Reader Reviews
Cloaca (Old Vic Theatre, West End)
Back to Show Details| Score | Comment | Date |
 | Irritating and dull. The odd line sparkles but every character seems so insular and glib. Very disappointing. - addicted to theatre | 20 Apr 10 |
| Absolutely superb - no regrets at parting with forty quid to see this one. Funnny, touching, well acted and general all round class entertainment. Perfectly cast too, I might add. - 195.92.198.75) | 03 Nov 04 |
| Terrible play. Dreadful choice for the start of Kevin Spacey's reign. Sentimental and incredible. Presumably someone thought wrongly that this would be another "Art". However, wonderfully acted, directed and designed. But how much better it would have been if there had been no interval. - 80.177.231.164) | 29 Oct 04 |
| Great cast, shame about the script. Appreciate Mr Spacey may be playing safe by choosing a new work thus evading directorial comparison however the lack of cohesive characters or plausible plot detracted from good performances by his cast. Some clumsiness in direction was revealed around the scene changes and lack of clarity on ending (another reflection of the script quality) £40 ticket price hard to justify despite attractive set and cast. - 81.134.189.253) | 27 Oct 04 |
| Overall rather disappointing, despite good performances from the cast. Highlights were the Madness take-off and Ingeborga Dapkunaite's outburst in Russian (you somehow got the drift of what she meant). Despite some funny lines, the play was too long and meandering - ultimately it was difficult to care about what happened to any of the characters (except maybe Ingeborga!). - 62.255.64.10) | 24 Oct 04 |
| Saw it Saturday night 25th absolutely brilliant the critics don't know their Blues Brothers from their Madness 5 encores so the audience must have liked it. Adrian Lukis biggest hit of the night got the loudest applause. Dance routine was hilarious. Didn't know if I was going to be laughing or crying from one scene to the next. Thought the ending was really well done by Neil Pearson. - USER: Whatsonstage.com (194.201.43.25) | 01 Oct 04 |
| A wonderful play, although £40 for a matinee ticket was overpriced! Hugh Bonneville's perfomance will stay with me for a long time and I laughed so much at the Madness ( yes Madness, not Blues Brothers, whichever reviewer said that) that I pulled my stomach muscles. I'd love to see it again but it's not within my means, unfortunately - USER: Whatsonstage.com (84.92.20.229) | 01 Oct 04 |
| The £5 price tag for the programme was outrageous - particularly as I had just paid £80 for two matinee tickets. I don't care if it was the Old Vic magazine too, I just wanted a theatre programme as a memento. The play itself was marvellous, I thoroughly enjoyed it and wish I could afford to see it again. - USER: Whatsonstage.com (195.92.67.77) | 01 Oct 04 |
| to echo the thoughts of others - this play was "wrong" but it is difficult to determine why... perhaps it was the lack of empathy then audience felt with any of the characters, perhaps it was the "trasmit mode" manner in which the clever, but unsubtle, dialogue was delivered, perhaps it was because it had a forced (falsed?) ending, or perhaps it was just an average play, adequetly executed. IMHO - USER: Whatsonstage.com (217.44.85.172) | 01 Oct 04 |
| I liked it very much, it's the best play I have seen in a long time. I thought all the actors were great, I would have enjoyed it even more if the couple next to me wasn't talking all the way through it. Maybe Mr Spacey can tell the audience not to talk through performances as well as not use their mobile etc. - USER: Whatsonstage.com (62.30.182.199) | 29 Sep 04 |
| I liked it very much, it's the best play I have seen in a long time. I thought all the actors were great, I would have enjoyed it even more if the couple next to me wasn't talking all the way through it. Maybe Mr Spacey can tell the audience not to talk through performances as well as not use their mobile etc. - USER: Whatsonstage.com (62.30.182.199) | 29 Sep 04 |
| A truly disappointing start. Not quire sure about Kevin Spacey's knowledge of theatre. If this is it, then it's just superficial. All about look and nothing on content. The actors did the best they could with the material, but at the end of the day I didn't care one iota about any of them and so much was telegraphed before it happened that the tragic ending is only tragic because it took so long to get there! - USER: Whatsonstage.com (80.177.104.153) | 29 Sep 04 |
| 4 of us saw it on the 25th September and we were very disappointed. Expected a dark comedy and found we were watching a TV sitcom. All the actors seemed to be shouting the lines (there were some mildly amusing ones)and the production was over-long; 90 minutes without interval would have worked better. Considering the set remained unchanged throughout I could not understand why there were some many breaks for no apparent reason. At the end none of us really cared what happened to any of the characters. However, based on the audience reaction at the end we were in the minority at our performance. - USER: Whatsonstage.com (82.44.202.21) | 26 Sep 04 |
| while the first act seemed very long, it was well-done. Think the ending needs work as don't think the audience knew it was "the end" with all the "lights out-scene changes" We saw it at the final dress rehearsal and would certainly recommend it - USER: Whatsonstage.com (192.30.226.31) | 25 Sep 04 |
| while the first act seemed very long, it was well-done. Think the ending needs work as don't think the audience knew it was "the end" with all the "lights out-scene changes" We saw it at the final dress rehearsal and would certainly recommend it - USER: Whatsonstage.com (192.30.226.31) | 25 Sep 04 |
| hmmm ... I don't know why, but this does not work. To criticise a play for being too 'stagey' seems ridiculous, but I just felt it was trying too hard. I thought the acting was truly excellent in the case of Hugh Bonneville and Adrian Lukis but maybe our Kev is simply not the greatest director on the planet?? The interminable scene changes with retro music and blackouts only to alight on a new scene where an actor has just picked up a jacket and moved across the stage drove me mad. All that said, the Old Vic is such a fabulous theatre to sit in that I did quite enjoy myself. I would not see it again though, and I wouldn't really recommend it. - USER: Whatsonstage.com (217.44.80.53) | 24 Sep 04 |
| The main problem with this play is that every character plays off Pieter and in order to buy into the play, you have to buy into him. And this is where it falls down - at first I thought Stephen Tompkinson wasn't comfortable with this role but then as the play progressed, I came to the conclusion that he simply cannot act. The whole performance was wooden and forced and rendered the character completely unbelievable. So although the other three leads were outstanding (despite the dreadful stereotype casting - maybe playing "safe" for Spacey's directorial debut) the play is unable to ring true and the end left me cold. Having said that there are some great lines, it is darkly funny and the direction is outstanding so it makes for a very enjoyable evening out. If you can get past the opening scene where both the diaogue and the performance are truely awful (perhaps something is lost in translation here?) then I would recommend this play - particularly if you enjoyed Art. But you can't help but leave feeling that it could have been, and should have been that much better than it is. - USER: Whatsonstage.com (81.138.39.65) | 24 Sep 04 |
| I thought the play was magnificent. I saw it on the first preview night and it was certainly packed out then. It received a standing ovation at the end. I thought the play was hilarious, moving and touching and brilliantly acted by everyone, especially Adrian Lukis. I'm seeing it again next month and can't wait. Definitely one of the best plays I've seen in a long time. - USER: Whatsonstage.com (195.92.67.76) | 22 Sep 04 |
| This is the first London play we have seen since our son was born nearly five years ago and we were looking forward to it...Maybe the cast was miscast or the dialogue lost in translation(alhtough I am a fan of tomkinson and pearson) but I found the whole thing dull, unfunny most of the time, poor unsensational storyline, confusing and just a little tedious. My husband and I kept thinking, that this must be good, it's a west end play for goodness sake, but ever heard the story about the emperor's new suit? We watched it all, listened to all the pretentious chit chat that Londoners love to indulge in and hot footed it to Gerrard Street for a duck soup and thought we could do better. Watch this space. - USER: Whatsonstage.com (80.189.163.103) | 21 Sep 04 |
| I thought the play was magnificent. I saw it on the first preview night and it was certainly packed out then. It received a standing ovation at the end. I thought the play was hilarious, moving and touching and brilliantly acted by everyone, especially Adrian Lukis. I'm seeing it again next month and can't wait. Definitely one of the best plays I've seen in a long time. - USER: Whatsonstage.com (195.92.67.76) | 20 Sep 04 |
| I found the first act long and tedious. There were a few good laughs here and there, but mostly the humour was as laboured as a tired old sitcom, yet littered with obscenities. The characters were wooden and unconvincing as old friends and the writing was so bad at times, causing the performers to over-act. The first act was an hour and a half, with a plot that seemed to be going nowhere fast. After looking at my watch several times, I assumed that this was going to be another one of those short productions without an interval. I was therefore surprised to find that there was another act to come, and quite frankly, I could not take any more and left, so I have no idea if the play did develop. Thank goodness I bought my ticket at TKTS. - USER: Whatsonstage.com (195.92.67.76) | 20 Sep 04 |
| I saw the first preview of this last night and it really didn't disappoint. The four main characters had a very convincing collective chemistry, and were individually convincing. A particular highlight is Hugh Bonneville as Jan, a ruthlessly ambitious politician who becomes progressively more tortured by the increasing self awareness of what he has become. A great start for Kevin Spacey at the Old Vic. - USER: Whatsonstage.com (193.194.7.84) | 17 Sep 04 |
