Theatre review: The Lady From The Sea with Alicia Vikander & Andrew Lincoln

Watery family drama floats my boat

Bridge Theatre

⭑⭑⭑⭑

Andrew Lincoln & Alicia Vikander in The Lady From The Sea. Photo: Johan Persson

Simon Stone brought us Yerma with Billie Piper, one of the finest productions I have ever seen, and Phaedra with Janet McTeer which was pretty good too. He likes to take a classic, tear it apart, get down to its basics, and rebuild it for the modern world. So did he pull it off with Henrik Ibsen, father of theatrical realism, and stars Alicia Vikander and Andrew Lincoln? The answer is, yes, with style. It is an entertaining, amusing, gripping, unique piece of theatre.

The evening starts (and continues) with much would-be witty repartee of the kind that you find in fiction rather than real life, except this production often presents it as crass or cringeworthy, and characters talk over one another, and mock one another. Ibsen was an early proselytiser of theatrical realism which meant believable conversations featuring middle class families that middle class theatre audiences could identify with, as opposed to the previous focus on royalty and gods. This play, with a script developed by the actors in conjunction with writer director Simon Stone, pays full homage to Ibsen with its realistic dialogue.

The subject matter is serious but this version is also very funny. One of exchanges that made me laugh, given the title of the play, was when someone said to Ellida: ‘You must be the lady of the house’ and she responded: ‘Did he just call me a lady?’

The play is set in the modern day in the Lake District, which makes a change from the Cotswolds, and is sprinkled with contemporary references, to OnlyFans and Just Stop Oil and the like, but the themes of love, loss and the effect of the past on the present are eternal and universal.

Edward and his second wife Ellida seem happy. Although his daughters from his first marriage are rebellious and rude, the couple are able to shrug it off. Then a former lover appears and Ellie must make a choice between an unfinished relationship and her current love.

Death hangs over the narrative: there are suicides, one by Edward’s first wife; Edward and Ellida have lost a child through miscarriage; a visiting young sculptor has a terminal illness. While the presence of death in their lives messes up some of the characters’ lives, it also acts as a reminder that life is short and unpredictable, and needs to be lived, not postponed. Dramatic choices and revelations continue to the end.

The acting is uniformly excellent but none better than the two leads- Andrew Lincoln is totally convincing as a man lacking confidence, despite being a leading neurologist. This is revealed to be the result of a cold father. Events test Edward’s liberal attitudes to breaking point. He, like the script, is funny, angry and anguished.

Alicia Vikander is a more subdued presence playing a quietly confident mature woman, with a slightly flat, stuttering delivery that made all the more powerful her passion, when it came out. At that point, she seemed to revert to the nervous, vulnerable youngster from twenty years earlier, who made decisions that would shape her life.

The young people- two teenage daughters planning the first stages of adulthood, and the dying sculptor- remind us of the turbulence of life as a young person. I loved Isobel Akuwudike and Gracie Oddie-James as the stroppy but ultimately caring daughters, and Joe Alwyn is wonderfully neurotic as the sculptor. John Macmillan is spot-on as the blunt, faithful family friend Lyle. Brendan Cowell is suitably charismatic as Finn, the lover from the past.

The Lady From The Sea at The Bridge. Photo: Johan Persson

Lizzie Clachan’s magnificent set isn’t in keeping with ideas of realism. It is pure theatre. The show is set in the round, bringing the audience close to the actors in this intimate family drama. There are minimal props- a table and chairs in one corner and a sun lounger opposite. (Avoid seats near the right corner as you enter the auditorium and the opposite corner on the far side, as these bits of furniture will sometimes obscure your view.)

During the interval, the entire set, both the floor and the small number of props are changed from completely white to totally black. Straightaway, you feel there will trouble ahead! The beginnings of scenes increasingly overlap with the ends of the previous ones, as the tension increases- as if we can’t wait to see what happens next.

Much of the baggage Ellida carries is weighed down by events at sea, so , in an eye-popping moment in the second act, water appears, first as heavy rain, then as shallow water when part of the stage drops. Two lovers make out in it with echoes of From Here To Eternity, before it becomes a swimming pool. It may not be an immersive production from the audience’s point of view but some of the actors are fully immersed in the pool. It could only happen in theatre. But, far from being gloomy, the water- like the play itself- is ultimately cleansing.

This is an intense piece of theatre I wouldn’t have wanted to miss.

The Lady From The Sea can be seen at The Bridge until 8 November 2025. Buy tickets direct from the theatre

Paul purchased his ticket.

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

September 20, 2025October 2, 2025

Theatre reviews roundup: The Lady from the Sea

Ibsen update: intense or mundane?

Bridge Theatre

Alicia Vikander and Andrew Lincoln in The Lady from the Sea. Photo: Johan Persson

Following his visceral adaptations of Yerma and Phaedra, writer/director Simon Stone has turned his attention to Ibsen’s The Lady From The Sea. Screen stars Alicia Vikander and Andrew Lincoln, plus Joe Alwyn and Brendan Cowell, impressed the critics but opinions varied on the quality of the adaptation. As a modern day middle class marriage comes under fire, some found it intense, others thought it was meandering and an insult to Ibsen. Lizzie Clachan’s traverse set uses a lot of water in the second act to metaphorical effect, which most critics enjoyed but some found over the top.

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

4 stars ⭑⭑⭑⭑

The Guardian’s Arifa Akbar commented: ‘Simon Stone is known for his rock’n’roll takes on the classics. This is a characteristically high-octane version of Ibsen’s play: loud, modern and led by screen stars Alicia Vikander and Andrew Lincoln. Yet his script, again created in the rehearsal process, retains all of Ibsen’s layers and adds some of its own in the updating’. She talked of : ‘the full-bodied intensity of the production, which is fantastically original, gripping and magnificent to the end.’

The Standard’s Nick Curtis called it ‘a dense, emotionally intense and often hilarious three hours – and god knows, belly laughs aren’t common with Ibsen – marred by a certain glibness.’ He explained: ‘As he formerly did with Lorca’s Yerma and Seneca’s Phaedra, Stone rebuilt the play in rehearsal with his cast, and they’ve worked hard to create a psychological and narratively coherent modern parallel for Ibsen’s ocean-worshipping mysticism…It works, but it reduces the play to being all about daddy issues.’

Dave Fargnoli of The Stage praised the stars and the writer: ‘Heading a uniformly strong cast, Oscar-winner Alicia Vikander’s Ellida roils with subdued emotion, her anxieties and divided loyalties visibly bubbling under the surface’…’Andrew Lincoln gives a consummate performance as neurologist Edward, maintaining an air of focused calm and fairness in the face of continual provocation’…’Stone’s contemporary dialogue is fast-paced and ferociously entertaining, equal parts realistic rhythms and deliberately grandiose pronouncements.’

WhatsOnStage’s Sarah Crompton said: ‘The script is demotic, flowing, beautifully written, and the entire cast inhabit it with ease, drawing the lines of character with power and subtle’ but complained: ‘The production, however, is clumsier than the script. I took against Lizzie Clachan’s staging – in long traverse, with the audience surrounding the playing area – that means from where I was sitting, I viewed events through a table, or from the back of a sun lounger.’ She concluded: ‘It is a hugely enjoyable evening, full of insight and provocation.’

3 stars ⭑⭑⭑

Matt Wolf writing for The Arts Desk declared: ‘Like the lighting that crackles now and again to indicate an abrupt change of scene or mood, Simon Stone’s version of The Lady from the Sea is illuminated by the sense of adventure and excitement one has come to expect from this singular artist.’

The Financial Times’ Sarah Hemming found: ‘Stone’s dialogue crackles with wit…It’s peppered too with truths about love, the competing urges for freedom and security, the intensity of youthful emotions that blaze in the memory, the legacy of parental failings and frailties. Above all there’s the uncertainty and restlessness of living in such a messed-up world. It’s also superbly acted.’

Tongue in cheek, Andrjez Lukowski of TimeOut described a pattern in Stone’s adaptations: ‘rewrite the whole thing into aggressively modern English that revolves around long, light hearted stretches of posh people swearing amusingly, season with a bit of Berlin-indebted stage trickery, and finally change tack and wallop us with the tragedy, right in the guts.’ He concluded: ‘when it’s serious, it’s very good. And when it’s silly it remains maddeningly entertaining.’

Dominic Maxwell of The Times commented: ‘It’s full of skill and ingenuity. But the 21st-century self-awareness drowns out Ibsen’s alluring strangeness as much as it makes it resonate.’

The Telegraph’s Dominic Cavendish felt: ‘The snag is that the staging, by Australian hotshot Simon Stone (with semi-abstract design by Lizzie Clachan), leaves his cast first high and dry on an exposing platform, then drowning in directorial overkill, as a deluge turns the set into a raised pool.’

Fiona Mountford of the i started positively: ‘The great news is that Andrew Lincoln …and… Alicia Vikander – in her London stage debut – make for a phenomenal central pairing as a distinguished older man on his second marriage and an attractive younger woman on her first.’ However, ‘The trouble with Stone’s updating of this story – of past loves returning to haunt current lives – is that he attempts to afford too many characters too great a slice of the dramatic action.’

2 stars ⭑⭑

Alice Saville of The Independent was damning about Stone’s adaptation: ‘He’s taken Henrik Ibsen’s tragic fable and extended it into something both lengthy and oddly mundane, bloated with new dialogue that namechecks OnlyFans and Nineties rap groups. It’s an unlikely showcase for the talents of a confident Andrew Lincoln..and..Alicia Vikander, who seems understandably adrift making her stage debut in this directionless play.’ She went on: ‘it feels as though, in laboriously engineering a plausible 21st-century setting for Ibsen’s story to unfold in, Stone has lost sight of what this play’s actually about.’ She decided: ‘It’s all a bit undignified for poor Ibsen… this play thoroughly retools his dialogue without finding a language for his symbolism.’

The Mail’s Patrick Marmion was also disappointed, describing the main characters as ‘a blandly homogenous bunch of wittering, health-conscious hedonists, without a cultural, moral, or political compass between them.’

Critics’ Average Rating 3.2⭑

Value rating 35 (Value rating is the Average Critic Rating divided by the typical ticket price.)

The Lady from the Sea can be seen at the Bridge Theatre until 8 November 2025. Buy tickets directly from the theatre

Click here to read Paul Seven Lewis’ review of The Lady From The Sea

If you’ve seen The Lady from the Sea at The Bridge, please leave your rating and review below

October 11, 2022April 29, 2025

The Crucible with Erin Doherty – National Theatre – review

★★★★

Erin Doherty in The Crucible at National Theatre London 2022

Back in 1953, when Arthur Miller wrote The Crucible, a play about the late 17th century witch trials in Salem Massachusetts, he no doubt had in mind a modern day witch hunt in which a US senator persecuted perceived communists, especially in Hollywood. But it could be about any time when authorities demonise others to consolidate their power.

It’s a compelling study in how the process of a witch hunt develops a momentum of its own and triggers vengeance, fear and even mass hysteria. Lyndsey Turner’s intense production is powerfully acted by Erin Doherty, Brendan Cowell and the rest of the cast.

In a small town run by the church, some misbehaving girls try to get off the hook by claiming to be possessed by the Devil. This gets out of hand as they take the opportunity to get their own back on some respectable and respected citizens by accusing them of being disciples of the devil who lead them on. A trial ensues. Adults confess to outlandish encounters with demons, more accusations fly, more adults confess in a form of mass hysteria, and the children too start to believe their own tales.

The girls are led by Abigail. It’s a bravura performance by Erin Doherty. You might know her best as an excellent Princess Anne in The Crown but she shows her full range as an actor here. Her character is clearly a rebel but also scheming. So, we see her wheedling, pleading, and, in a terrifying scene, inspiring the other girls into wild-eyed, uncontrolled shaking, as if possessed.

Authoritarian power is just one of the subjects explored in Arthur Miller’s complex play, but it’s the one from which all elsefrom which all else arises. As we enter the Olivier auditorium, we are confronted by pouring rain. Every scene begins with pouring rain. Torrents of water team onto the front of the stage. It seems this community is already suffering the punishment of a pitiless Old Testament God. We’re told the community is a theocracy. No separation in those days between church and state: the Church is in charge and there can be no challenge to its authority.

The church leader Reverend Parris is confronted by children secretly rebelling against the church’s rules by secretly dancing, among other things. Some of the citizens believe this behaviour has been caused by the Devil in the form of witchcraft. The priest is skeptical but he knows support for him in the community is shaky, so he calls in a preacher with higher authority and a knowledge of witchcraft: the Reverend Hale. A major trial follows, headed by Deputy Governor Danforth, played with a steely eye and a stern jaw by Matthew Marsh. He has his own reasons for wanting to stamp his authority on the community.

At this point, it’s a case of ‘to a hammer everything is a nail’. It seems obvious that the children are dissembling but, as the excellent National Theatre programme points out, the authorities see what they believe rather than believing what they see. As the witch hunt goes to extremes in the heat of the ‘crucible’, both Parris and Hale, given passionate and nuanced performances by Nick Fletcher and Fisayo Akinade respectively, begin to see how one-sided the trial is. They realise good people are being dragged down and note that ‘every defence is seen as an attack on the court’.

Production photo from The Crucible at the National theatre London in 2022 showing Brendan Cowell — Brendan Cowell in The Crucible. Photo: Johan Persson

One man who speaks out against the trial is John Proctor whose wife is accused of witchcraft. It’s a thundering piece of acting from Brendan Cowell as a good but flawed man. In a heart-breaking sequence, he nobly tries to reason with the Court and is brought down by his own honesty and the challenge he poses to the Church’s teachings.

What else is going on? Oppression of women by the church. They are expected to be silent and obedient. As the girls are indoctrinated by tales of hellfire and damnation, they are primed for believing they have been taken over by unseen forces. And they have a readymade means of excusing themselves.

Fear, revenge and greed all play a part. People turn on each other to save themselves. The girls are only too quick to denounce the many adults they resent. Ruthless people take the opportunity to gain land from those found guilty of witchcraft. There’s a lot to think about and be shocked by in this intelligent, frightening play.

It’s easy to discern many parallels more modern than the McCarthyite witch hunt. We can see what goes in all totalitarian countries where a weak authority cannot be questioned: the actions of the morality police in Iran for example, or would-be authoritarians closer to home for whom an alternative point of view or a minor misdemeanour can ignite outrage on social media leading to death threats and cancellation.

Director Lyndsey Turner has created an fervid production, only marred by a tendency at times towards melodrama. One nice touch is that nearly all the characters point fingers as they argue, a metaphor made physical. The masterful set by Es Devlin is appropriately black-and-white except when we visit the Proctors’ warmer-coloured home. An opaque ceiling hangs over hhe entire stage. Through it filters a diffused flouredcrnt white light suggesting no one can hide from a pitiless regime.

Crucial to the production are Tim Lutkin’s lighting and the sound by Caroline Shaw, Tingying Dong and Paul Arditti. The cast are usually lit from the side creating a lchiaroscuro effect, again suggesting no middle ground. A stretched low note drones in the background, ratcheting up the tension.

The impressive cast also includes Sophia Brown, Karl Johnson, Eileen Walsh and Tilly Tremayne.

The Crucible was performed at the National Theatre 21 September – 5 November 2022, and will transfer with cast changes to the Gielgud theatre from 2 June to 7 September 2023

Paul was given a press ticket by the producer.

Click here to see the review on the One Minute Theatre Reviews YouTube channel