Reader Reviews
Really Old, Like Forty Five (Cottesloe (National Theatre), West End)
Back to Show Details| Score | Comment | Date |
 | As someone who is really old, like 51 and feeling every day of it at the moment, Tamsin Oglesby's play is a look at a potentially grim future. Given the average age of a NT matinee audience I dread to think what they made of it. The play is a clever satire which just about manages not to fall into the trap of stretching the bounds of plausibility too far and it's also very funny in places - the comparison of sex to pantomime is brilliant. In an excellent cast it's a neat trick to cast Judy Parfitt as the sister with Alzheimer's and the wonderfully dotty Marcia Warren as the (marginally) more clued up sister; she also gets most of the funniest lines. Occasionally the moralising is far from subtle but this is a rewarding contribution to the highly topical debate on caring for the elderly and having the right to die with dignity. As just one example, Joanna Lumley has proposed an army of adoptive grandparents - just as in the play - and the idea of separate speed lanes foe pedestrians is brilliant, but then again I'm about as impatient as Gawn Grainger's cantankerous Robbie. I'm surprised at how many negative reviews this has received, I found it mostly enjoyable and quite provocative. - David Baxter | 20 Apr 10 |
| The biggest problem about this play is that it doesn't sell itself honestly. If you go expecting a great night's entertainment and don't expect anything blindingly avant garde or full of poignant politics you certainly won't be disappointed. The acting is superb, the story unfolds cleverly and unexpectedly and it is great entertainment. Superb value - we loved it and so did the rest of the audience last Saturday when we went. - Mrs H | 23 Feb 10 |
| Well, not as high as 3 but not as low as 2 really! New plays have become a rarity at the National, so it's disappointing to report that their choice has again be found lacking. The play is set in the future when the old who have no family to care for them have to choose between becoming grandparents for teenage orphans or the subject of clinical and surgical trials. It's a satire / a black comedy / a tragicomedy which I'm afraid doesn't really work. It's a very good idea and a very topical subject. I'm not entirely sure why it doesn't work, but I think it's because it isn't enough of anything - enough of a satire to bite or enough of a black comedy to make you wince and laugh simultaneously. The main reason to see the show is a terrific performance by New Adventures dancer Michela Meazza as a robot nurse which is technically impeccable and an absolute hoot. There was a time when plays like Jerusalem and Enron were staged at the National; what's happened? - Gareth James | 17 Feb 10 |
| brilliant, vivid and sensitive juggling of the complex issues that surround dementia, executed through great innovative and imaginative writing and stagecraft, but consequently challenging for an audience to get to grips with if they are not able to cope with such difficult themes or approaches. people will love it or hate it! - gerald | 10 Feb 10 |
| Paul Ritter is fantastic as always and indeed the whole cast are good and the production and design etc are all pretty good but I thought the play was trivial, facile, unfocussed and uneven. And smug- are jokes about characters being at the National (while performing in a play at the National, do you see?!) really THAT clever or funny? - Benet Catty | 06 Feb 10 |
| poor play. not funny, and doesn't make sense. some interesting ideas and moments, but feels like a very early draft. - natalia | 05 Feb 10 |
| Simply dreadful - went with friends, one of whom would rather remove his nose hairs with a burning candle than leave a play at the interval - needless to say neither he nor I lasted 'til the second half. - James C | 05 Feb 10 |
| Play all over the shop, BUT you can't fault the talent of Michela Meazza as the robot! A stunning performance in a play that doesn't quite know what to focus on. - Steven Davidson | 04 Feb 10 |
| quite the worst play that i have seen at the National, Nation, only being a fraction better! Badly written and directed, but very well acted. A confusing production, it did not seem to know where it was going and consequently resulted in a mess. a very luke warm response the night i saw it. - tom berg | 04 Feb 10 |
| Judy Parfitt and Marcia Warren are the best things in this confused play that is nowhere 'savagely comic' as it claims to be. - addicted to theatre | 04 Feb 10 |
