Dave Fargnoli in The Stage (4★) liked the way the director Nancy ‘Medina takes a methodical approach, allowing conflict to escalate gradually, the debates eventually descending into rapid-fire shouting matches. This allows for some brilliantly judged comic timing, as the residents twist themselves into exquisitely awkward knots, trying to mask their toxic entitlement with hollow civility.’

The Times‘ Clive Davis (4★) began ‘this quirky domestic drama sends you home with awkward questions buzzing around in your head.’ He was happy that ‘there’s an intensity to all the performances that keeps agitprop at bay. Jephta’s mischievous portrait of life in  a far-away country has a universal flavour.’

WhatsOnStage‘s Sarah Crompton (4★) called it ‘fast-moving and very funny, puncturing assumptions and attitudes with swift and searing observation’. The Standard‘s Nick Curtis (4★) said, ‘This isn’t perfect but it’s perceptive, provoking fun.’

Aleks Sierz at TheArtsDesk (3★) said it was ‘perceptive and provocative, but it’s also an imperfect mix of styles and topics.’ While calling it ‘a worthy exploration of prejudice and privilege’, Holly O’Mahony at LondonTheatre (3★) decided, ‘this play, with its cracking premise, still has room to grow.’

Alexander Cohen at Broadway World (2★) was disappointed, describing it as ‘A case of never being more than the sum of its parts, even if those parts have promise in themselves.’

Critics’ Average Rating 3.5★

The Good House can be seen at the Royal Court Theatre until 8 February 2025.  Buy tickets direct from the theatre.

If you’ve seen The Years at the Royal Court Theatre, please add your review and rating below

 

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The Little Foxes at the Young Vic – review

Anne-Marie Duff is chilling in 20th century classic

★★★★

A woman in a dress holding a cup faces a man in a suit with a paper under his arm, both are standing
Anne-Marie Duff & Mark Bonnar in The Little Foxes. Photo: Johan Persson

Like me, you probably see more acting on TV than in the theatre. That means I’m always interested to see whether a favourite actor can make that transition from screen to stage.  The Little Foxes at the Young Vic was packed with faces from British television. Mark Bonnar who you will have seen in Shetland and Guilt; Steffan Rhodri best known as Dave Coaches from Gavin & Stacey; Anna Madeley who is Mrs Hall in All Creatures Great And Small; and one certifiable star in Anne-Marie Duff most recently seen in Bad Sisters.

I have seen all these actors on stage before, but it is still a thrill to be reminded that, like so many other screen actors, they are often only giving us a glimpse of their skills when they’re in front of a camera. The real test of their acting ability comes when they are trapped in the time and space of a theatre show, communicating directly with a live audience. This cast passed the test with distinction. 
Lillian Hellman’s The Little Foxes was premiered in 1939 but this attack on capitalism focuses on a family of landowners from the American South around 1900. So, the first question you might ask is, why did Lillian Hellman, who was a communist by the way, set her play around 40 years in the past? I’m guessing it’s because 1939 was not the best time for an anti-capitalist message. America had just experienced successful state intervention in their free market system in the form of Roosevelt’s New Deal, so a mixed economy may have seemed more attractive than a communist one. More than that, communists, capitalists, rich and poor were in the process of uniting in a fight against fascism, or at least that was the perception. So it might have been easier to show unadulterated capitalism, raw in tooth and claw as it were, from a couple of generations earlier.
The first half introduces us to the Hubbard family. There are two brothers- Ben played by Mark Bonnar, cunning as a fox and arrogant as a peacock, initially strutting about the stage, nonchalantly shrugging off challenges. Ben boasts of the way his family, who were traders, took advantage of the Civil War to buy up property while the Southern grandees were being defeated, fighting for their principles. He is even proud of their exploitation of what he calls ‘coloured people’.
The other brother Oscar, a weak bully, is played by Steffan Rhodri with a rat-like blend of slyness and nerves. The lead character is their sister Regina played by Anne-Marie Duff. Her bravura performance dominates the evening, entrancing us with her hyperactive character, who is by turn charming, quivering with frustration or displaying a diamond hard will power that is genuinely chilling. Her sparkling eyes and wide smile are a mask that covers her amorality.
The brothers inherited their father’s money. When they have an investment opportunity that will make them a huge fortune, Regina is shocked and angry to find she has been left out of the spoils. She plots to get both her share and revenge, by using her ailing husband’s money to make up the additional investment her brothers need.
After a slow first half that establishes the characters and their situation, the play takes off like a SpaceX rocket, as these greedy siblings ruthlessly trick and use one another.  Regina becomes more ruthless than any of them in her ambition.
It’s a savage expose of people whose greed trounces love, loyalty and all other moral values. But, is it relevant today? I guess the answer to that partly depends on your politics, but the fact is, capitalism remains the dominant system, despite regulation and the welfare state. Add to which, we appear to be entering an era of less regulation, in America at least, and we have seen the privatisation of public services in the UK. So I suppose it is a good time to be reminded that however high the quality of service or product we receive from companies, their number one priority is profit, not people. 

Powerful performance from Anna Madeley

A mature woman in a dress looks down
Anna Madeley in The Little Foxes. Photo: Johan Persson

The play presents some alternatives. Oscar’s wife Birdie is from an aristocratic family. She represents the ‘old values’ based on patronage, duty and responsibility. She is an alcoholic, bullied by her husband, and ghosted into a lack of confidence. She may be brittle- she laughs nervously, she looks down, there’s fear in her eyes- but still expresses her beliefs. It’s a powerful performance from Anna Madeley, showing Birdie beaten down but still proud. The quality and depth of her acting won’t surprise you if you’ve seen her as Mrs Hall, giving much-needed weight to the cosiness of All Creatures Great and Small.

Regina’s husband and daughter show that behaving morally is an option. They are played by John Light and Eleanor Worthington-Cox, the latter subtly showing how her character grows in strength as events force her to choose between standing up for her beliefs or standing by watching. In fact, the play’s strongest message is that most of us stand by watching bad things happening and do nothing about it. In stark contrast, Oscar’s son, played by Stanley Morgan, is morally bankrupt, like his father.
The black servants show two different sides of the class that has been most exploited and abused by this family. Freddie MacBruce as Cal goes about his job without question, but Andrea Davy’s Addie is firm in her opinions and tenderly loyal to those who treat her well.
Quite a few reviewers criticised the design, suggesting that its mid 20th century look was not appropriate, and even confusing, when used in a play set in 1900. On the contrary, I think Lizzie Clachan’s design is a stroke of genius. First and foremost, it doesn’t distract. A turn of the century design could have made the story seem of a bygone age, irrelevant to today. On the other hand, modern day clothes would have been too anachronistic for a play that’s set over a hundred years ago and mentions horses and carriages.
Instead, Ms Clachan cleverly plumps for the neutrality of clothes of the time it was written. The dominant beige reinforces this.  The absence of the trappings of the life of the well-off suggests these are people who want wealth for its own sake. They aren’t even that interested in enjoying the luxuries that come with it.
It’s a damning picture of capitalism but I think it’s unfair to suggest, as some critics did, that it fails because the main character doesn’t evoke enough sympathy. I found that I had plenty of sympathy with her over the way she was treated and therefore cheered her on as she exacted revenge. But that sympathy only heightened the shock of seeing just how far she would go and what sacrifices she would make. Yes, she does become a monster but it seems possibly sexist to me to suggest that this portrait of a greedy capitalist woman can only can only be of interest if we have sympathy for her. I don’t think you have to sympathise with the murdering Macbeth to get involved in his character and story, or with the greedy Lehman Brothers to find them fascinating. I didn’t like Regina as a human being but it was gripping to see how far she would go and whether she would finally realise there is more to life than money.
Director Lyndsey Turner delivers a powerful interpretation and the excellent cast squeeze every ounce of drama out of it. Before the interval I was wondering whether it was ever going to take off but when it did it was riveting. And if you love watching great acting, this is one not to miss.

The Little Foxes is at the Young Vic until 8 February 2025. Buy tickets direct from the theatre

Paul paid for his ticket
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