The National, the Old Vic, the Barbican (including the RSC) and the Globe
Rufus Norris’s opening year at the National promises much for the future, although there have been a few misses in amongst an array of great hits.
Already, he has set out his stall, giving the impression that whether for economic or artistic reasons, co-productions will be common, while there is likely to be a great range of programming from traditional to avant-garde.
Perhaps the crème de la crème came in the form of the best new play to grace the London stage this year, Stephen Adly Guirgis’s The Motherf**ker with the Hat, which came over from Broadway complete with director and a chunk of cast.
By turns, funny and violent, this wonderful evocation of Puerto Rican immigrant life in New York today felt like a grim dose of Dirty Realism without a moment of dullness from start to finish, taking on the thorny subject of drug addiction in its stride along the way.
People, Places & Things in the Dorfman was a welcome showcase for the writing skills of one of our upcoming stars, Duncan Macmillan. However, Jeremy Herrin’s production was rendered unforgettable by the central performance from Denise Gough as a drug addict actress in denial. It seems inconceivable that she will not win almost every best acting award in sight (shame on you Evening Standard).
Also in the smaller Dorfman Theatre, Tom Stoppard’s The Hard Problem was one of those brave plays that takes on science for an audience that is typically not well versed in the subject.
Pleasingly, Stoppard is such an adept and experienced playwright that he managed to entertain and educate in equal measure.
Two bold adaptations presented other highlights. A low-key stage version of Jane Eyre, which originally saw the light of day at the Bristol Old Vic, looked potentially dull and unpromising. However, thanks to the invention of director Sally Cookson and her committed cast, it turned out to be both a wonderful experience in its own right and a fitting tribute to Charlotte Brontë’s novel.
Similarly, the concept behind Husbands & Sons by D H Lawrence seemed a recipe for disaster. Take three full-length plays that might have been well past their sell by dates and paste them together into a single three-hour work about the dull reality of coalmining and what you get?
The answer, when you allow Ben Power to do the adapting and Marianne Elliott the directing, is a gripping play that felt entirely coherent despite its divided origins.
Dara by Shahid Nadeem, adapted by Tanya Ronder, offered a rare opportunity to experience a slice of Islamic history in a vastly entertaining epic featuring exciting mythic romance that also shed light on global issues today.
Sam Holcroft’s Rules for Living offered an up-and-coming writer a platform to show off her talents. The play proved entertaining rather than challenging.
Patrick Marber’s The Red Lion shone a light on non-league football with due wit but, despite its possibly oblique commentary on the state of the nation today, required a least a little enthusiasm for its main topic to hold the attention throughout.
The National also presented a wide variety of revivals of classics to sustain its loyal audience.
This year’s Shakespeare production was a modernised As You like It directed by Polly Findlay with a super design from Lizzie Clachan.
While Rosalie Craig did nothing wrong as Rosalind, Patsy Ferran grabbed the eye every time that she appeared on stage in the role of Celia.
Farquhar’s The Beaux Stratagem is an extremely funny comedy which, under the direction of Simon Godwin, proved to be a real winner. It featured an excellent cast with a number of eye-catching performances including those from Samuel Barnett, Geoffrey Streatfeild, Pippa Bennett-Warner, Pearce Quigley and Susannah Fielding.
Three Days in the Country represented Patrick Marber’s fresh new approach to Turgenev who started off with a whole month out of town. The loss of the 27 days did no harm to another National hit with a cast led by Amanda Drew, John Simm and Mark Gatiss.
Harley Granville Barker is always good value for money and even managed to survive a potentially confusing, minimalist version of his political masterpiece, Waste. Directed by Roger Michell, it featured a nice cameo from Olivia Williams (whose character dies early in the piece) and a much more substantial performance by Charles Edwards.
Timberlake Wertenbaker’s modern classic Our Country’s Good was given an opportunity to strut its staff on a much bigger stage than that for which it was written or on which it is generally performed. Nadia Fall and her ensemble cast delivered a good, if not unbeatable, production.
For this reviewer, despite a memorable central performance from Ralph Fiennes, George Bernard Shaw’s Man and Superman felt overly long, especially with an additional scene that is generally thought to be superfluous.
Chiwetel Ejiofor gave a magnificent central performance in Everyman, a modern take on the mystery plays but the messages were rather better hidden from general viewers than might have been desirable.
Similarly, even for fans of Caryl Churchill, Light Shining in Buckinghamshire may not have been the best selection of the year.
As winter began to herald thoughts of the New Year, three consecutive openings met with less than united critical acclaim.
Evening at the Talk House by Wallace Shawn is very much an acquired taste. It presented a sad but funny view of American life in the playwright’s inimitable style, aided by his presence on stage in a key role. While many did not take to it, this reviewer was a big fan.
A similar story applied to Caryl Churchill’s Here We Go. Featuring a stand-out performance from 82-year-old Patrick Godfrey, it looked death squarely in the eye. However, many found the second half of a mere 45 minutes tough going, as the boredom and helplessness that old age brings to so many was put under the spotlight in a ruthless, if determinedly realistic fashion.
Finally, wonder.land, which attempted to bring Alice in Wonderland into the 21st-century musical format, was generally considered to be in need of significant reworking, even though it had originally premièred at the Manchester International Festival in the summer.
As it transitions from Kevin Spacey to Matthew Warchus, the Old Vic has gone for quality rather than quantity.
High Society is covered in the section on West End Musicals, leaving four other productions.
Clarence Darrow was effectively Kevin Spacey’s swansong. This fantastic solo performed in-the-round portrayed a controversial American attorney at work, painting a fully-rounded, humanitarian figure in whom one could believe implicitly. It also proved once again that the former Artistic Director is still a fantastic stage actor who can hold any audience in the palm of his hand.
Future Conditional by Tamsin Oglesby launched the Warchus era. It is a deeply political play looking at the education system to the eyes of an Anglo-Pakistani immigrant, her class teacher and various civil servants.
Reverting to proscenium arch, The Hairy Ape is not one of Eugene O’Neill’s easier plays, using expressionism to consider the human condition. A striking revival by Richard Jones benefited from the strong central performance of Bertie Carvel.
To close the year in upbeat mood, David Greig was asked to adapt Dr Seuss’s The Lorax for the stage, with the assistance of compositions from Charlie Fink of Noah and the Whale fame.
As with all Christmas shows, the intention was to provide fun for all the family and the company duly delivered a political eco-thriller with pleasing visual and musical effects to delight youngsters.
The Barbican continues to welcome assorted programming from the UK and overseas and has become the occasional London home of the RSC once again.
It welcomed indisputably the highest profile, if not necessarily the best, stage production of the year. Lyndsey Turner’s much anticipated version of Hamlet hit the headlines thanks to the presence of Benedict Cumberbatch in the leading role.
The general consensus was that while the evening was often visually intoxicating, the play took third place behind The Benedict Cumberbatch Show and some rather tricksy directing by Miss Turner. This did the supporting actors no favours.
That wasn’t the Barbican’s only Hamlet in 2015, since it also welcomes Yukio Ninagawa’s interpretation, which attempted not wholly successfully to combine a Shakespearean aesthetic with a Japanese one.
Two transfers were likely to garner considerably more favour with audiences. The Regent’s Park production of To Kill a Mockingbird had proved popular at the Open Air Theatre and deserved a chance to move audiences indoors.
Timothy Sheader’s simple staging with Robert Sean Leonard in the lead was a reminder of just what a good novel Harper Lee had written and, appropriately, arrived just as the sequel, Go Set a Watchman, was about to be published amidst the storm of publicity.
Londoners are used to regular revivals of Waiting for Godot, usually performed by British, Irish or French companies.
Andrew Upton and his Sydney Theatre Company prove that the Australians are no slouches when it comes to Beckett either.
Théâtre de la Ville-Paris’s contribution was a typically French, stylish look at Luigi Pirandello’s Six Characters in Search of an Author. Young director Emmanuel Demarcy-Mota was clearly keen to stamp his auteurial mark on an unusual but thought-provoking and intelligent evening.
In the Silk Street Theatre, Cheek by Jowl delivered a typically avant-garde Measure for Measure in Russian, which like the Young Vic version later in the year will have divided opinion.
The RSC’s contribution included an unexpectedly lacklustre version of Henry V starring Alex Hassell, which continued the cycle that had already shown Barbican audiences Richard II and Henry IV in previous years.
Also for RSC at the Barbican, Sean Foley and Phil Porter must have had almost as much fun as their audiences in creating a lively, updated version of Thomas Middleton’s A Mad World My Masters. Many of those present had probably never realised that the secondary Jacobean playwrights could be such fun.
The RSC did not restrict themselves to the Barbican. They also made a significant impact in the West End.
Possibly the highlight of the year for anybody who was lucky enough to see it was Gregory Doran’s centenary tribute to Arthur Miller through an immaculate new production of Death of a Salesman. This starred the ennobled pairing of Sir Anthony Sher and Dame Harriet Walter. On finishing a limited run in Stratford, it immediately transferred to London, to share the pleasure around.
Oppenheimer by Tom Morton-Smith was designed to remind British viewers about a scientist whose life took an unexpected turn. This play concentrated as much on the domestic as the global aspects of J Robert Oppenheimer’s life, combining his very human passions with the scientific research and its explosive consequences when bombs that would not have existed without his efforts changed and destroyed the lives of millions.
On a trip to Stratford to see Death of a Salesman, there was also a chance to pop into the Swan and enjoy a very serviceable production of The Jew of Malta by Christopher Marlowe with Jasper Britton in the leading role, director Justin Audibert managed to draw considerable laughter from a play that is not quite out of the top drawer but provided a useful comparator with Marlowe’s canon and other works of the period, particularly The Merchant of Venice.
Visits to the main stage at Shakespeare’s Globe are inevitably significantly coloured by the climactic conditions.
The undoubted highlight was a pitch perfect new production of The Merchant of Venice starring Jonathan Pryce as Shylock under the direction of Jonathan Munby. An injection of novelty was provided by the presence of the star’s daughter Phoebe playing the merchant’s daughter Jessica.
Blanche McIntyre was able to cast the wonderful Michelle Terry opposite Simon Harrison in a frenetic version of As You Like It. Rather than relying on Shakespeare’s timeless text, directorial influence was used to an exceptional degree in an effort to get even more laughs than the Bard had ever intended, regrettably losing some of the originals in doing so.
Jessica Swale’s new play about orange-selling courtesan Nell Gwynn felt like it needed rather more work before achieving full potential. Even so, with Gemma Arterton replacing Gugu Mbatha-Raw in the title role it is set for West End transfer in the New Year.
The Sam Wanamaker Playhouse is located indoors and primarily candlelit. The experience is very different, although the seating is equally uncomfortable.
A brief sample of the fare on offer included a production of The Changeling. Dominic Dromgoole’s enjoyable romp featured the ever-reliable Hattie Morahan as a gentlewoman overcome with lust and then burdened by bad intentions, while Trystan Gravelle made a good foil representing the embodiment of all evil.
The Broken Heart by John Ford proved to be a complex Grecian revenge tragedy of the kind that very few theatres beyond the Sam Wanamaker Playhouse would ever be likely to produce. Even so, it was a suitably amusing way to spend an evening.