The stars have aligned – but not in a good way – this week. Fêted American Oscar-winners have faced critical brickbats after venturing on the London stage. Rami Malek – so acclaimed as Freddie Mercury in Bohemian Rhapsody that he won an Oscar – was the first to bite the dust, in an Old Vic Oedipus that found him, we said, “entirely at sea… his curious delivery strangling almost every word at birth”. The following night it was Brie Larson’s turn to underwhelm, in a West End Elektra that has her emoting into a microphone like a sixth-form Eminem tribute-act.
Coming off the back of Jamie Lloyd’s scorn-drenched Tempest at Drury Lane, which diminished the stature of Sigourney Weaver (not least because she was required to sit for chunks of the show), the round of thumbs-down has reaffirmed how decisive, and gladiatorial, theatre can be in the making and maintaining – and marring – of actors’ reputations.
Theatre can often be seen as the poor relation to the big and indeed small screen but it’s an invaluable no-hiding-place medium that sorts the wheat from the chaff. Yes the camera can get up-close, peer into your eyes and soul. But it also allows for take after take, edit after edit. At the risk of stating the obvious, theatre has a live-wire immediacy that means a stage triumph is like nothing else. If an actor flunks on stage, their TV and film work may well continue – but can they look themselves in the mirror and fully believe that they’ve got what it takes?
To borrow another line from Mercury, it’s a kinda magic when, for instance, you watch Mark Rylance hold an audience in the palm of his hand, as he did – so unforgettably – in Jerusalem, the role of Rooster Byron being the one he will forever be associated with. Yes, the years in Shakespeare will have informed the variety and immensity that he then brought to this contemporary yet mythic chancer – and one must credit the writing, the directing and so on.
But equally what he demonstrated, to the hilt, was that theatre calls for an animal quality that can’t be faked. Not everyone can match the leonine aura of Olivier in his pomp – but an actor at the centre of attention on stage must have abundant presence: able to rivet us with the smallest gesture, and reach right to the gods.
Unfortunately for Malek, not only was Robert Icke’s recent Oedipus more interesting conceptually, but it was a masterclass in theatrical instinct. Mark Strong’s tormented leader had you reeling too at the horror of his predicament, his distress percolating across the stalls, his pained looks somehow magnified without any camera-work. In his hands, the oldest plot-twist in world drama appeared to be happening for the first time. And Lesley Manville had no less subtlety and scope as Jocasta.
Obviously, stage and screen have different challenges – it’s reductive to say that you just have to do less for the latter. Larson deserves her plaudits for her screen work, and considering the hot-mess of this Elektra, she may deserve a standing ovation for being even half-good. But alongside British stage-acting stalwart Greg Hicks as Aegisthus, her theatrical limitations are evident; Hicks has a vocal power and command that, quite naturally, eclipses her.
We shouldn’t be sneering at the hubris of visiting Hollywooders, and my goodness they have been brave in tackling demanding classical roles in experimental versions when a contemporary play might well have been wiser. We Brits are lucky that there’s such cross-fertilisation between industries with household names such Judi Dench, Ian McKellen, Helen Mirren, Kristin Scott Thomas, the late Maggie Smith and Ralph Fiennes proving that being a creature of the stage can bring more heft, not ham, to the screen. But though his name is now hard to cite without qualification, it’s absolutely the case that Kevin Spacey was the perfect A-list all-rounder: a dazzling Richard III, compelling as Clarence Darrow, incredible in O’Neill classics.
Spacey was at the vanguard of a wave of visiting stars in the 1990s and 2000s that saw mighty successes – Nicole Kidman in The Blue Room, Kathleen Turner in The Graduate – as well as huge let-downs, like Madonna in Up For Grabs (“No stage presence” decided one reviewer).
Our glittering West End thrives on Hollywood titans trying to earn a place in its illustrious history and I hope the current chorus of disapproval doesn’t put off other contenders. It must be very grim to be stuck in a critical flop in London, especially in the winter, after clearing the decks and building up hopes.
While 2025 has got off to a bad start, there’s merited excitement on the horizon in the shape of the ever-estimable Cate Blanchett, treading the boards at the Barbican in The Seagull later this month, while after decades of theatrical abstinence, Gary Oldman is returning to his alma mater, the Theatre Royal York, in Krapp’s Last Tape in April. If there’s a take-home message, though, it must be to the industry insiders who should weigh the financial pros against the cons for their stars’ cachet: don’t put your celebrity on the stage unless you’re convinced they can cut it.
