Revivals and Fresh Blood
The New Year sees no shortage of quality around theatreland as both excellent revivals and some punchy new pieces are there to temp you into the dress circle
Preview by Geoffrey Leadwell Photograph by Manuel Harlan
Several revivals are showing this month. Waste by Harley Granville Barker is at the National until March. The production is directed by Roger Mitchell who has worked extensively in theatre, as well as making a string of successful films (Persuasion, Notting Hill, Enduring Love), and it has garnered great reviews across the board. Written at the beginning of the last century, the play exposes the machinations of a Tory government trying to stay in power during a hung parliament at the expense of the naive protagonist, Henry Trebell MP. Expect a slow but satisfying evening which perfectly marries the personal with the political and oozes 1920s style.
Over at the Old Vic, The Master Builder, a late masterpiece of Norwegian playwright Henrik Ibsen, is about to open in a new adaptation by David Hare. This play tells the story of Harvard Solness, a builder and architect, and his growing relationship with a stranger who visits him, Hilde Wangel. Marrying moments of realism and symbolism, the play is decidedly cryptic but offers moments of real emotional truth. This version stars the formidable Ralph Fiennes in the starring role, so tickets will no doubt sell out quickly, but if you can get your hands on one it will certainly be worth it.
In Manchester, at the Royal Exchange, the decidedly more modern Pulitzer prize winner Wit, by Margaret Edson plays for three weeks. An incredibly powerful piece of writing which outlines the treatment of Dr Vivian Bearing, professor of English, who is diagnosed in the initial scene with stage four ovarian cancer. Smart, insightful and human, with the relationship between Bearing and her doctor at its heart, this rarely revived play is one to catch whilst you can.
In terms of new writing, two pieces stand out. At the Royal Court the ever experimental Caryl Churchill’s Escaped Alone follows fresh off the back of her recent short piece Here We Go at the National Theatre. Refreshingly the play stars four older women, played by the joint and not inconsiderable talents of Linda Bassett, Kika Markham, Deborah Findlay and June Watson. Directed by James MacDonald and designed by Miriam Buether, the piece promises to marry ‘tea and catastrophe’, in what will no doubt be a pointedly political evening.
Finally, at the Arcola, from Keith Huff, writer of Mad Men and House of Cards, comes A Steady Rain, a macho American cop drama set in Chicago. The promise of ’swearing, violence and flashing strobes’ means subtlety might be low on the agenda, but the play has already won plaudits for its run on Broadway starring Hugh Jackman and Daniel Craig. This production doesn’t offer those A list names, but Vincent Regan and David Schaal are both solid actors who no doubt will do this two hander justice. It runs from February 10th. 