It gets better. Mark Rosenblatt’s now multi-Olivier-winning play was a remarkably well-timed reassessment of Roald Dahl’s national treasure status when it was first performed at the Royal Court in October last year. This West End transfer feels even more potent and pertinent thanks to John Lithgow’s remarkable reprised performance as Britain’s best and most loved writer of children’s stories – and now notorious, even to non-Jews, antisemite.
It helps that in Nicholas Hytner’s gripping production set in the author’s Buckinghamshire house in the summer of 1983 during renovations, Rosenblatt captures the dry yet acidic wit that Dahl directs at anyone deemed worthy of his displeasure.
In his cross hairs is the play’s pivotal fictional character – Jessica Stone (Aya Cash), who represents Dahl’s concerned American publishers. His review of a book of photographs capturing the suffering of Beirut citizens during Israel’s bombardment of the city in 1982 was an antisemitic rant. With The Witches about to be published, Stone and Dahl’s (real life) agent Tom Maschler (Elliot Levey) embark on damage- limitation exercise which, aided by Dahl’s wife Felicity (Rachael Stirling), must involve an apology. But no deal.
That Dahl’s resistance is fuelled by a deep-seated loathing of Jews – including Stone and even Maschler – is slowly and shockingly revealed. Watching Lithgow release the bigotry like bottled poison is like witnessing one of Dahl’s witches transform from upstanding citizen to grotesque hateful attack dog.
The power of the play for me lies in its ability to convey the condition of being a British Jew in a way no other work has captured
But the power of the play for me lies in its ability to convey the condition of being a British Jew in a way no other work has captured. Key to this is Levey’s serenely civilised Maschler who embodies the figure of the sophisticated anglicised Jew. That is until he is goaded by his client into revealing what it is like to go to parties where he is made to account for Israel’s actions “as if I’m the f*cking ambassador”.
On top of this layer of Jewish experience there is the well observed difference between relaxed American Jewish identity – as embodied by Cash’s Stone – and the more tense English version. “England’s another planet,” explains Maschler to his American colleague. “It’s not Manhattan!” he adds before defending Dahl with the promise that he wouldn’t be friends with someone who fundamentally hated him.
“So we’re friends?” asks Dahl.
The production is appreciably enhanced by new cast member Cash who, though playing a fictitious character, captures the all-too-real anger and fear that goes with being at the sharp end of British antisemitism.
Theatre: Giant
Harold Pinter Theatre
★★★★★
