Sigourney Weaver is Alien to Shakespeare

theatre royal drury lane

Garnering some of the worst reviews of the year, The Tempest has turned out to be a disappointing start to Jamie Lloyd‘s Shakespeare season at the mighty Theatre Royal Drury Lane. All eyes were on Sigourney Weaver (still seen as Ripley from Alien by many) but her flat delivery of the lyrical language was decried by the critics. As if that wasn’t enough, the barbs thrown in the direction of Jamie Lloyd’s stark production suggest a rare failure after his string of hits ranging from his 2018 Pinter season to Evita, Cyrano, The Seagull, The Effect and most recently Sunset Bouevard. Views were mixed on the matter of Soutra Gilmour‘s dark set and Matthew Horne‘s comedic turn but everyone praised Mason Alexander Park as Ariel.

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

‘Weaver is not a masterful Prospero: her verse delivery is flat and featureless, which leaves a vacuum in this key role,’ said Arifa Akbar in her Guardian (4★) review. However, there were compensations: ‘The swirling black emptiness around the set looks fathomless, blasts of light bring tremendous visual drama, and sheer silken sheets spanning the length of the stage are used in simple but sensational ways. The production creates its own dark magic with large-scale grandeur.’ She concluded, ‘It’s all thoroughly odd, but in an audacious and enlivening way.’

Neil Norman in the Express (4★) said ‘Weaver is a supremely confident presence, dressed in grey and white and delivering Prosero’s great speeches with a clarity of diction that is characteristic of the entire production.’ As for the production, it ‘rarely falters throughout’. He expanded: ‘Lloyd’s vision is spectacular but spare’ and ‘Soutra Gilmour’s design is simple but epic’.

The Telegraph‘s Dominic Cavendish (3★) found, ‘Weaver fails to weave the requisite magic.’ He spoke of ‘much woodenness in her delivery – an even-keel approach that verges on the automaton.’

Andrzej Lukowski in Time Out (3★) said about the Hollywood star: ‘She’s not a good verse speaker, delivering everything in a concerned-mom monotone that fails to hold this big, weird play together.’ but he did call the production ‘an awesome spectacle’.

The Standard‘s Nick Curtis (3★) too was disappointed: ‘instead of lightning in a bottle, it’s a damp squib.’ He declared, ‘An interesting thematic suggestion that Prospero’s island is a place of rebirth gets lost amid the sonorous intonation and tedious comic relief. For all its stark visual boldness, this is a curiously old-fashioned take.’

Sarah Hemming in The Financial Times (3★) described how ‘Lloyd and lighting designer Jon Clark sculpt the space, sending the characters hurtling across the stage in a glowing burst or silhouetting them stock-still on the set’s dark hills.’ However, ‘human intricacy and intimacy often elude this staging. There’s a lack of jeopardy and it’s curiously unmoving’.

Patrick Marmion for the Mail (3★) commented that Jamie Lloyd’s ‘insistence on using mics not only makes everyone look like they’re lip-synching, it paradoxically renders some of the Bard’s finest verse in muttered whispers.’ He was disappointed with the use of the star: ‘I’d like to have seen Weaver’s emotional range stretched a bit more than simply deploying her as an alpha-female observer on her own story. It’s a bit like renting a vintage Cadillac and using it for the weekly shop.’

LondonTheatre‘s Olivia Rook (3★) found Sigourney Weaver ‘too detached to have much impact, often simply speaking the lines rather than offering up a new interpretation.’ But she did like the look of the production: ‘Soutra Gilmour’s grey-scale, futuristic, moon-like set, with mountainous rock face and rubble, is visually striking and, once lit by Clark’s lighting, aptly captures the hostile environment of this rough, wild island. There’s little substance in this production, but plenty of style. It’s worth a trip just to see Gilmour’s beautifully bleak set.’

Dave Fargnoli in The Stage (3★) described ‘a terse, unfussy minimalism to the performers’ delivery that builds an effectively eerie atmosphere, but leaves Shakespeare’s poetry feeling underserved, its meaning adrift.’ He liked ‘Soutra Gilmour’s bold design (that) sets the action in a bleak, blackened wasteland, where shreds of white smoke crawl across an undulating landscape of glimmering volcanic sand. He found Sigourney Weaver’s ‘delivery flat and frequently tentative’.

For Alice Saville in The Independent (3★), Sigourney Weaver ‘doesn’t have the charisma to anchor this fanciful story’. She comes up with an interesting analogy for the setting: ‘This island feels like a queer fetish club at 4am, where time stands still’. Well, now we know what Ms Saville does after a hard night’s reviewing!

Sarah Crompton at WhatsOnStage (2★) called it ‘misconceived and under-achieved’. She continued, ‘The unremitting mood of darkness is not leavened by any move towards hope or redemption. There is no sense that this is a play about revenge and forgiveness; the tone is unremitting.’

Clive Davis in The Times (2★) wasn’t impressed by Ms Weaver: ‘she turns in a strangely impersonal performance’. As for the production: ‘as the colours of the backdrop and Gilmour’s costumes are so muted, Lloyd’s vision of a magical kingdom soon grows monotonous’.

BroadwayWorld‘s Alexander Cohen (2★) didn’t get on with it. ‘The three times Oscar-nominated Hollywood veteran mumbles through Prospero’s lyricism with barely a glint of an attempt to grasp the coiled intricacies of the language’ he said. And the production? ‘Lloyd’s chuck-it-at-the-wall-and-see-what-works vision doesn’t help. The auteur’s trademark visual austerity strips the island of specifics, with piles of black ash flecked by glaring crepuscular light forming a planetary hellscape.’

Heather Neil at The Arts Desk (2★) said ‘Lloyd and his designer Soutra Gilmour have conjured a strange, otherworldly, hilly, inhospitable place’. ‘There’s not much evidence of the “sweet airs” Caiban speaks of’, she added. She said she ‘would have preferred a more actively engaged Prosopero’. Like nearly all the other critics, she praised Mason Alexander Park’s Ariel as ‘the central energetic force throughout’.

Fiona Mountford in the re-branded i paper (1★) called it a ‘dismal non-event of a production’ and awarded a dismal one star. She said Weaver’s ‘wooden delivery never wavers from a tone of blank meditation’.

Critics’ Average Rating 2.7★

Value Rating 16 (Value rating is the Average Critic Rating divided by the typical ticket price)

The  Tempest is at the Theatre Royal Drury Lane until 1 February 2025. Buy tickets from the theatre

If you’ve seen The  Tempest at the Theatre Roayl Drury Lane, please add your review and rating below 

The Best Christmas Show?

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Noel Streatfeild’s popular children’s novel about aspiring ballerinas has been faithfully adapted by Kendall Feave, albeit with a few nods to modern times, and directed by Katy Rudd, with choreography by Ellen Kane. Likely to be the best reviewed Christmas show in London, it received a corps of 5 and 4 stars from the critics with only a pas de deux of 3 star reviews.

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

At the i (5★), Fiona Mountford announced, ‘here is a real Christmas cracker from the National Theatre’, saying it ‘has been exuberantly adapted by Kendall Feaver in a manner so skilful it will please the novel’s generations of fans while simultaneously enchanting a whole new audience.’

The Standard‘s Nick Curtis (5★) declared, ‘This delicious show about three female foundlings forging their own identities, and a makeshift family, in a house full of oddballs in interwar London absolutely bowled me over.’ He explained: ‘Katy Rudd’s production may not have the dazzle and snark of last year’s NT Christmas hit, The Witches, but in its celebration of plucky women and old-school values – personal and theatrical – it never puts a foot wrong. The acting ensemble is excellent, the choreography (by Ellen Kane) and stagecraft sublime, and Frankie Bradshaw’s sets wonderfully simple.’

For The Telegraph‘s Dominic Cavendish (5★), the girls’ voyage of discovery is … thrilling and catches a collective joy achieved through pluck and grit. He found Rudd’s fleet, beautiful production…has a lightness of touch on all fronts.’

Sarah Crompton at WhatsOnStage (5★) stated, ‘adaptor Kendall Feaver and director Katy Rudd have done a magnificent job….Above all the staging, fluidly choreographed by Ellen Kane (with Jonathan Goddard), creates its own magic, making a story that is full of love for the self-realising powers of theatre and dance into a transformative experience in itself.’ She summed up, ‘It’s a Christmas show with heart, soul and a flurry of movement to sweep you away.’

Alice Saville in The Independent (5★) ‘Ballet Shoes is as delicately balanced as a dancer en pointe as it leaps between its period setting and the present, finding ways to diversify and complexify this story in ways that never feel lazy or jarring. It’s a Christmas treat for every possible kind of family.’

The Times’ Clive Davis (4★) called it ‘a beguiling play with music that exemplifies the very best of the National’s production values.’ He went on to talk of a ‘magnificent’ set and ‘exuberant’ performances.

The Guardian‘s Arifa Akbar (4★) decided, ‘Under the direction of Katy Rudd, this is an exquisite Christmas cracker of a show, albeit an elegant one that never quite let its hair down, but still it is filled with spectacular theatricality and fabulous performances all round.’ Getting into detail, she said, ‘Samuel Wyer’s costumes dazzle and Frankie Bradshaw’s set is no less than luminous … while Ash J Woodward’s video projections and Paule Constable’s lighting create the almost magical effect of movement: dinosaurs lurch and sea waves swish across the stage.’ She concluded, ‘The old-style, big-band music, composed by Asaf Zohar, captures a bygone time and Ellen Kane’s precious choreography captures the gorgeousness of a silver-screen musical.’

Susannah Clapp at The Observer (4★) joined in the praise: ‘adapter Kendall Feaver and director Katy Rudd have not simply sent the original text pirouetting over the stage but subtly rewired it for today.’

Chris Omaweng for LondonTheatre1 (4★) said, ‘this may not be a perfect show, but it excels in being uplifting and inspiring without being overly saccharine.’

Julia Rank at LondonTheatre (4★) – not to be confused with the rival ticket selling website above- enthused ‘Frankie Bradshaw’s gorgeous set, a cabinet of curiosities, recalls the first room in the V&A’s Alice: Curiouser and Curiouser exhibition, beautifully lit by Paule Constable. In an avant-garde production of A Midsummer Night’s Dream with robot-esque costumes, the tenderhearted Petrova gets her chance to defy gravity and discovers her voice in the process.’ She said ‘Ellen Kane’s choreography is a delight and always organic.’ She concluded, ‘It might not hit the heights of last year’s National Theatre Christmas show The Witches, but still a very winning fairy on top of the Christmas tree for this season.’

In The Stage (3★), Holly O’Mahony had more reservations than the other critics but still concluded: ‘If it could do with a little more challenge and excitement, it’s still a loveable, big-hearted production that captures imaginations and tickles the humour of audiences of all ages.’

Andrzej Lukowski in Time Out (3★) said, ‘It’s slick, classy and meticulously directed by Katy Rudd. But ultimately it lacks dramatic punch.’

Critics’ Average Rating 4.3★

Value Rating 54 (Value rating is the Average Critic Rating divided by the typical ticket price)

Ballet Shoes is at the National Theatre until 22 February 2025. Click here to buy tickets direct.

If you’ve seen Ballet Shoes at the National Theatre, please add your review and rating below

lyttelton theatre At the national Theatre

Doctor Who’s Ncuti Gatwa and Sharon D Clarke impress

Director Max Webster has taken Oscar Wilde’s familiar text by the scruff of the neck (or maybe some other part of the anatomy) and overlaid it with a panto style gay party. Many critics loved it, some had reservations, but all agreed on the quality of the acting by Ncuti Gatwa, Hugh Skinner and Sharon D Clarke, and the bright set and costumes by Rae Smith.

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

Most enthusiastic was Marianka Swain for LondonTheatre (5★): ‘Max Webster’s revival isn’t just vibrant, joyous and triumphantly queer, it’s also a thoughtful reclamation of a play that has become far too cosy, matching Wilde’s subversive spirit in every bold creative choice.’ About the stars, she said, ‘Gatwa wonderfully reinvigorates familiar lines with his breezy spontaneity and flirtatious charisma, while Hugh Skinner, who sports a bouffant hairdo and elaborate moustache, turns the staid character of Jack/Ernest into a hilarious indignant fop’ and ‘Clarke gives her Lady Bracknell an understated but utterly devastating disdain.’ She ended, ‘This is where you’ll find pure magic theatre this Christmas.’

The Times‘ Clive Davis (4★) advised, ‘Think of it as adult panto. Max Webster’s bold and brash reboot of Oscar Wilde’s comedy rattles along with the help of oodles of camp and performances which, apart from Sharon D Clarke’s Jamaican-accented Lady Bracknell, are all nudge-nudge, wink-wink.’ He cautioned, ‘the hilarity becomes a tad gruelling…you wonder if the director is throwing everything at the audience and hoping for the best. When it works, though, it’s a joy.’

The Guardian‘s Arifa Akbar (4★) was a fan: ‘there is an elegance to the nudge-wink references and it is a production with just the right amount of delightful mischief….The pace never becoming hectic, the physical comedy steers clear of farce and lines are crisply delivered without hamming up.’ She enjoyed the performances of the leads: ‘The current Doctor Who Gatwa brings arch shades of his character in Sex Education to the part while Skinner excels in balancing emotional vulnerability with archness and physical humour…Perhaps best of all, Sharon D Clarke’s Lady Bracknell is an exquisitely dressed battle-axe’.

Alice Saville in The Independent (4★) was delighted with the production: ‘director Max Webster’s bold, brash and beautifully cast production blows away every trace of wink-wink nudge-nudge subtlety from this classic’. Howver she noted, ‘when you turn the subtext into text, you’re left with nothing below the surface, and sometimes proceedings here slip into the territory of an especially brainless panto.’ She concluded, ‘What lingers here are the images, more than the words – perhaps because Wilde’s famous aphorisms sound especially glib when delivered with vigour, rather than their more usual laconic detachment.’ She liked the stars: ‘Ncuti Gatwa plays a gorgeously flamboyant Algernon who peacocks in silk corsets and ruffled negligees between scenes. And Sharon D Clarke shines as his formidable aunt Lady Bracknell’.

Time Out‘s Andrzej Lukowksi (4★) decided, ‘if the leads are written as subtextually queer, then Webster’s approach is essentially to crank up the subtext to 11 and not worry about every aspect of internal logic so long as we’re having a good time.’ About the actors, he said, ‘Gatwa is supremely enjoyable as agent of chaos Algy, but it’s full of standout turns: I loved the great Sharon D Clarke as a twinkly, pragmatic Caribbean-accented Lady Bracknell and (Eliza) Scanlen as a somewhat feral Cecily.’

The Standard’s Nick Curtis (4) talked about ‘Max Webster’s fizzing, knockabout production’ that ‘tips the text’s implicit gayness into a heavier display of sexual fluidity.’ He explained ‘I loved it because it honours Wilde’s wit but also his radicalism and his embrace of artifice.’ He said Ncuti Gatwa is ‘charming and charismatic as the preening sybarite, tossing off witticisms as if they’re going out of fashion.’

Fiona Mountford in the i (4★) reassured, ‘None of this re-interpretation is laid on too thickly.’ She said, ‘The sparkling artificiality of Wilde’s confection is playfully emphasised’ and concluded with the conclusion of the evening, ‘The curtain call is a riot of flamboyant costumes, more glittery and colourful than any pantomime. This is a big success, oh yes it is.’

The Observer‘s Susannah Clapp (4★) commented, ‘I would have thought that crashing in and out of convention, underlining the risqué, would crush Wilde’s celebrated witticisms. Actually, it releases them. Lines are delivered not archly but with ease.’

Dominic Cavendish in the Telegraph (3★) thought ‘There’s some straining after laughter, albeit it is often obtained.’ He declared, ‘the main plaudits should go to Sharon D Clarke’s sedate, imperious, fabulously attired Lady Bracknell’.

Sarah Crompton in Whats On Stage (3★) had reservations: ‘It’s panto season at the National Theatre. Max Webster’s production of Oscar Wilde’s most famous play is colourful, cross-dressing, brash and often very funny. The trouble is that the importance of its author sometimes vanishes in the mayhem…. The text seems less important than accommodating the next bum joke, or a slip on some fake grass…Wilde should seem effortless but here there’s a terrible sense of trying hard’. Sharon D Clarke, she said, ‘is utterly wonderful, turning the character into a disdainfully magnificent matriarch, contempt for the world and its imperfections dripping from every line.’

Sam Marlowe in The Stage (3) put aside her reservations: ‘there’s so much fizz and sparkle in the staging, and such charm, cheek and flair from the cast, that we’re consistently tickled and ultimately won over.’

Critics’ Average Rating 3.8★

Value Rating 48 (Value rating is the Average Critic Rating divided by the typical ticket price)

The  Importance of Being Earnest is at the National Theatre until 25 January 2025. Tickets from nationaltheatre.org.uk

Read Paul Seven Lewis’ less than enthusiastic review here

If you’ve seen The  Importance of Being Earnest at the National Theatre, please add your review and rating below