Noel Coward Theatre, London – until 11th May 2019
Reviewed by Serena Norgren
4****
The inevitable hype surrounding this remake of the 1950 film of the same name starring Bette Davis and Anne Baxter as well as Mary Orr’s original play The Wisdom of Eve, with the added attraction of Gillian Anderson and Lily James meant that expectations were running high for this eagerly anticipated play.
All About Eve is the story of Broadway star, Margo Channing (Gillian Anderson) whose fame is starting to diminish as she reaches her 40th birthday. She hires a super fan, a young and very beautiful girl, Eve (Lily James), as her assistant. Eve inserts herself into Margo’s life, first becoming indispensable, then her understudy and ultimately usurping her completely. This is a tale of ambition and desire for fame as Eve inveigles herself into the life of an increasingly insecure Margo. Gillian Anderson portrays testy vulnerability in a similar and equally convincing style as she did as Blanche Dubois in Tennessee Williams’s A Streetcar named Desire at the Young Vic. Combining fragility with a haughty sang-froid, Anderson plays Margo’s impending demise with great nuance although it is perhaps hard to really imagine her as a fading star. Lily James, as Eve, does a fine effort in combining sweet innocence and sly ambition, with more innocence and slightly less convincing ruthlessness.
However, this production is taken to the level that it achieves through the skilled performances of some of the other actors. Monica Dolan as Margo’s friend Karen who introduces her to Eve and then colludes in a joke that results in her sabotaging Margo’s career is striking. Then there is the manipulative and power-hungry theatre critic, Addison DeWitt, played with steely smoothness by Stanley Townsend who helps finesse Eve into Margo’s part. His caramel tones belie the almost psychopathic ambitions of perhaps a failed actor. Rashan Stone as Karen’s husband, Lloyd Richards, does a great hapless yet malleable writer underscoring how the power of a star (or celebrity in current parlance) can wield and control. Julian Ovenden is equally splendid as neurotic director and Margo’s younger lover, Bill Sampson, trying to convince her in an increasingly unconvincing way that her star is not waning.
The play was adapted and is directed by Ivo van Hove. Van Hove brought the concept of using live filming to our stages in his award-winning adaptation of Network. Using the same sophisticated technology, there are scenes in closed boxes upstage streamed onto a huge TV while actors sit at tables in a restaurant at the front of the stage. This gives both a sense of claustrophobia and discombobulation. Margo’s fear of aging is masterfully managed as she looks at herself in a mirror on an empty stage while she ages on the giant TV screen above her head. Occasionally, one has to remember to focus on the actors and not what is going on the TV but the feeling of menace and angst is unavoidable. PJ Harvey provides a sound track that adds to the melancholy.
Overall, this production pretty much meets the hype: fine performances and the use of multi-media make it definitely worth a visit and its themes resonate in our celebrity obsessed culture. Well worth a visit.