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Synopsis A satirical play about money and movies - desire and ambition. The three-hander focuses on a producer called Bobby and his decision, brought about by his seduction by a temporary secretary, to film a novel about a nuclear catastrophe and the end of the world rather than the star-laden, sure-fire hit brought to him by his friend Charlie. The original Broadway production starred Madonna while the British premiere was produced by the National in 1989.
Hollywood actors, and real-life friends, Jeff Goldblum and Kevin Spacey play Hollywood producer buddies Bobby Gould and Charlie Fox in the Old Vic’s 20th anniversary revival of David Mamet’s Speed-the-Plow, which opened last night (12 February 2008, previews from 1 February) for a limited season to 26 April (See Also Today’s 1st Night Photos).
In Speed-the-Plow, Gould and Fox engage in a verbal boxing match centred around the eternal debate of art versus money. Should Gould go for another bad blockbuster that will make his fortune or put himself on the line for an adaptation of a spiritual, apocalyptic novel offered to him by his beautiful secretary Karen?
The three-hander’s cast is completed by British musical theatre star Laura Michelle Kelly, who makes her play acting debut in the production, alongside Goldblum making his West End debut. The Old Vic production is directed by Matthew Warchus and designed by Rob Howell – whose most recent collaborations include Boeing-Boeing and The Lord of the Rings - with lighting by Paul Pyant.
It’s not often the first night critics unanimously agree on something, but this production of Mamet’s Speed-the-Plow is one of those rare occasions. Mainly down to Kevin Spacey and Jeff Goldblum’s “high-octane acting”, the piece has received four-star rave reviews hailing it as “an absolute blast of a smash hit” and “infinitely better than the National premiere in 1989”. Together, the critics agree, Spacey and Goldblum create the “virtuoso double act” in Matthew Warchus’ “exhilarating” and “cracking” revival.
Michael Coveney on Whatsonstage.com (four stars) - “David Mamet’s Speed-the-Plow has lost none of its bravura brilliance or ironic take on Hollywood creative morality. In Matthew Warchus’ crackling revival, Jeff Goldblum and Kevin Spacey prove the hottest double act in town … Goldblum is about eight feet tall and as elegant as a heron. His stage movement is fantastic, a sort of hip-swivelling shimmy with finger-clicks and fancy footwork while Spacey bounces around after him like an untrained puppy. I see a lot of Spacey’s hero, Jack Lemmon, in this performance, its slouch and panic-stricken small-mindedness. Hardly letting each other complete a sentence, the impact is electrifying … While the show’s main weakness is the lack of fire power in Kelly’s messianic central speeches – she looks absolutely gorgeous but is frankly over-parted – it soon recovers in this final, shattering section. Rob Howell’s sleek design, lit with provocative extremes of shade and brightness, by Paul Pyant, matches the performances perfectly. Warchus’ revival is infinitely better than the National premiere in 1989 and more exciting than the West End version eight years ago.”
Michael Billington in the Guardian (four stars) - “In Matthew Warchus' exhilarating revival we not only get some bravura, high-octane acting from Kevin Spacey and Jeff Goldblum but a also sense of the ultimate hollowness of an industry, and a society, based on buddy-buddy values. The set-up is classic Mamet … In Warchus' helter-skelter production, we grasp the spiritual overtones while relishing the air of satanic buoyancy; and Spacey, in particular, gives a masterly performance as Charlie. He's so pumped up by the bitch-goddess success that he does yoga exercises while frantically puffing on a cigarette … The greatness of Spacey's performance, however, lies in the suggestion that, under the comic bluster and feverish energy, exists a desperate human being and a source of infinite corruption. Goldblum offers a perfect foil as Bobby … Laura Michelle Kelly has exactly the right teasing ambiguity: she's an indecipherable mix of Joan of Arc and ambitious studio go-getter. It's the acting that motors the evening; and what comes across, through the hectic, often overlapping dialogue, is the sense that language is a form of camouflage rather than a means of communication.”
Charles Spencer in the Daily Telegraph - “Wow, these two guys are on fire. Kevin Spacey and Jeff Goldblum take to the stage of the Old Vic in David Mamet’s Hollywood satire as if determined to set the place ablaze. And they do just that … Both actors deliver Mamet’s sharp, smart, rat-a-tat dialogue with a panache that creates a thrill of pure pleasure. And though every word is scripted, there is a wild, wired spontaneity about these performances, a daring overlapping of speeches, and an ability to turn the mood on a sixpence that puts one in mind of two improvising jazz musicians at the very top of their game. As well as capturing all the verbal rhythms and comic panache of Mamet’s writing, the pair also prove exceptional physical actors. Just the sight of the implausibly tall Goldblum’s pipe-cleaner legs and goofy hangdog face makes one smile … Spacey, in contrast, as Charlie Fox, is by turns obnoxious, funny, pitiful, scabrous, cunning and scary … During the performance itself the charismatic brilliance of Spacey and Goldblum, and the subtle radiance of Kelly, silence all niggling criticism of Mamet’s brilliant but flawed script. There’s no doubt: the Old Vic has an absolute blast of a smash hit on its hands.”
Paul Taylor in the Independent - In “Matthew Warchus' breakneck, intriguingly balanced revival … the recently promoted head of production, Goldblum's lithe, leggy, finger-clicking Bobby Gould zig-zags round his new office with a snappy, fast-talking cool. Kevin Spacey, playing his long-time buddy, Charlie Fox, is a nervous wreck of wired-up, hyperactive elation. He can't believe his luck. Just when he has the chance to cash in on this connection, along comes the script of a routine prison buddy movie that's bound to be a smash because there's a bankable star on board … Warchus' astute, high-powered production shows great canniness in the casting of the third character, a temporary secretary who threatens to drive a wedge between the friends when she proposes a rival project. Tapping into the not-quite-of-this-world quality she had in Mary Poppins, Laura Michelle Kelly makes you believe in the temp's rhapsodic belief in the project. Thanks to her air of enigmatic integrity, you are prepared to credit that her convictions are not compromised by a willingness to use sex as a means of persuasion, and that she is the cause of a Damascene flash of idealism in Gould.”
Nicholas de Jongh in the Evening Standard (four stars) - “What a rare, theatrical triumph Kevin Spacey and Jeff Goldblum achieve with their virtuoso double act in Speed-the-Plow. By sheer acting firepower, they help disguise the fact that David Mamet's famous assault on the philistine materialism of the Hollywood movie industry, its immoralists, hustlers and dimwits, packs a pretty soft punch … Spacey has long been a master of full-frontal menace and vituperation, but he surpasses himself in the climactic act of Speed-the-Plow as Charlie Fox the freelance film producer … For Goldblum's elegantly vacuous studio head or airhead, Bobby Gould, has fallen for a temporary secretary, Laura Michelle Kelly's well-upholstered but pallid Karen, and her own hippie choice of film script … Matthew Warchus' dynamically choreographed production encourages Spacey and Goldblum to maintain terrific physical momentum … Laura Michelle Kelly, a notable leading lady in musicals, makes an odd choice for the role of Karen, whose sexual power and eagerness to spellbind Bobby with post flower-power mysticism she does not convey in a sometimes inaudible performance … (But) the Spacey/Goldblum combination proves a winning one.”
Benedict Nightingale in The Times (four stars) - “David Mamet’s satire on Tinseltown greed, need and terminal triviality has its flaws; but it provides two super roles for men able to cope with his brash, breathless dialogue. And last night Jeff Goldblum, playing the head of production at a major studio, and Kevin Spacey, the fixer bringing him a bankable star, didn’t merely rise to the challenge. Nobody with the least interest in acting should miss the snap and crackle, whiz and fizz of, in particular, their opening scene. Imagine a game of ping-pong played with several balls, some filled with hand-grenades, and you’ve the way Spacey and Goldblum manage a swaggering, streetwise poetry that overlaps, breaks off, explodes. The speed is tremendous: less a run than an Olympic sprint over hurdles, with double-somersaults in between. It’s as expertly acrobatic as the Cirque du Soleil — and funnier than anything their clowns have recently concocted. Amazingly, it’s also perfectly clear.”
Twenty years old now, and first seen in New York with Madonna driving a wedge between two best buddies in the movie business, David Mamet’s Speed-the-Plow has lost none of its bravura brilliance or ironic take on Hollywood creative morality.
In Matthew Warchus’s crackling revival, Jeff Goldblum and Kevin Spacey prove the hottest double act in town. Bobby Gould (Goldblum) is a newly promoted studio mogul whose sidekick – they started out in the mailroom together – the desperate, dishevelled Charlie Fox (Spacey), has hooked a big star from a rival studio with the bait of a prison movie with lots of sex, violence and titillation.
The snap and urgency of the situation comes from the star’s insistence that the project is given the green light within 24 hours. This becomes a problem when the head honcho, the unseen Ross, disappears on other business and delays the decisive meeting until the next morning.
Goldblum is about eight feet tall and as elegant as a heron. His stage movement is fantastic, a sort of hip-swivelling shimmy with finger-clicks and fancy footwork while Spacey bounces around after him like an untrained puppy. I see a lot of Spacey’s hero, Jack Lemmon, in this performance, its slouch and panic-stricken small-mindedness. Hardly letting each other complete a sentence, the impact is electrifying.
Then, randomly baiting the new temporary secretary Karen (Laura Michelle Kelly) and riding a bet from Charlie that he won’t sleep with her that very night, Bobby throws her the book of another potential property, a novel by “an Eastern sissy writer” about radiation and the end of the world, and asks her to give it a “courtesy read”.
In the second of three long scenes – total playing time 90 minutes – Karen nearly changes Bobby’s mind and his life. She loves the book. She burns with its redemptive power. Shaken and disturbed – and laid – Bobby returns to the office and tells Charlie he’s switching horses.
Goldblum now looks like a man hit by a truck. And his pristine white office, in decorative transition of builders’ ladders and boxes of scripts, becomes a savage battleground as Spacey explodes in demonic fury. While the show’s main weakness is the lack of fire power in Kelly’s messianic central speeches – she looks absolutely gorgeous but is frankly over-parted – it soon recovers in this final, shattering section.
Rob Howell’s sleek design, lit with provocative extremes of shade and brightness, by Paul Pyant, matches the performances perfectly. Warchus’ revival is infinitely better than the National premiere in 1989 and more exciting than the West End version eight years ago. But I wonder why nobody thought of adding Mamet’s Bobby Gould in Hell (1989) as a coda – and an encore?
Joesmith must have been day dreaming? Goldblum & Spacey were magnificent. Spacey in particular, in exquiste manic mode, gave out enough energy to light a small town so gawd knows what his carbon footprint must be like? lol! Perhaps, Laura Michelle Kelly could have produced something more interesting in her character, but maybe Matthew Wachus didn't want it that way? In anyway it didn't detract for me from the two star performers and an absolutely terrific one too from Spacey, one that will linger long in the mind. A not unsurprising sold out run that won't disappoint the punters.
- rds
23 Mar 08
Goldblum's mugging and dire attempts at upstaging and corpsing are a disgrace. This from someone who teaches acting. Mary Poppins is miscast and the show is entirely saved by Spacey's titanic attempts to hold it all together.Well done Kev! You get all the stars. - Joesmith
04 Mar 08
Tour de force performances from Spacey and Goldblum. Not so sure about Laura Michelle Kelly, Fight for a ticket!! - David
18 Feb 08
Even with all the interviews, reviews and buzz that there was to read for the past few weeks, I still wasn't sufficiently prepared for these exhilirating performances. Enigmatic yet forceful. Charming but rough. Probably was partially autobiographical for them but still very imaginative and creative. Spacey and Goldblum are magical together -- it was a brilliant pairing. An unforgettable night and one of the most exciting theater experiences ever had. These guys can challenge themselves to do anything and I couldn't admire them more. I didn't want it to end and I could have sat there for another show before going home. - Abigail Fox
17 Feb 08
Even with all the interviews, reviews and buzz that there was to read for the past few weeks, I still wasn't sufficiently prepared for these exhilirating performances. Enigmatic yet forceful. Charming but rough. Probably was partially autobiographical for them but still very imaginative and creative. Spacey and Goldblum are magical together -- it was a brilliant pairing. An unforgettable night and one of the most exciting theater experiences ever had. These guys can challenge themselves to do anything and I couldn't admire them more. I didn't want it to end and I could have sat there for another show before going home. - Abigail Fox
17 Feb 08
Speed-the-Plow benefits hugely from two towering performances from the principals. Jeff Goldblum is initially cocksure in his new promoted role but brilliantly conveys his insecurities and doubt about whether he should now be making "good" movies. Kevin Spacey has no such doubts and is wired to a dangerous frenzy. He also points up how inadequate Christian Slater was in Spacey's role in Swimming With Sharks. This is a much better play about Hollywood but the quality of the performances and the brilliance of the rapid-fire dialogue cannot disguise the fact that Mamet does not have anything new to say about the movie business. Also: it only last 90 minutes, is a midweek matinee too much to ask for? - David Baxter
14 Feb 08
What is it with musical actresses transferring to plays? I agree with the other comments here, Laura Michelle Kelly's stiffness was highlighted by the fluency between Jeff Goldblum and Kevin Spacey. Like Janie Dee in Shadowlands, she seemed hampered by a fake American accent. Surely there must be better actresses who could have fitted between the two stars more comfortably? - Sue Stanley
14 Feb 08
Goldblum and Spacey are fantastic, but the play sags severely in Act 2. (In fact I'd be tempted to cut it completely and go straight from Act 1 to Act 3.) Laura Michelle Kelly is bland and utterly overwhelmed by her co-stars. Her voice is so unappealing I rapidly switched off whenever she spoke: it was rather like the teacher in "Snoopy". Still, 4 stars just on the strength of two out of three wonderfully charismatic performances. - Quentin
13 Feb 08
The high score is really for the acting abilities of Goldblum and Spacey. Their machine-gun delivery is exhilerating to witness and will not be easy to forget. Goldblum has great comic timing and has charisma oozing from his pores,while spacey plays the funny, edgy, sometimes scary character that we have seen many times on screen. A truly great combination that leaves you wanting more.
The down points would have to be the second act that is between Goldblum and Kelly. First of all, Kelly seems to be in awe of her situation of being on stage with two seasoned actors. She's supposed to be seducing Goldblum, but she doesn't convey that at all. Secondly, the book that just has to be made into a film due to its shear greatness, sounds just plain dull and there are lots of quotes from this book that are confusing to say the least.
So, would I recommend you go see this play? Yes, but only for the acting masterclass of the two leads, if not the story itself. - Peter Daly
13 Feb 08
Superb - the contrast between the tall, poised Jeff Goldblum and a jumpy ever-moving Spacey was excellent. The speech was so fast - each talking over each other yet the audience picking up every clever nuance. I didn't want it to end - and what a surprising last scene. - Jenny Hornsey
The Old Vic is one of the oldest theatres in London and famous throughout the English speaking world. Long known as 'the actors theatre', many of the greatest performers of the last century have played on its stage. In September 2004, The Old Vic Theatre Company was launched, under the artistic leadership of Kevin Spacey, to present a wide range of work, from the classic to the new, to appeal to both traditional theatre-goers and new audiences.
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