Tartuffe, Remixed

“I saw Inter Alia in its initial run at the National Theatre in July of 2025. It levelled me. Rosamund Pike gave everything in the 100-minute performance with no interval. As I recall, there is hardly a moment where she isn’t speaking or in motion in Suzie Miller’s devastating three-hander. The play is a must-see, Pike plays a criminal barrister, a King’s Counsel (KC), who has recently taken her place on the bench as a Crown Court judge. Her husband, played by Jamie Glover, is also a criminal barrister and KC, but was always a step or two behind Pike’s character, which creates a professional and marital tension. They have a teenage son, played by Jasper Talbot, who is beginning to have his first experiences with alcohol and parties. After seeing the show, I sent fellow Culture Curator, and dear friend, Clementine Melvin to see it. I met her afterwards, and words failed her. Such is the dramatic power of the writing and the frenetic energy of Pike’s performance. I also recommended it to a criminal barrister and KC, his words to me after seeing it – “saw Inter Alia this evening – pulverised”. It is a piece of theatre that challenges the audience and proposes a moral scenario that nobody would like to face. It is the successor to Miller’s Prima Facie which also enjoyed considerable success both at home in Australia, where Miller is from, as well as in London and New York with Jodie Comer cast in the one-woman play for the London and New York productions. That was a sellout, and I expect this will be too. It is not an easy watch, but it is a masterful display of dramatic acting and a piece that is highly relevant to our times.”

“Once the curtain came down for the first interval, I turned to my companion and asked whether she was getting John Tucker Must Die vibes. She thankfully responded: "YES". Mozart's dramma giocoso (a drama with jokes) similarly centers on the social takedown of an unrepentant, serial womanizer. The libertine, Don Juan, is played with relentless promiscuity and humour by Gordon Bintner in this production and is accompanied by the exquisitely timed comic Roberto Tagliavini as his servant. The performances of this duo are stronger than in many operas where the singing takes center stage (rightly so) and make for a fabulous and funny show. Truly, we were snickering away. Costumes by Anja Vang Kragh are incredibly impactful haute couture designs; black ink-stains fading into soft pink gowns, the names of Don Giovanni's conquests imprinted into silks, taffeta capes making me long for winter (and colder climates) and a Victorian wedding dress for which I would contemplate getting married again for. Designer of the moment Es Devlin's projection mapping (which does start of well with the scrawling of the names of the serial-seducer’s 2065 victims) is a bit of a *sigh* for me... but I overheard other people praising it - reminding me that the theatre subjective! ”

“I’ve always wanted to see something written by Lucy Kirkwood in the theatre. I’ve read some of her plays and wolfed down as many interviews with her that I could find but had never seen her work on stage. So, I trotted off to the Lyric in Hammersmith full of hopes and dreams. My hopes and dreams were not realised. They were surpassed. I didn’t think I could find a show set in the aftermath of a nuclear disaster enthralling, but I did. I didn’t know I would find dialogue about nuclear fission exciting, but I did. I didn’t know I could find debates about the merits of having children or not entertaining, but I did. This is entirely down to the strength of Kirkwood’s writing, the performances, and the set, which transported me to Dungeness, or somewhere else equally as grey and atmospheric. All the elements coalesced to produce a theatrical explosion. But back to the writing. Once scene saw the three characters discussing drunkenness from the confines of a coastal cottage. Robin, a sixty something year old man, said that men when they are drunk and young are ‘impotent and rageful’ but when drunk and old become ‘incompetent and belligerent’. When asked by Rose, a sixty something year old woman, about what old women are like when they are full of drink his response was a flat: ‘FAT’. Cue an audible gasp from the stalls that was verging on panto. The audience were hanging onto every word. This production of The Children did what the best theatre has the power to do: it made me laugh, made me think and made me want to talk to everyone and anyone about it. It’s only on for a short run. Book your ticket now.”