Star-studded dramas and comedians returning to the stage have been on the agenda this week.
Ahead of the long weekend, we saw the opening of Amy Adams’s turn in The Glass Menagerie, as well as Steve Coogan’s Alan Partridge live show arriving in London. There was also It’s A Sin star Nathaniel Curtis taking on the titular role in Roman tragedy Britannicus and the new show from reigning Edinburgh Comedy Award-winner Jordan Brookes.
Next week, we’ll be back with Sunshine on Leith in Edinburgh and Harry Hill’s Tony: The Tony Blair Rock Opera.
The Glass Menagerie – Duke of York’s ★★★☆☆
Tennessee Williams’s much-loved 1944 memory play The Glass Menagerie centres on Amanda Wingfield, a Southern matriarch who has always shapeshifted with the production’s approach. At London’s Duke of York’s Theatre, Amy Adams’s interpretation is sympathetic, and free of the trappings of fading Southern-belle kitsch the role often comes with. But although director Jeremy Herrin’s take brings new warmth to the family ties at the heart of this play, he doesn’t capture the wit and strangeness that have won it such a devoted following.
His most visible innovation is to split the role of aspiring writer Tom, who narrates the story, into two roles. It’s not a choice that particularly illuminates the play. Instead, the magic comes from technical trickery: a cabinet of softly tinted glass animals glimmers at the centre of the stage, with cameras projecting close-ups of this tiny menagerie onto a giant screen above.
In this production, a lot of that intensity comes from Amanda’s painfully shy daughter Laura, played with pathos and subtlety by Lizzie Annis, who has cerebral palsy and is making her professional stage debut. Amanda begs Tom to bring home “gentleman caller” Jim (Victor Alli) so that he can be wooed and cajoled into matrimony with an elaborate dinner. But when Amanda’s aspirations subside like an overmixed souffle, it’s Laura’s anguish that lands most strongly.
The Glass Menagerie is typically funny as well as tragic, but this production is light on laughter. That’s mostly down to Adams, who delivers a likeable but underpowered performance. Still, though this staging lacks the vigour to fully hit home, it’s a welcome chance to revisit this play. Alice Saville
Jordan Brookes: This Is Just What Happens – Soho Theatre ★★★★☆
Jordan Brookes is the longest-reigning Edinburgh Comedy Award winner. Yes, the pandemic had something to do with it, but let’s ignore that. In his first show since winning that prestigious prize in 2019, Brookes luxuriates, as ever, in discomfort. But it also sees him at his most personal.
The show hinges on one party in 2019, when he heard on the grapevine that a friend had called him a “slimeball”. How is that possible, Brookes asks. He’s a nice guy. He didn’t lose his virginity (or “virginny-gin-gins”, as he disgustingly calls it) until he was 24. He gives every woman he sleeps with “the boyfriend experience” – whether they ask for it or not – and has been told he’s “confusingly good” at sex.
Brookes circles back to the “slimeball” thing again and again. Attempting to shake the label, he is comically polite to the audience. “What did I say about latecomers?” he roars when a group enter mid-show. “I say they’re welcome, please be seated.”
Still, the comic delights in playing with his crowd. There are jokes about Captain Tom (a highlight of the show) and sex dreams involving family members. During one repeated punchline, you can feel the audience gritting their teeth. At the same time, Brookes pushes his body to extremes. He spends the show hunched on a high stool, contorting himself into ever more ludicrous, grotesque positions throughout. It’s hard work making people this uncomfortable. Isobel Lewis
Britannicus – Lyric Hammersmith ★★★☆☆
Britannicus is a play about power – who has it, who wants it, and the extreme lengths people go to hold on to it. In many ways, the political drama poses timeless questions: What do people want from their leaders? Should leaders want to be remembered for ruling with virtue, or is tyranny the best way forward?
Emperor Nero (William Robinson) is the leader in question as the official ruler of Rome. He’s youthful and bratty, and his word is law – think Joffrey from Game of Thrones. But Nero is only as powerful as the voices in his ears. As Agrippina, Nero’s scheming, status-hungry mother, Sirine Saba is a formidable presence on stage – even if her villainy is a touch on the nose at points.
Surprisingly, Britannicus is not actually about the character it’s named after. Portrayed by It’s A Sin’s Nathaniel Curtis, Britannicus’s main job is to stand as a symbol of Nero’s biggest insecurity. Though not playing as major a role as the marketing might make you think, Curtis does a fine job, his 6ft 5in frame adding a bumbling quality to Britannicus’s naive, gentle nature.
It’s not an easy watch: 90 minutes of ancient Roman politics with ancient Roman names to keep up with won’t be for everyone. Still, the strength of the ensemble makes you invested in the destruction that will follow Nero’s jealous actions. It’s a shame that we have to wait for the action to heat up, though – by the time we want more, it’s already over. Nicole Vassell
Alan Partridge: Stratagem – O2 Arena ★★☆☆☆
There’s always been a bit of cult mentality surrounding Alan Partridge. OK, “cult” is probably too strong of a word, but it’s fair to say that Alan Partridge: Stratagem arrived to find the O2 London a cathedral of the converted.
In Stratagem, Coogan deploys his obnoxious alter ego as some kind of motivational speaker – though this premise is only attacked with the woolliest sense of conviction. He walks out on stage to a re-lyricked version of “We Built This City” by Starship; this then segues into a mercifully brief Hamilton riff. From there, he embarks on a number of comic skits, sometimes involving video projections, sometimes involving on-stage guest stars.
Partridge is inherently a low-rent, low-status character who thrives most in the glamourless intimacy of a north Norfolk radio booth or in the small-town surroundings of I’m Alan Partridge. It was always going to be a struggle adapting the character for such a large stage. There is maybe 45 minutes of enjoyable material in Stratagem – enough to bulk out for an Edinburgh show but nowhere near enough for a two-act arena gig. One gag about the GoCompare advert feels nearly as old as Partridge himself.
In his many TV ventures, you can’t help but pity Partridge, a character who, through his own hubris and ineptitude, is always the butt of the joke. Watching the character strut and sing before a stadium of cheering fans, you suspect the joke may have been lost in translation. Louis Chilton
