Icelandic company Vesturport have been one of the most thrilling and inventive theatre groups to arrive on the scene in the last decade. With Romeo & Juliet here at the Young Vic, Woyzeck at the Barbican and Metamorphosis at the Lyric Hammersmith, they gave us three original and innovative interpretations of classic stories. I’m afraid they haven’t made it a quartet with this one.
The idea of an old people’s home (which the director also used in the misguided musical Love at the Lyric) with a retired actor as one of its residents is a good one – allowing the story to be told by someone looking back on his life as a role he never played. Unfortunately the idea doesn’t really work when staged. It hampers the story-telling potential and slows down the pace. The dialogue is pedestrian, with clumsy use of humour, and it stages too little of the epic tale to be anything other than an impression.
When the actors are on netting above your head it’s spectacular, but that isn’t really enough to redeem a fairly dull couple of hours which seemed a lot longer than that.
Not everything can be a roaring success and I’m sure they’ll return to form in the future.
Gareth's Culture and Travel Blog 
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