Old Vic
Tom Stoppard’s classic play returns to the Old Vic and becomes the first critical hit of the autumn. The praise was not quite universal and some reviewers were less impressed by Stoppard’s clever script than others, but the quality of acting and Max Webster’s production carried the day for nearly all. The play within a play structure examines the meaning of love, and drama as a way of conveying it.
[Links to full reviews are included but a number are behind paywalls and therefore may not be accessible]
Time Out’s Andrzej Lukowski (4★) described the play as ‘a dazzlingly arch exploration of performative identity’. He said ‘Max Webster’s production is direct and accessible’ but is convinced, ‘this absolutely would not work without McArdle, whose combination of louche intellectualism, ebullient physicality and startling inner seriousness is just perfect – he plays the complicated role like some sort of esoteric string instrument.’
Nick Curtis in The Standard (4★) wrote, ‘It’s impossible not to be carried away by the brio of the whole thing, though: the way the plays-within-the-play inform mesh and overlap; the joyous relish of words; the potent, romantic yearning at the core for something pure. Here, a script is famously likened to a cricket bat, engineered to send the ball of an idea soaring without apparent effort. The Real Thing is such a play, and Webster and his cast play a blinder with it.’
The Guardian’s Arifa Akbar (4★) found it ‘Artfully directed by Max Webster, with wonderful long-shadowed lighting by Richard Howell and a poppy soundtrack, the drama’s artifice is playfully exposed, maybe even sent up’ ‘at this drama’s heart is a timeless study of passion and art that 40 years on remains…exquisitely intact.’
Dominic Maxwell in The Times (4★) proposed The Real Thing as ‘the greatest Stoppard, the one that best blends formal audacity with wondrous wit and, crucially, extraordinary emotional acuity. Yet it took me a while to succumb to Max Webster’s slightly skittish production, acted out, in Peter McKintosh’s design, in a rectangle of creamy furnishings amid a sea of royal blue.’ He ended, ‘The longer it goes on, the more this production finds a plangent tone where the witty, the wise and the wounded are forever colliding.’
Marian Swain for LondonTheatre (4★) praised the director and the stars: ‘Webster beautifully punctuates his production with pop music’… ‘McArdle finds an effective balance between making Henry a facetious, maddening hypocrite and a surprisingly vulnerable romantic’ … ‘the excellent Bel Powley adds depth and fire to Annie’. She concluded, ‘the passionate performances help to counter the charge that Stoppard is merely a “clever” writer. Listen to McArdle’s Henry confess his intimate truth that “knowing, being known” is the most exquisite joy of love, and you discover that the playwright’s much-vaunted articulacy is in service of a beating heart.’
Steve Dinneen for CityAM (4★) was enamoured: ‘sometimes it’s fun to simply watch a master expertly place one word before the next in an order that frequently takes your breath away.’
Sarah Hemming writing in the Financial Times (4★) lavished praise on all aspects of the production: ‘Stage managers become part of the action, rushing to rearrange Peter McKintosh’s handsome, electric-blue living room set, as if dressing a display in department store Heal’s. The top-drawer cast bring out both the pithiness and the pain of Stoppard’s script.’
Sarah Crompton at WhatsOnStage (4★) was just as captivated. It was, she said, ‘a sophisticated and enjoyable revival of a play that still, beneath its beautiful veneer of humour, has the heft to raise troubling and endlessly fascinating questions about the state of the human heart and how we describe it.’ She too paid tribute to its star: ‘At its heart is a sensational performance from James McArdle’.
The Observer‘s Susannah Clapp (3★) found it ‘A word-spinning, form-crunching demonstration of the way the real and the pretend spin around each other in the theatre’ and thought ‘James McArdle is compelling in oration and in his unravelling.’
The Telegraph’s Dominic Cavendish (3 ★) thought it was ‘Admirable and cleverly engaging, but not wholly loveable.’ He commented, ‘while Max Webster’s production delivers consummate style… its emotional substance is more uneven.’
Alice Saville for The Independent (3★) both liked and disliked the play: ‘there’s something resolutely unfashionable about its spectacle of adulterous middle-class couples being beastly to each other in beige living rooms. It’s Stoppard being his most brilliant, most infuriating self’. She was impressed by the lead actor: ‘James McArdle is fantastically eloquent in the central role of Henry’
Fiona Mountford for the i (3★) wasn’t keen, describing it as ‘a strongly cast revival of Tom Stoppard’s wordy but hollow 1982 rumination upon real life versus fiction, fidelity against infidelity. For all the play’s flaws, James McCardle and …Bel Powley are terrific in the leading roles.’ ‘On it goes, slick but arid and when it ends it’s a challenge to know what we’re meant to take away from it.’
Sam Marlowe for The Stage (3★) found much to admire but ‘None of it seems to matter very much. But clever? Of course.’
Gary Naylor at BroadwayWorld (2★) was not impressed at all: ‘the play I witnessed seemed barely worthy of praise, never mind the avalanche of plaudits that have come its way since its premiere 42 years ago and consequent to its many revivals since. Had I missed something? In pooh-poohing the assessments of so many fine judges, was I just being a bear of very little brain? Or had this soapy tale (albeit with longer words, but almost as much shouting) merely outlived its utility? Probably a bit of all three.’
Critics’ Average Rating 3.5★
Value rating 54 (Value rating is the Average Critic Rating divided by the typical ticket price.)
The Real Thing can be seen at the Old Vic Theatre until 26 October 2024. Click here to buy tickets direct from the Old Vic
If you’ve seen The Real Thing at the Old Vic, please add your review and rating below