Patriots – Almeida / Noel Coward Theatre

[mkb]

Peter Morgan's play ponders whether those vying for power in 90s Russia following Perestroika were idealistic patriots or greedy opportunists, or the former corrupted into the latter by circumstance and realpolitik. It leaves the question open.

In the hands of, say, Mike Bartlett, such rich material would have lent itself to an epic Shakespearean tragedy, but Morgan's treatment squanders the opportunity, and the writing feels more akin to the style of the soap operas that masquerade as prime-time tv historical drama serials these days. This is not helped by excessive expositional dialogue shoe-horned in. There are also some cringemakingly-awful attempts to extract allegories from simple mathematical concepts a la Tom Stoppard.

I had forgotten that one of my reasons for booking Patriots was the presence of Tom Hollander as Boris Berezovsky. So, from my side-circle, front-row, vantage point last night, looking down on the lead's artificially balding crown, it took me a few minutes to place the familiar voice, so different was his appearance.

Any character who could believably have risen to command power and wealth in the former Soviet Union is always going to be a larger-than-life one, and Hollander delivers that, yet keeps Berezovsky human and avoids pathos or turning him into a pantomime villain. It is a bravura performance.

Both Will Keen as Mad Vlad Putin and Luke Thallon as Abramovich are exceptional, their body language being unnervingly accurate. (Interestingly, the production chooses to pronounce the former-Chelsea-owning oligarch's surname with the accent on the second syllable as practised by football pundits, rather than the third as we've been told is more accurate.)

For such a tiny theatre as the Almeida, the set design is unnecessarily and wastefully large. The sides are invisible from the Circle so rarely used, and the front did not need to protrude so far as to knock out several rows of Stalls seating.

This is a production that will be talked about for years and is very much worth seeing, but it falls well short of its potential. The fault lies with the playwright.

Three stars.

Act 1: 19:34-20:41
Act 2: 21:02-22:13

[Dave B]

Hollander, Keen and Thallon (who wow can wear a suit!) are all great and worth price of admission. The rest kinda left me cold throughout. For me, it either needed to be cut down and pacing looked at or it needs to go full on Lehman Trilogy and commit to a deeper dive into the events it is trying to cover off.

[tmesis]

I was totally absorbed by this - unlike The Lehman Trilogy which I hated. Fantastic performances and stylish design and for me a return to form for The Almeida whose previous recent offerings have left me cold.

[andrew]

Has anyone sat in rows G/H in the stalls for this? They were marked as restricted view when I booked and I was wondering how restricted they are.

[tmesis]

Yes I was in row G (£10) seat. It's just the usual thing of the pillar but I didn't find it off putting. For the money it's an absolute bargain.

[Dave B]

Jul 26, 2022 11:47:46 GMT andrew said:

Has anyone sat in rows G/H in the stalls for this? They were marked as restricted view when I booked and I was wondering how restricted they are.

Heh, I've sat in both and at the same show.

Often with the strange way Almeida sells and presents these restricted seats, we book one at £10 for me and one the other side of the house at £10 for my better half and sometimes we'll swap at the interval just because. There is a black pillar in the way but it's pretty easy to lean to see around, there is enough space to see each side. For this show I was in G18 and then H9 and I didn't feel like I missed anything. For the price difference of the £40 seat directly next to me - it's more than worth the slight inconvenience. If you go in expecting to lean and to swap between which side of the pillar you lean a couple of times each act, I think you'll be fine.

I'm know I'm not the only one around here that likes these seats, they pop-up in Almeida threads reasonably often as cheap, value seats that are nothing like as restricted as Almeida seem to think they are and they can often get snapped up early.

[Jon]

Jul 26, 2022 19:27:47 GMT catw said:

Rumour this is transferring to the Noel Coward spring next year.

I assume it's due to Tom Hollander's availability as he's shooting a film straight after Patriot's Almeida run.

[theatrefan77]

This was very good overall. Interesting play about Russian politics. Enjoyed the performances too. Good to see Jamael Westman on stage again after Hamilton, although it's a small part.

[jm25]

Thought this was pretty dry. Second half considerably stronger than the first but overall thought it was a bit ‘meh’. Liked the use of space a lot but didn’t care for the sound - the mixing certainly felt a bit off.

[peggs]

Loved this, writing, set, lighting, sound , acting. Knew next to nothing going in and that was fine. Held my attention throughout and left me wanting to go away and find out more.

[showgirl]

So agree, peggs: saw yesterday's matinee and having read comments above re the need to know the political background or to the play being dry, I'd gone prepared not to understand and maybe to want to leave at the interval, but I loved it from the very start and there was never a dull moment. I hadn't expected the staging to be so lively, which certainly helped, but after The Southbury Child last Saturday and now this, I feel extremely fortunate to have seen 2 such well-written, entertaining and thought-provoking plays within little more than a week. And a steal for £10, even with the pillars.

[peggs]

I was at that performance too, I had a 2 week gap from The Southbury Child but quite agree with your sentiment.

[Latecomer]

Really enjoyed this too. Great staging and fabulous dialogue….plenty of humour and an interesting and clearly told story. The maths was absolute rubbish that they put on the blackboard, which was a bit annoying. If they were going to pretend to do a mathematical exchange at least make it a real one….not some garbage. But apart from that I enjoyed it a lot! I lived though all the London stuff, watching the news at the time, but had no idea who the main character was in this play before this. Fascinating!

[Forrest]

Aug 8, 2022 12:27:30 GMT Latecomer said:

RThe maths was absolute rubbish that they put on the blackboard, which was a bit annoying. If they were going to pretend to do a mathematical exchange at least make it a real one….not some garbage. 

This made me laugh! My partner is a mathematician and I was so sorry he was not at the Almeida with me to tell me whether it indeed was garbage (which I assumed it to be). Thank you for solving that mystery! :) It reminds me of a brilliant article I read years ago about how computer programming when shown in films is mostly just "garbage" too, and it made me wonder - why?! If you're going to do something like this, do it right. I fully agree.

[stevemar]

I really enjoyed this play - well staged*, fantastic performances from Tom Hollander, Will Keen and Luke Thallon. All of them brought so much to their roles.

Although Boris Berezovsky is hardly a sympathetic character, Tom Hollander really brought him to life. I have some familiarity with his real life story, but I wonder how much of the play was written before the Russia-Ukraine conflict.

(*) the stage did seem unnecessarily large for the Almeida. Row C was the front row and I think that means 2 or even 3 rows had been removed. It’s almost as if the stage had been designed for the Old Vic, where the 47th really was inferior to this play IMO. But I wonder how much of that is due to the personalities in this play being slightly less well known?

4.5 stars from me.

Some trademark Rupert Goold flourishes, but he can bring out the best performances from actors who really raise the play to a much higher level I think than some of the dialogue. Oh, the mix of accents was a bit off putting at first.

[Rory]

Does anyone know where this is transferring to?

[Being Alive]

Spring. Noel Coward after Best of Enemies I think.

[jaggy]

Glad someone brought up the accents in this.

I was confused as to why Jamael Westman was using a Liverpudlian accent. I thought maybe they were trying to create a class distinction as the characters in power used RP accents whilst the other characters used regional accents. I assume that was their intention but Westman should have used a different accent. His scouse was awful!

[alessia]

Aug 11, 2022 19:47:56 GMT Rory said:

Does anyone know where this is transferring to?

just tweeted!

[Rory]

Aug 11, 2022 21:55:31 GMT Being Alive said:

Spring. Noel Coward after Best of Enemies I think.

Good shout!

[theatrefan77]

Front row at the Noel Coward has just been released. Just £20 per seat

[jakobo]

Do we know how high the stage is?

[mrbarnaby]

May 20, 2023 22:35:10 GMT jakobo said:

Do we know how high the stage is?

3’ high

[jakobo]

Seems a bargain then unless I’m missing something. Are those front row seats only available for previews?

[max]

May 21, 2023 12:23:19 GMT mrbarnaby said:

May 20, 2023 22:35:10 GMT jakobo said:

Do we know how high the stage is?

3’ high

The DMT website says "the front of the stage is very high, and you may miss moments of the performance".  This shows when your cursors hovers over front row seats.