Isobel Lewis gave The Almeida production five stars, and told everyone to buy tickets. But rewatching it has her questioning our 'recommendation culture'
I saw it at the Almeida too and loved it, although perhaps not as much as many critics and acquaintances. Whilst it was fantastic to see five women on the stage, I felt less engaged with the younger depictions of Annie and would have preferred those sections to be shorter. The intensity picked up when we got to Romola Garai though and Gina McKee was heart-stoppingly good.
The response to it was so overwhelming that it was an obvious candidate for a transfer and I did wonder if it would work as well in a larger space - so often a game-changer for a production. I also knew that I wouldn’t go and see it again. Sometimes big impact plays are best experienced only once.
Conversely I just saw Asa Butterfield in Second Best in the large hangar-like space at Riverside Studios and thought it would feel truer and less overly slick in a smaller room.
Know what you mean; when I saw it was transferring I was delighted because I loved it if slightly surprised because of the content! Even with her Nobel prize I still don’t feel like Ernaux is that well known here outside of literary circles, so a show nominally about her life - even though it’s about so much more - felt like a strange choice for such a big theatre! We’ll always have the Almeida production, though… (Also fascinating about the Asa Butterfield show, which from the poster alone looked so bad!)
I saw it at the Almeida too and loved it, although perhaps not as much as many critics and acquaintances. Whilst it was fantastic to see five women on the stage, I felt less engaged with the younger depictions of Annie and would have preferred those sections to be shorter. The intensity picked up when we got to Romola Garai though and Gina McKee was heart-stoppingly good.
The response to it was so overwhelming that it was an obvious candidate for a transfer and I did wonder if it would work as well in a larger space - so often a game-changer for a production. I also knew that I wouldn’t go and see it again. Sometimes big impact plays are best experienced only once.
Conversely I just saw Asa Butterfield in Second Best in the large hangar-like space at Riverside Studios and thought it would feel truer and less overly slick in a smaller room.
Know what you mean; when I saw it was transferring I was delighted because I loved it if slightly surprised because of the content! Even with her Nobel prize I still don’t feel like Ernaux is that well known here outside of literary circles, so a show nominally about her life - even though it’s about so much more - felt like a strange choice for such a big theatre! We’ll always have the Almeida production, though… (Also fascinating about the Asa Butterfield show, which from the poster alone looked so bad!)