The Human Body - Donmar Warehouse

[Mark]

I found it rather slow and agree that it's only 3 stars because of how strong the leads are. A very average afternoon.

[david]

Well, I loved the cast at tonight’s performance but that is about it with this latest offering from Lucy Kirkwood. KH and JD are sensational on stage with their performance and certainly lift this play with the rest of the cast as others have commented to a 3⭐️ viewing. 

It’s ok having a great cast and all the techy camera stuff on show but dear lord the writing really wasn’t great for the 2hr 45
min run time. There were plenty of interesting political, medical and social ideas within the writing which if more focused would of made a terrific viewing but in this form in this play none really hit the mark for me to make an engaging entire watch. The combing of these ideas alongside the Brief Encounter style plot meant that the interesting stuff was really diluted in its impact. 

For me there were moments, particularly in Act 2 that worked such as KH’s speech during the committee selection and the final few minutes looking at what the NHS could be. However, it is a bad situation as an audience member when there are some really emotional scenes being played out in front of you and you just couldn’t care less. I heard some people describe this show as “light and fluffy” during the interval and quite honestly it’s hard to disagree with this view.

I’m watching Nye tomorrow evening so hopefully that will be a more engaging NHS history play. 

[stevemar]

In line with the views here and having lowered my expectations, this was a real mish-mash of a play, so won’t repeat what others have said…

I quite liked the revolve. Fortunately, the cameras were used less in the second half, but at least unlike Sunset Boulevard, the actors addressed each other rather than the cameras.

I didn’t love the holding of props by the stagehands (though funnily it was ok in Rebecca Frecknall’s Streetcar where the other characters took this role), nor the swell of romantic Brief Encounter “signalling” music with every encounter between Iris and George. It just took away from the relationship between them and made the scenes seem like a pastiche?

I confess I was a little disappointed by Jack Davenport who I’d looked forward to seeing, but played exactly as per his “type” due to the artifice of his scenes.

Despite everything thrown into the mix, I still enjoyed the production. It was best when it took time to breathe, particularly in the scenes between Iris and her husband and daughter.

All the cast and stage hands worked hard to make this work, particularly Keeley Hawes, but the confused writing let it down.

7.5/10.

[mkb]

The melding of tones does not work and is the principal stress fracture in this piece. The light and fluffy melodramatic sweep of the Brief-Encounter-style forbidden affair is at odds with the earnest and gritty feminist tale of a woman fighting for the creation of the NHS and for her own self-determination.

I didn't care much for the romance as I couldn't see the attraction of Jack Davenport's George, and any chemistry feels artificial and very much acted. Include an affair in the plot by all means -- political operators have them all the time it seems -- but I would have kept it real and dirty, not elevated it to Cowardesque levels of dreamy sentimentalism with accompanying Rachmaninoff soundtrack.

The only thing saving us from the muddled script and wholly misguided direction is Keeley Hawes, who is terrific as Dr Iris Elcock, the Superwoman who manages to juggle being a GP with being a mother and housewife, and still has time for both local and Westminster politics and specifically to champion the genesis of a public health service. The scenes where she is battling her corner are the more interesting ones, although the dialogue veers into cliché and predictability far too often. Disappointingly, Elcock turns out to be an entirely fictional creation, not even a composite of a number of women.

Quite why we have snippets of the score from Vertigo at various points in the first act I couldn't fathom. It sets the mood that we're watching a thriller where all is not as it seems, and that's completely inappropriate.

The revolve is pointless, unnecessary, overused and incredibly distracting.

Clearly someone decided they wanted a monochrome theme throughout, but then presumably someone else pointed out that black props might be invisible, so they went for blue. Why blue? No idea. But not the newspaper; that could have been on blue paper, but, no, it's stubbornly black on white.

The two directors, just like Jamie Lloyd, betray a vast ignorance of the cinematic genre to which they seem to believe they are paying homage. High definition video, here in a multitude of inauthentic aspect ratios, and 24 frames-per-second 35mm celluloid have an entirely different look and feel. They are chalk and cheese. It's possible to use electronic tricks to make the former resemble the latter (although far from perfectly) but none of these directors bother. Their attempts to evoke the romanticism of the silver screen is epic only in its failure.

This also means that when not contending with the incessant rotation of the stage floor, the audience is further distracted by the modern, hi-tech camera being paraded about as obtrusively as possible.

With some serious workshopping and rework, there could be a good four-star play to be found here, but this ain't it. The ill-judged and ham-fisted directorial choices only compound the problems. We would be firmly in two-star territory were it not for Hawes who keeps it interesting.

Three stars.

Act 1: 19:33-20:40
Act 2: 21:00-22:10

[nash16]

Apr 2, 2024 1:16:02 GMT mkb said:

The melding of tones does not work and is the principal stress fracture in this piece. The light and fluffy melodramatic sweep of the Brief-Encounter-style forbidden affair is at odds with the earnest and gritty feminist tale of a woman fighting for the creation of the NHS and for her own self-determination.

I didn't care much for the romance as I couldn't see the attraction of Jack Davenport's George, and any chemistry feels artificial and very much acted. Include an affair in the plot by all means -- political operators have them all the time it seems -- but I would have kept it real and dirty, not elevated it to Cowardesque levels of dreamy sentimentalism with accompanying Rachmaninoff soundtrack.

The only thing saving us from the muddled script and wholly misguided direction is Keeley Hawes, who is terrific as Dr Iris Elcock, the Superwoman who manages to juggle being a GP with being a mother and housewife, and still has time for both local and Westminster politics and specifically to champion the genesis of a public health service. The scenes where she is battling her corner are the more interesting ones, although the dialogue veers into cliché and predictability far too often. Disappointingly, Elcock turns out to be an entirely fictional creation, not even a composite of a number of women.

Quite why we have snippets of the score from Vertigo at various points in the first act I couldn't fathom. It sets the mood that we're watching a thriller where all is not as it seems, and that's completely inappropriate.

The revolve is pointless, unnecessary, overused and incredibly distracting.

Clearly someone decided they wanted a monochrome theme throughout, but then presumably someone else pointed out that black props might be invisible, so they went for blue. Why blue? No idea. But not the newspaper; that could have been on blue paper, but, no, it's stubbornly black on white.

The two directors, just like Jamie Lloyd, betray a vast ignorance of the cinematic genre to which they seem to believe they are paying homage. High definition video, here in a multitude of inauthentic aspect ratios, and 24 frames-per-second 35mm celluloid have an entirely different look and feel. They are chalk and cheese. It's possible to use electronic tricks to make the former resemble the latter (although far from perfectly) but none of these directors bother. Their attempts to evoke the romanticism of the silver screen is epic only in its failure.

This also means that when not contending with the incessant rotation of the stage floor, the audience is further distracted by the modern, hi-tech camera being paraded about as obtrusively as possible.

With some serious workshopping and rework, there could be a good four-star play to be found here, but this ain't it. The ill-judged and ham-fisted directorial choices only compound the problems. We would be firmly in two-star territory were it not for Hawes who keeps it interesting.

Three stars.

Act 1: 19:33-20:40
Act 2: 21:00-22:10

Excellent review, MKB. You described its failings perfectly. Such a wasted opportunity.

[kate8]

I assumed the monochrome blue set was like a green screen to take the video out of their mundane lives?

I wanted to like this, but just felt there were too many competing elements thrown in by the writer, director and designer - romance, political drama, kitchen sink drama, revolving stage, video screens, film references, lots of distracting stagehands and camerapeople. The romance didn’t feel like it fitted in at all or had any point to make - I wasn’t sure if it was meant to be a fantasy?

I liked the basic story of Iris and the conflict between her political and personal lives, between motherhood and work, and between being a GP and her political commitment to a better health service which pulls her away from actually doing medicine. I think that would have been enough for a really interesting play without all the distractions.

No criticism of any of the actors, who were all great, especially the two women.

[A.Ham]

Yes, so interesting reading these latest reviews now I’ve seen it. I agree with a lot of the points made but did on the whole enjoy it - as others have said, elevated by Keeley Hawes who was as excellent as ever.

Re. the blue for everything on set (bar the newspaper!) I assumed it was for the NHS, given that’s the colour long associated with their logo, signage etc.

[Dave B]

Apr 2, 2024 7:26:11 GMT A.Ham said:

Re. the blue for everything on set (bar the newspaper!) I assumed it was for the NHS, given that’s the colour long associated with their logo, signage etc.

Yup, I'm fairly sure that was NHS blue throughout.

[greatauntedna]

I loved it, 5 stars!

[bwayboy22]

I am a huge fan of Keeley Hawes and booked this the minute they went on sale to see her perform. How on earth did this play make it to the stage? Lordy! That revolve was giving me motion sickness. Poor Keeley - it's a miracle she can perform so beautifully while being spun around like that! I hated the super short scenes, the poor stage hands having to hold the props for the actors, the constant moving of set pieces required by the short scenes, the annoying cameras filming in B&W - I want to watch live theatre, not a screen! The ridiculous music accompanying the romance made me laugh out loud a couple of times as it was so cheesy! The two stories were not well blended together and not very interesting. I was so disappointed! The all blue props was also a horrible choice.

On the positive side, I thought the acting was very good especially from Keeley Hawes, Pearl Mackie, Tom Goodman-Hill and Siobhan Redmond. I thought Jack Davenport was fine but nothing really special in his performance. They did their best but couldn't overcome the horrible direction/script. If I were Keeley I would have tried to get out of this if I could. The amount of choreography and memorization required for the staging was ridiculous and didn't add to the story at all, it was just distracting and annoying.

5* for the cast
2* for the show

[mkb]

I wonder if the problems come from having two directors rather than a single coherent vision.

[bordeaux]

What a mess this is. I can't think what persuaded me to book so far in advance and spend that amount of money!