London Theatre: Part Two

4 were amazing. 1 was terrible.

Are you ready?

Broken Glass (Tricycle Theatre)

I'm a strange person. I can usually tell within the first few minutes of a play if I'm going to love or hate whatever I'm about to see. This play was no exception. There Matt and I were, sitting in the front row of this small theatre when all of the sudden, all the lights shut off, we hear a loud noise and BAM....the play begins. I turned to Matt and said, "I love this play. I already love this play." Broken Glass was written by Arthur Miller, one of America's greatest playwrights. It's not one of his better known plays, but no matter. The plot centers around a married couple, in their 50s, in the late 1930s. They are living in New York and news of the Holocaust has just begun to make headlines. Sylvia, the wife, has lost feeling and control of her legs. Basically, she spends all of her time in bed or a wheelchair. However, doctors can find nothing physically wrong with her and determine that her inability to walk has to be psychological. This play was fascinating. There was not a bad actor on stage and the script was just so gripping! What was even more fascinating was the design of this show. The set consisted of walls, making up three sides to a room, which were covered in peeling paint, and several bare, hanging light bulbs. Every scene change was perfectly choreographed and accompanied by live cello music, being played by a musician, sitting on a platform at the back of the stage, lit by a single spotlight. The dark, ominous music played while the actors took their time during the scene changes, always staying in character, never rushing off into the wings. It was beautiful. Everything about this play was beautiful. If you can't tell by this long paragraph, I LOVED THIS PLAY.

Design For Living (The Old Vic)

You'd think that a play involving adultery, cheating, lying and polyamorous relationships (relationships between more than two people) would be a sickening, awful play to sit through. Well, you couldn't be more wrong. Design For Living, written by Noel Coward, was the first pure comedy that I've seen since arriving in London (The 39 Steps doesn't count, because it was a farce) and my goodness, what a show! I haven't laughed that hard during a play in a long time. Like I said, the plot centers around three people, two men and one woman, all in love with each other. But it's not a love triangle. Gilda loves both Otto and Leo. Leo loves both Otto and Gilda. Otto loves both Gilda and Leo. Is that confusing? Well, that's the play. What's so interesting about this play is that it's written in such a way that you couldn't possibly dislike any of these characters! Yes, in essence, what they are doing is terrible, but the whole plot is so darn enjoyable! Noel Coward is a genius. The director of this play is a genius. The play was three hours long. Three acts. And not once did I glance at my phone to check the time. Not once was I bored. That is a true testament to how wonderful this play was.

House of Games (Almeida Theatre)

We knew that eventually, the day would come. The day we would see a bad play in London. We knew our streak of good shows couldn't last forever, and sadly, it ended with this one. This play is an adaptation of a screenplay written by David Mamet, who is a very good playwright. This just goes to show that you should not mess with a good thing. AKA, don't adapt Mamet! Yuck, yuck, yuck. That's what this play was. It was just bad. I didn't like any of the actors. The script was extremely predictable. I knew how everything was going to play out in the first scene. In contrast to Design For Living, this play was barely over an hour and a half and it seemed to go on forever. Do you want to know the plot? Well, listen up LOST fans. Do you remember that episode where, in a flashback, Sawyer meets and attempts to con a woman, but she catches him, asks to learn about conning, so he teaches her, and ends up conning her in the end anyway? That was this play. But bad.

Deathtrap (Noel Coward Theatre)

We almost didn't make it to this one. Matt and I were riding the Piccadilly line (the tube) to Leicester Square and at a stop on the way, we hear an announcement that someone has been pushed onto the tracks and been run over by a train. Awesome. Our train was stopping here, and all trains on the Piccadilly line were being terminated so they could take care of this incident. The problem was, we were still several stops away from our destination. The only thing to do was get out and take a bus. However, everyone on the Piccadilly line had the same idea. The buses were as packed as sardines, but we managed to squeeze onto one and rode all the way to Piccadilly Circus (during rush hour too). At this point, it was 7:15 and the show started at 7:30. We finally agreed to get off the bus and run. This would have been a brilliant idea, had I not been wearing HEELS. Not just any heels, the Ralph Lauren stilettos that my friend, Dalton bought me for my birthday. So we've got Matt, thinking he knows where he's going, about 6 feet in front of me and we've got me, running like Elle Woods mixed with Carrie Bradshaw, yelling at Matt that he's not going the right way. FINALLY, we found the theatre, tore through the lobby, about four minutes late, were lead to a room with a monitor to watch the first bit before they could seat us, and eventually collapsed in our seats. And out came Jonathan Groff.

Jonathan Groff plays Jessie St. James on the hit TV show, Glee. He was also in the original Broadway cast of Spring Awakening. In short, he's a hunk. Estelle Parsons was also in this play. She won an Academy Award for her supporting role in Bonnie and Clyde and played Roseanne's mother on the old TV show, Roseanne. We were in the presence of celebrities. But enough about that, let's talk about the actual play. We'd seen dramas and we'd seen comedy, but now were seeing a thriller. And boy, was it thrilling! Deathtrap is about murder. It involves an older playwright, so desperate to keep a good reputation and publish a new play, that he would kill for it. This play had a big twist, one that I did not see coming at all. The script was smart and the actors were spot on. Very good play.

Prince of Denmark (The National)

I saw this play this afternoon, rather spontaneously. Today was the last show and I woke up and said, heck, why not? I went to the theatre, only to be told that the performance was sold out, but I could wait and hope that someone wouldn't show up. Luckily, a man heard me ask for a ticket and very kindly gave me one of his, telling me that his friend wasn't able to make it. I reached for my wallet to give him the 5 pounds that the ticket cost, but he protested that I didn't need to pay him. What a nice person. And more free theatre!

If you haven't already guessed, this play was about Hamlet. As a teenager. Played by teenagers. The play was produced by The National Youth Theatre and the plot was centered around Hamlet, Laertes and Ophelia about ten years before the play, Hamlet, takes place. Everyone in the cast was under 18. I was a little wary going into the play, thinking I was about to see a lot of awkward acting, but of course, The National can do no wrong. These kids were awesome. The boy who played Laertes really impressed me, and it was very cool to think that these kids are going to be the next big stars in London. Hooray for kids in theatre!

Thus concludes my second London theatre review.