Due to a weird fluke of theatre availability, Rufus Norris’s final Dorman season at the NT ran on for a few months longer than his final season at the Olivier and Lyttelton theatres. So while Indhu Rubasingham’s tenure started in October at the two larger venues, Man and Boy is the moment she finally takes over the Dorfman.
It’s also unusual insofar as the NT’s smallest venue has almost exclusively staged new writing for decades now. This, however, is Anthony Lau’s revival of a semi-obscure Terence Rattigan play. Set during the Great Depression, Man and Boy follows amoral financier Gregor Antonescu as he holes up in the New York City apartment of his estranged son Basil in an effort to regroup and plan anew following the ravages of the stock market collapse.
Last seen in London in 2005 in a West End production starring David Suchet, it’s never been viewed as a stone cold Rattigan classic but it’ll be interesting to see it restaged in the age of Trump. And needless to say an intimate National Theatre production sounds like a proper treat, with Lau directing a cast of Ben Daniels as Gregor and Laurie Kynaston as Basil.
