Long Day's Journey Into Night

Too see a fantastic revival of Eugene O'Neill's claustrophobic play Long Day's Journey Into Night at the Theatre Royal Bath last night, in the production that will shortly hit the West End. David Suchet is astoundingly good as the paterfamilias James Tyrone senior as he drowns the sorrows of missed opportunity and lost dreams in several bottles of whiskey. His performance is every bit as good as that of Jack Lemmon in the 80s West End version. Suchet is supported by three fine actors: Laurie Metcalf plays the drug addicted Mary with utter credibility; while Trevor White as James Jr and Kyle Soller as Edmund are both excellent, especially Soller as he faces the prospect of a sanatorium for his TB. There is much of O'Neill's own American Irish Catholic upbringing in the story, set in a Connecticut summer home 1912, and it effectively manages to combine an emigrant's rags to riches experience with the debilitation of a household addicted to alcohol and drugs. The play has been shortened to three hours in this production, but loses none of its intensity in the process. One of the finest pieces of ensemble acting I have seen in a long time.

Mike Leigh's Grief

The stultifying world of late 50s suburban middle class respectability mixed with the memories of wartime loss is the setting for Mike Leigh's remarkable new play, Grief, which has its first out-of-London run at Bath this week. Lesley Manville plays Dorothy, a war widow trying to bring up a 15 year-old girl Victoria (played by Lark Rise star Ruby Bentall) in a household shared with her soon-to-retire brother Edwin (a fine buttoned up turn by Sam Kelly).

The two-hour play, which runs with no interval, follows a series of events from autumn 1957 to summer 1958, as Victoria is supposed to be preparing for her O levels and Edwin faces retirement. Special days like Christmas, New Year and birthdays are intertwined with occasional visits from their friends. Each vignette takes place in the living room, where the only real communication between Dorothy and Edwin is through old songs beautifully rendered by Manville and Kelly, and where the chasm between mother and daughter grows ever wider. There are a remarkable number of scene changes, each adding to our understanding of the characters, and all leading to a terrible denouement. We were treated to an after-show discussion with Leigh and his cast last night, and the most fascinating revelation from Manville was that the set behind the stage contained furnished bedrooms to give the upstairs events that we only ever hear a firmer grip on reality. With a fine cast, this is an excellent new play.

Three Days in May

To see a very fine performance by Warren Clarke as Churchill in Ben Brown's play Three Days in May, at the Theatre Royal Bath, last night. Clarke well captured the mix of wiles and passion that saw Churchill get his way at a crucial stage in World War II. The days in question, 26-28 May 1940, were on the eve of Dunkirk, as Belgium had surrendered and France was close to doing so. Churchill had four others in his war cabinet: for the Tories, remarkably, both Neville Chamberlain, still party leader, and the foreign secretary Lord Halifax, both noted appeasers, with Clem Attlee and Arthur Greenwood for Labour. The real drama is between Churchill and Halifax - ably portrayed by Jeremy Clyde - over the latter's support for a French attempt to use Mussolini as a mediator to sue for peace with Hitler. In the end, a lot of the drama hinges on how Chamberlain reacts to the competing arguments, scarred as he is by Munich. This is a splendid production by Alan Strachan, and a fascinating reminder of the debates that still took place in the Tory party nine months after the outbreak of the Second World War.

The Syndicate

To see a great performance by Ian McKellan at the Theatre Royal Bath, where he is playing Don Antonio in the Chichester production of The Syndicate. Eduardo de Filipo's play is set in and around Naples in 1960, where the Don is in his twilight years and playing a cross between Solomon and Robin Hood to the locals and their problems. With a strong cast of twenty, including Michael Pennington as the loyal Doctor Fabio and Cherie Lunghi as the godfather's wife Donna Armida, the whole production has a lot going for it, helped by a splendid set. But, despite the great performances - and some nice comic touches as the Don hoodwinks the local loan shark - the whole play feels like a lot less than the sum of its players. A stronger first part is followed by a gradually weakening storyline and a mightily clumsy final act that leaves one simply puzzled, and asking what it was all about? The capacity audience at Bath lapped up the strong performances but were left none the wiser about its import.

Yes, Prime Minister

One of the most delicious moments in my time working in government was when David Blunkett played the episode of Yes Prime Minister where abolition of the Department for Education is proposed, to senior officials in the department after an away day dinner. The episode may have been based in the early 80s, but it resonated far too close for their comfort in the late 90s. The series set such a high standard that the new stage version clearly had a lot to live up to. It was with that in mind that I finally caught the Chichester Theatre production at Bath last night. And while it lacked the presence of Paul Eddington and Nigel Hawthorne, it retained enough of the wit of the original, cleverly updated to today's fiscal crises and global warming obsessions, to entertain for the best part of two hours.

Simon Williams was a creditable Sir Humphrey and Richard McCabe a blokeish Jim Hacker for our times, as they sought to reconcile the sordid requests of a foreign minister from one of the ex-Soviet 'stans with the need for a vast oil-fuelled bailout. With the threat of a civil service act designed to remove many civil servants' perks, Sir Humphrey is persuaded to do the PM's bidding. Parts of the script simply didn't ring true, not least the conversations with the BBC, but Anthony Jay and Jonathan Lynn ensured that it retained enough fresh and knowing humour to remind us how much we miss such genuinely good and well-observed political comedy. The play has been on the go for a year, but the writing felt sufficiently fresh and relevant to engage the Bath audience last night. Perhaps we could have a short TV series revival for the coalition age?

Enron and Eric

To see Lucy Prebble's wonderful Enron last night. The staging is brilliant, the cast great and the exposition of the way the company operated electrifyingand worryingly revealing. Prebble's story, brilliantly realised under Rupert Goold's direction, relates the rise and fall of Enron as a story not only of greed, but also of I watched this stunningly good play at Bath Theatre Royal last night, I found one of extraordinary hubris. Particularly poignant was the way Enron's staff were encouraged to invest in such dodgy stock. But there was one episode that seemed particularly chilling and of contemporary relevance: as the firm's accountants endorsed their fraudulent scheme, they declared their willingness to provide their customers with whatever they wanted. For some reason, I couldn't help thinking about the plans by the ludicrous Eric Pickles to replace the independent integrity of the Audit Commission with a system where local authorities shop around for auditors likely best to meet their needs - and tell them what they want to hear. Enron Eric - I offer this to his new opponent, Caroline Flint, free of charge.

The Country Girl

To see the new production of Clifford Odets' The Country Girl at the Theatre Royal Bath, ahead of a West End run at the Apollo Theatre. Martin Shaw is compelling as Frank Elgin, the faded actor whose alcoholism and self-delusion destroyed a promising career, with Jenny Seagrove his icily supportive and long-suffering wife, Georgie. When Bernie Dodd (Mark Letheren) is determined to revive Frank's career in a new play in Boston, he has to battle not only with the actor's loss of confidence but with his own misapprehensions about the nature of his relationship with Georgie. This often bleak tale had Bing Crosby, William Holden and Grace Kelly in the 1954 film version - it is finely acted by all the current cast, and benefits from an imaginative set. Rufus Norris's direction provides a worthy revival that should be a success on the London stage.

The Rivals

To see a splendid production of Sheridan's The Rivals, his Bath-based tale of rivalry and comic misunderstanding, at the refurbished Theatre Royal last night. Penelope Keith was simply splendid as the wary aunt, Mrs Malaprop, enhanced by the sheer pleasure of absorbing so many of her malopropisms. She was ably supported by Peter Bowles as the Sir Anthony Absolute, played with timely moderation, and a fine cast, notably Gerard Murphy as the blustering stage Irishman Sir Lucius O'Trigger, Robyn Addison as the languid Lydia and Tony Gardiner as Faulkland. But this was very much an ensemble performance, under Sir Peter Hall's incomparable direction, that served to remind the capacity audience at Bath of the wonderful wit of this 1775 play (with its operatic echoes). Sheridan was just 23 when he wrote it, though his first effort extended to four hours, mercifully halved for later audiences. The reunion of Keith and Bowles is an added pleasure in this excellent start to a new Bath season.

The Good Soldier

Bath Theatre Royal's summer offering at the Ustinov - while the Main House is closed for a revamp - is Ford Madox Ford's The Good Soldier, based on a novel written just before the outbreak of the First World War. The story revolves around an American prude John Dowell and his flirtatious wife, Florence, and their friends Edward and Leonora Ashburnham, a British couple whom they met at a German spa resort.

The cast is excellent in a fine adaptation by Julian Mitchell that makes great use of the limited space in the Ustinov, with many of the actors playing several roles. Edward is a seemingly good soldier - outwardly - whose mix of extavagant unaffordable charity and serial philandering provides his long-suffering, but calculatingly cold wife Leonora - played superbly by Flora Montgomery -with a full-time job rescuing the family finances and saving her caddish husband from himself and his romantic urges.

The relationship with the Americans provides a backdrop for a longer series of flashbacks and revelations that are delivered with extraordinary energy and pace by the cast. But for all their exuberant enthusiasm - and a very fine adaptation - the story itself is ultimately unredemptive. Fine novel it may have been - and championed by Graham Greene - but one is left wondering after a dizzying two hours what it was all about, really.

Simon Callow's Man from Stratford

To see Simon Callow's one-man show Shakespeare: The Man from Stratford at the Bath Theatre Royal last night. In one of the last Main House shows before this summer's revamp of the historic theatre, Callow delivered another tour de force as he raced through the Bard's career interspersed with great speeches from his plays. Loosely -and inevitably - dividing his 90 minute monologue into the Seven Ages of Man, Callow took us from a Middle England childhood where young Will received a grounding in Latin grammar at Stratford grammar school, before working in his father's glove shop and marrying Anne Hathaway, through plague-ridden London to Shakespeare's time at the Globe and his retirement as a man of property to his home town. It is a thrilling story of small town politics, big city revenge, royal fickleness and apparently transient fame. Callow excels at this sort of show - as his earlier brilliant renditions of Wilde (the Micheal MacLiammóir version) and Dickens showed, and he thrilled his audience again last night as he moved effortlessly from historic narrative to dramatic impersonation. The play is touring through to Edinburgh, where it is sure to be a great hit.

Haunted

To see the touring production of Edna O'Brien's Haunted at the Bath Theatre Royal last night. Brenda Blethyn and Niall Buggy put in fine performances as the ageing couple whose lives are haunted by a lost child, and whose lost romance is crystallised in his infatuation with a young and bewitching woman, Hazel, an affair with its own sorry but predictable conclusion. The acting is superb, and there's a great set, but one is left with one question, for all the Shakespearean allegory, poetic quotation and Biblical allusion: is that it?

Hedda Gabler

Rosamund Pike is simply superb as an icily beautiful and statuesque Hedda Gabler in the Bath Theatre Royal revival of Ibsen's story of the frustrated woman whose scheming has shocking and tragic consequences. Pike's chilling portrayal brings out the demon that Ibsen saw in Hedda to full effect, while being ably supported by Tim McInnerny in a great performance as the louche Judge Brack. The combination of tragic menace, shocking indiscretion and frustrated hestitation is wonderfully captured in Adrian Noble's production of a very modern translation by Michael Meyer. Other cast members, including Anna Carteret as Auntie Ju-Ju and Robert Glennister as Hedda's adoring but boring husband Tesman, make for a bracing evening's entertainment. It is a sure-fire hit when in reaches the West End.

Private Lives

To see Richard Eyre's sparky production of Noel Coward's Private Lives at Bath's Theatre Royal last night. With Kim Cattrall (left) as Amanda and Matthew MacFadyen as Elyot, there is no shortage of glamour in this revival of the 1930 comedy which originally brought Coward and Gertrude Lawrence together in the lead roles. Amanda and Elyot have been divorced for five years, and find themselves both on honeymoon with new partners in Deauville, with serious and not entirely predictable, often comic and sometimes shocking consequences. The new Bath production enlivens every line of Coward's drama while Cattrall and MacFadyen are brilliant in the roles, though they are ably supported by Simon Paisley Day as stuffy Victor and Lisa Dillon as the romantic perfectionist Sybil. This is a great production of one of Coward's best plays, and should be a big hit when it transfers to the Vaudeville in London. It has had a rapturous reception in Bath.

This posting has been picked up by the Darcylicious/Matthew MacFadyen blog.

My Wonderful Day at Bath

To see Alan Ayckbourn's splendid new play My Wonderful Day at Bath Theatre Royal last night. The play follows the absurdities of adult behaviour through the eyes of nine year-old Winnie. Her mum, Laverne, has gone into labour at the house where she cleans, so Winnie who has accompanied her that day, is left in the 'care' of the adults of the office, as she proceeds to fill her exercise book with an essay on her day, as a school assignment. Watching the tantrums, adultery and jealousies of the adults, whilst experiencing their patronising behaviour, gives her a memorable essay and creates a highly entertaining black comedy, enhanced by Winnie's insistence on speaking French (as it is a Tuesday) to please her Francophone mother. With a stunning central performance by 18 year-old Ayesha Antoine (pictured), the play breezes along in 100 interval-free minutes.

Pride and Prejudice

The programme at Bath Theatre Royal reminds us - as if we needed reminding - that Pride and Prejudice is a perennial favourite for film-makers and fillers of the Sunday night TV schedules. So it was brave of Simon Reade to attempt Jane Austen's familiar classic for the stage in this new Bath production. Susan Hampshire plays a nice comic turn as Mrs Bennett, while Peter Ellis is credible as her long-suffering husband. The production is split into 18 quick changing scenes with members of the 17-strong cast filling in as trees and statues to provide some light relief along the way (shades here of the recent 39 Steps production). From there, the verdict must be more mixed. Newcomer Katie Lightfoot is excellent as Lizzie, Tom Mothersdale plays Mr Collins with appropriate absurdity, and Carolyn Pickles is a suitably sinister Lady Catherine de Bourgh. But other members of the cast suffer from their lack of acting experience: Nicholas Taylor's boyish Darcy inevitably draws comparisons with Colin Firth. Still, it is a credible attempt to dramatise the Austen novel, and it was well-received by the predominantly female Bath audience.

The Pitmen Painters

To see the wonderful National Theatre production of Lee Hall's The Pitmen Painters last night. Max Roberts' production of the story of a group of Northumberland miners whose artistic talents were unleashed thanks to a combination of the Workers Educational Association and an academic art teacher from Durham University, Robert Lyon, who believed in them makes for great theatre and a splendid mix of comedy and tragedy. The group saw their work displayed in galleries during the 1930s and found themselves feted by the art establishment. Of course, there were tensions with their new-found fame, and the clash between a belief in tight-knit community values and an aspiration to get on in the world are well explored, with aspiration the loser or community values the winner depending on your perspective. The staging is splendid with overhead projections of the paintings and art blended with an otherwise simple stage that is perfect for the many scene changes. The cast is great, and while the author is keen to bemoan the failings of post-war Britain to embrace socialism, the real loss is perhaps the spirit of auto-didactism that inspired such a culture of learning and inquiry. The Bath audience cheered the cast into four well-deserved encores. I can easily see why this play won so many awards. It is back in London soon, and is well worth seeing.

The Caretaker

To see a magnificent performance by Jonathan Pryce as the tramp in the Liverpool Everyman production of Pinter's The Caretaker, in Bath this week. The semi-absurdist play, apparently based on Pinter's own experiences of some neighbours in a Chiswick flat, has echoes of Beckett as the tramp and the eccentric brothers play out a series of farcical episodes after Aston, who has a history of mental illness brings home Davies to live in a dilapidated London flat with himself and his volatile brother, Mick. The resulting combination of the tramp's snoring and 'stink' combined with the odd behaviour of the two brothers combine to produce many comic moments. But behind it all are the best intentions never fulfilled - Davies always talks about going to Sidcup for his papers; Mick dreams of importing interior design into the squalid flat. It was Pinter's first big success, and is shown to great effect in this splendid revival.

Mrs Warren's Profession

To see a sparky Felicity Kendal in a new Theatre Royal Bath production of Shaw's once controversial comedy about prostitution, Mrs Warren's Profession, last night. The play which tells the story of an independent-minded 1890s Cambridge-educated young woman's discovery of how her largely estranged mother earns her living and has paid for her genteel upbringing, is remarkable not only for its subject matter but also for its strong feminism. Behind the comedy there is a sharp critique of the sort of jobs and wages that poorer women faced in late Victorian England. Much of the action takes place in the country, where the local vicar's background is found to have coincided a little too closely with Mrs Warren. With its principal theme, and a suggestion of incest, the play, although written in 1894, was not performed publicly until it appeared in New York in 1905. It took another 20 years before the Lord Chamberlain's officials deemed it suitable for a general British audience (though it was performed in private theatre clubs from 1902). The play's qualities shine through in this fine production from Bath. With excellent support from David Yelland, as Lord Crofts, as caddish a figure as any created by Shaw, and great acting from Lucy Briggs-Owen, as Vivie, Mrs Warren's daughter, this production is a great revival of an underperformed gem. It is touring before a West End slot in 2010.

Entertaining Angels

To see Entertaining Angels, a sparky, poignant and very English comedy, running this week at Bath Theatre Royal. The story of a vicar's widow who in the midst of her discussions with her late husband's ghost is stunned to learn a dark secret about his past and their marriage. It is a story with echoes in that of the new vicar, a young woman who is ready to take over the vicarage.

Penelope Keith is superb as Grace, the spiky widow, and she has strong support from an excellent cast, including Polly Adams as her sister, a missionary who supposedly has come home to comfort her and Benjamin Whitrow as the late vicar.

There is a marvellously evocative set of a vicarage garden, complete with a small stream and real plants. But the best thing about the play - aside from Keith - is Richard Everett's script which is punchy, witty and philosophical in equal measure. It is on tour this year and may reach the West End in 2010, where it deserves to be a hit.

Balmoral

We saw the revival of Michael Frayn's 1978 farce Balmoral at the Theatre Royal Bath. This is the story of an imaginary gathering of writers in 1937 at the freezing Balmoral Writers Retreat (no longer occupied by any Royals) in Soviet Britain, after the 1917 rising took place in the UK rather than Russia. It is an entertaining farce based around four writers at the retreat in the depths of winter, but lacks any real political bite. There are amusing touches, not least as the writer of erotic verse Enid Blyton discovers her true vocation and the Beaverbrook Royalist hack Godfrey Winn is portrayed as a slavish supporter of the State's version of the truth.

Despite this, the play is more slapdash comedy than serious critique. It was served well by a competent, if slightly raucous cast. Rik Mayall was supposed to play Skinner, the warden of the house, and was ably replaced by Steve McNeil. In any event, his seemed a lesser role than that of the 'butler' and general factotum, McNab, played here comedian Andy Gray, but played by Fulton Mackay in the original seventies production.