Cold War
Almeida Theatre, London
There’s a grand piano centre stage for much of Rupert Goold’s beautiful production of Cold War. In its way it’s a battleground itself: the focus for much of the pain, hope and longing in the story, which weaves through 15 years of the cold war, entwining love, politics and artistic integrity. And music sits at the heart of Conor McPherson’s stage adaptation of Pawel Pawlikowski’s 2018 film — from Chopin to gloriously delivered Polish folk songs and choral work and delicate new ballads written by Elvis Costello.
At the centre are Wiktor and Zula, two Polish musicians who meet in 1949 during auditions for a state-sponsored showcase of traditional music and dance. He’s a pianist, she’s a singer; he’s clipped and reserved, she’s fiercely passionate; he’s crippled by a shameful action in his past, she’s driven by defiance. For her, music is a voice; for him, it’s a way of hiding — he resists composition in favour of adaptation.
Both are damaged, difficult and scarred by the war, and both struggle in a net of compromise and coercion. They are superbly played by Luke Thallon and Anya Chalotra, who pull your sympathies back and forth, with spare, soulful songs from Costello speaking for them as they strive to survive in an impossible world.
Around them the cold war locks into place. In Poland, the troupe’s oily manager, Kaczmarek (brilliantly played by Elliot Levey), spies career advancement in pushing traditional music as propaganda, and Wiktor is told by a party official to come up with an “authentic” folk song about collective agricultural machinery. He defects and winds up in Paris, but even here artistic integrity is hard to maintain, as he is urged to create sounds that cater to the market.
McPherson’s episodic script flits through the story skilfully, though a few scenes and characters — such as Irena, Wiktor’s previous partner, played by the excellent Alex Young — feel rather short-changed. Goold and choreographer Ellen Kane fill the Almeida with music and dance: at one point the stage pulsates to Parisian teenagers jiving to “Rock Around the Clock”; at another, the theatre resonates to the rich, thrilling harmonies of Polish folk song (members of Warsaw Village Band have acted as consultants for the production).
The piece ends, as it begins, with music: a beautiful, haunting duet from Costello for Wiktor and Zula, movingly delivered by Thallon and Chalotra. Bleak but beautiful.
★★★★☆
To January 27, almeida.co.uk
Pacific Overtures
Menier Chocolate Factory, London
Matthew White’s chamber revival of Stephen Sondheim’s 1976 musical Pacific Overtures, about the westernisation of Japan, arrives in London at a time of heightened sensitivity about cultural appropriation and whose versions of history we hear. Though written from the point of view of the Japanese, and drawing on Japanese music and Kabuki, the show is the work of two American artists (Sondheim and John Weidman). Fittingly, this co-production between the Menier and Umeda Arts Theater, Osaka, first seen in Tokyo, folds some of these issues into the staging, often with a wry wink. And, like Cold War, it examines the plight of individuals caught up in vast political battles.
The show begins in what appears to be an exhibition of Japanese artefacts, which members of the cast peer at with the curiosity of visitors, while a disembodied voice instructs them not to touch. Then, as if starting up a video reconstruction, Jon Chew’s Reciter (our guide to events) flips us into the story: the day in 1853 when American warships arrived in Tokyo Bay with the aim of persuading — or forcing — this secluded nation to open itself up for commerce. Throughout the show Chew’s snappy Reciter pops up to add useful facts and move the action along.
It’s a tale that starts with Japan’s resistance to the United States’ “pacific overtures” and ends with contemporary Japan at the cutting edge of technological development. Caught up at its centre are two men — Manjiro and Kayama — who travel in opposite directions and whose stories encapsulate the challenges and changes.
Manjiro begins as a fisherman who has spent time in the US, but eventually becomes a samurai; Kayama, originally a samurai, is promoted to governor of Uraga, and, as the country begins to trade with western powers, takes on the suit, pocket watch and mannerisms of a western gent (his solo, “A Bowler Hat”, is one of the sharpest numbers in the show). Circumstances make them friends, but then place them on opposing sides. Joaquin Pedro Valdes (Manjiro) and Takuro Ohno (Kayama) bring a delicate wit and sympathy to “Poems”, the duet in which they come to befriend one another, and painful poignancy to their final duel.
White’s production balances real feeling with stylisation and also with snappy satire. “Please Hello” is deliciously staged, with representatives from western countries prancing up to the bewildered Shogun to deliver absurd versions of their respective national dances (wonderful choreography from Ashley Nottingham). It’s crisply, wittily delivered by a fine cast on Paul Farnsworth’s simple set of burnished gold curls and sliding screens, using the intimate space to tell a rich and resonant story nimbly.
★★★★☆
To February 24, menierchocolatefactory.com
Pandemonium
Soho Theatre, London
Topicality comes in many guises. Armando Iannucci’s new comedy about the UK government’s handling of the pandemic opened on the same day as prime minister Rishi Sunak’s appearance in front of the Covid Inquiry and a week after Boris Johnson’s spell in the same hot seat. Both men come in for a hefty swipe in this highly stylised satire, a cod 17th-century comedy delivered by a troupe of players speaking in rhyming couplets and gobbets of repurposed Shakespearean verse.
So we have Orbis Rex, a mop-headed chump who spouts bad Latin, has an uncertain relationship with the truth and fancies himself a god, and his chancellor Riches Sooner, a beady little imp in tiny trousers. Joining them are Matt Hemlock, who slithers out of a slimy swamp to take charge of health, various exasperated experts, and a brazenly inept wannabe female leader called Less Trust, who evaporates on being asked if she has done her sums.
The difficulty for political satire these days is that real events are often so ludicrous that it is hard to compete. And given episodes such as a special advisor’s drive, mid-lockdown, to Barnard Castle to “test his eyesight”, and Liz Truss’s failure to outlast the life of a lettuce as PM, Iannucci and Patrick Marber, directing, have their work cut out.
The result is hit and miss: ambitious in style, very funny in places, rather flat in others. There are some wonderfully sharp lines, however, and some cracking performances. Paul Chahidi gives Orbis a near-deranged level of self-obsession; Natasha Jayetileke’s little Riches takes the role of sidekick literally, capering with delight over money matters; and Amalia Vitale oozes magnificently as Hemlock. And while it doesn’t always feel savage enough, it ends, potently, with a speech of cold fury.
★★★☆☆
To January 13, sohotheatre.com