The Play Review

Jodi and I review The Hills of California by Jez Butterworth, currently playing at the Harold Pinter theatre in London’s West End, directed by Sam Mendes. Do not be misled by the title; we are not in sunny California, but in the back streets of Blackpool, where four daughters come together to say goodbye to their dying mother. The play is a portrait of lost dreams, of deeply ingrained patterns of love and hurt within a family, and of suppressed and mutable memories. A new Jez Butterworth play is a theatrical event. Does it live up to our high expectations?

Jodi and I review An Enemy of the People, which is currently playing at the Duke of York’s theatre in London's West End. Matt Smith, who of course many will know from Dr Who, stars in Ibsen's fable of truth and lies, political compromise and the environmental costs of capitalism. This production is very much a contemporary adaptation of Ibsen's original play. It was conceived by the German director Thomas Ostermeier at the Schaubuhne theatre in Berlin, where Ostermeier is the Artistic Director, and has now been redrafted in English by the British playwright, Duncan Macmillan. While the central plot of the play remains as Ibsen wrote it, this version brings the setting bang up to date, with references to many of the concerns of our time here in the UK. The show also contains a very dramatic theatrical event, which has sparked debate among crtitics and audiences alike! So does this bold interpretation of Ibsen's classic work for our time?

Jodi and I review Lynn Nottage’s play Clyde’s which is currently on stage at the Donmar Warehouse theatre in London. The show is directed by Lynette Linton, who directed Nottage’s last play at the Donmar, Sweat back in 2018, which I thought was a fabulous show. Clyde’s premiered on Broadway in November 2021, and was nominated for four Tony awards in 2022. According to American Theatre magazine it was the most-produced play in non-profit theatres in America in 2022–2023, so there’s something about this play that touches a nerve. Lynn Nottage is very well known in America, having  won the Pulitzer Prize for Drama twice: in 2009 for her play Ruined, and in 2017 for Sweat. Clyde’s is set in the same town of Reading, Pennsylvania, in what is known as America's rust belt.  The title is the name of the truck-stop diner on the outskirts of town that belongs to Clyde. Clyde is a former prisoner in the local penitentiary, as are all of her staff and the four other characters in the play. The stories and characters of this play, and of Sweat,are based on extensive research Nottage carried out in Reading in the 2010s, and the plays certainly have the stamp of lived reality.

Jodi and I were lucky enough to be invited to see Elephant at the Bush Theatre last week. Elephant is a one-woman show, written and performed by Anoushka Lucas. Anoushka is a very talented singer, songwriter, actor and writer. As an actor she has appeared in Oklahoma! at the Young Vic,  Henry V at the Donmar, After Life at the National, and Jesus Christ Superstar at the Open Air theatre in Regent’s Park. She has written musical scores for other shows, and released an album of her own music, Dark Soul. Elephant is her first play, which was first seen at the Bush last year, and now returns in a new expanded version. It is running at the Bush until 4th November.

Jodi and I review the new production of Pygmalion at the Old Vic in London. Pygmalion is arguably George Bernard Shaw’s most famous play, partly of course because it spawned the even-more famous musical and film My Fair Lady. The play offers two iconic parts in Eliza and Higgins, played famously in the film by Audrey Hepburn and Rex Harrison. The Old Vic production boasts two of the most respected stage actors of our time in Patsy Ferran, fresh from her Olivier-winning run as Blanche in A Streetcar Named Desire, and Bertie Carvel, who has conjured the figures of Donald Trump and Rupert Murdoch no less on stage, not to mention Miss Trunchbull in Matilda the Musical. Shaw’s biographer, Michael Holroyd, describes Pygmalion as “a comedy of manners and a parable of socialism.” Written more than 100 years ago, does this revival convince us that the play stands the test of time?

The show that we are reviewing today is God of Carnage by Yasmina Reza, which is currently playing at the Lyric Theatre in Hammersmith in West London. The play, written in French and translated by Christopher Hampton, had its English language debut in the West End back in 2008. The play followed Reza’s earlier play Art, which was a worldwide hit in the 1990s, being translated into 30 languages and winning Olivier and Tony awards. God of Carnage was similarly a popular and critical success, reprising the Olivier and Tony awards, and in 2011 the play was also turned into a movie, Carnage, directed by Roman Polanski. So, Reza and the play come to the Lyric with a stellar CV. This revival is directed by the Lyrics’s Associate Director, Nicholai La Barrie, and the four-handed cast includes Freema Agyeman, who is perhaps best known as Doctor Who’s companion Martha Jones. The action of the play all takes place on one afternoon in the elegant living room of a cultured middle-class couple, where they have invited another couple to come to discuss an incident that has occurred between their respective 11-year old sons, one of whom has hit the other in the mouth with a stick, breaking two of his teeth. The parents of the victim want to understand what provoked the attack, and to explore what action could be taken by way of resolution. The play is a comedy of manners, or perhaps more accurately of no manners.

Lucy Prebble's 2012 play The Effect is revived in an updated version at the National Theatre, directed by Jamie Lloyd, and starring Paapa Essiedu and Taylor Russell. The play charts the effects on two young people who participate in a residential drug trial, during the course of which they fall in love; but can they trust that their feelings are real? Jamie Lloyd’s work as a director is not to everyone’s taste – so what did Jodi and I make of his version of this very thought-provoking play?    

Jodi and I review two shows in this episode. First up is Dario Fo's classic farce Accidental Death of an Anarchist which has been updated to modern-day Britain by Tom Basden. This hilarious new adaptation is directed by Dan Raggett, and is running at the Theatre Royal Haymarket until 9th September. Our second review is of Martin McDonagh's The Pillowman at the Duke of York's Theatre in the West End, directed by Matthew Dunster, and starring Lily Allen and Steve Pemberton. How does McDonagh's uneasy mix of horror and dark comedy work in this revival of his 2004 play?

Jodi and I review James Graham's latest play Dear England, which is running on the Olivier stage at the National Theatre in London until 11th August 2023, but you will have another chance to cheer when it transfers to the Prince Edward Theatre in the West End from the 9th of October. Graham has earned acclaim for masterfully turning contemporary British history into accessible and thought-provoking theatrical drama. Dear England charts the rise and influence of Gareth Southgate as the Manager of the England men’s football team from his appointment in 2016 to the present day. As unlikely as this sounds for the subject of a production at the National Theatre, as Jodi and I discuss, the play is about more than just football.

Jodi Rilot joins me for the first time to review two shows: The Circle by Somerset Maugham at the Orange Tree theatre in Richmond-upon-Thames, and Private Lives by Noël Coward at the Donmar Warehouse in London. Tom Littler. who directed The Circle, draws a line connecting Somerset Maugham to Noël Coward in the history of English drama, so it is appropriate that we cover these two shows together. 

The Motive and the Cue at the National Theatre in London is currently one of the hottest tickets in town. There are numerous reasons why this show is so popular, starting with the fact that it tells the story of when two acting giants of the 20th century, Sir John Gielgud and Richard Burton, came together to stage Hamlet on Broadway in 1964. This was at a time when Burton had just married Elizabeth Taylor, and they were the most famous couple in the world. Mark Gatiss and Johnny Flynn recreate Gielgud and Burton respectively. The play is written by Jack Thorne, the amazingly prolific author for stage and screen, and directed by Sam Mendes. So many reasons to want to see this show. Jodi Rilot returns to help me to assess whether it lives up to its billing.

Jodi and I share our thoughts about Rebecca Frecknall's production of Romeo and Juliet at the Almeida Theatre in London. Rebecca Frecknall is currently the hottest director in town, her most recent credits including A Streetcar Named Desire with Paul Mescal and Patsy Ferran, which also started life at the Almeida before transferring to the West End, as well as her innovative production of Cabaret. She is known for her stripped down, modern takes on classic titles and her Romeo and Juliet is no exception.