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Natasha, Pierre, and the Great Comet of 1812 (Donmar Warehouse, London) - ★★★★ REVIEW
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Mickie Jo
Now, I know the Internet has collectively decided that we're going to be referring to this show, which has an incredibly long title, as Great Comet. But I missed that meeting and in fact, I, before it had reached Broadway, had been referring to it as Natasha Pierre. And since it's been in London, I've been giving it an even shorter nickname. I've been calling it Tashi P. Oh, my God. Hey, and welcome back. My name is Mickie Jo and I am obsessed with all things theatre. Hello to you. If you are watching me on YouTube or listening to me on a podcast platform. I am a professional theatre critic here on social media and today I'm going to be telling you about a show which I saw at the Donmar Warehouse that's now the right way around, which was Natasha Pierre and the Great Comet of 1812, a musical written by Dave Malloy, previously seen on Broadway, which had gained acclaim from an Off Broadway run, now receiving in a very different production, directed not by its original director, Rachel Chavkin, but by the new artistic director of the Donmar Warehouse, Timothy Sheder. Its UK premiere at a venue which is delivering a lot of exciting musical UK premieres recently. The Donmar recently finally brought Next to Normal to the uk. Now they have delivered with Natasha Pierre. But is this production one that will make its fans as excited as they were about the Broadway production? Is this going to deliver on that front? Now, I have been vaguely following this musical for a few years now. I first became aware of it before it moved to Broadway and I was following what unfolded during its run. But I had never fully immersed myself in the material because I always had the sense that this is something I wanted to see in its full theatrical context and understand, you know, with the full experience. And now I finally have. So in this review, we are going to be discussing not only the Donmar Warehouse production and this cast, but also the show itself and its material. Does it live up to the hype? This has a huge cult fan base at this point. Do we think it deserves it? And I say we, because as well as telling you what I think, I would also love to know what you think as well. If you have had the good fortune of seeing this at the Donmar Warehouse, let us all know what you thought about the show and this production in the comments section down below. In the meantime, if you enjoy this review, make sure to subscribe right here on YouTube. Follow me wherever you are hearing my voice or seek me out across the musical theatre Internet. I am Micky Joe Theatre. Everywhere you look, literally Everywhere you look, I will. I will be there. In the meantime, here is what I thought about Natasha, Pierre and the Great Comet of 1812 aka Tashi P. So what the heck is this show with an incredibly long winded title? Well, this is a musical adaptation of the famously short War and Peace. Not that the length of source material is anything to be concerned about. Les Miserables being the world's longest running musical. And in fact, this has the advantage of only adapting a section of War and Peace and depicting many of its characters, not only the titular Natasha and Pierre, but also several others, all of whom we are introduced to in a very pithy fourth wall shattering prologue, one that lets the audience know immediately all of this information is available in their programs. And they're going to have to pay attention and study up a little bit if they want to be able to follow the narrative that is unfolding on stage. And the most complex element of that probably is these characters and their interpersonal relationships, which is why the material is very smart. Dave Malloy has made a great choice in laying all of that out to us in a very informal way right at the top and explaining the defining traits of each character in a way that will exemplify what they go on to do in the show, as well as the key dynamics between many of them. The actual plot itself, outside of external factors, is not too complex. It sort of feels like Pride and Prejudice in Russia. It's a little bit Bridgerton adjacent. In order to really feel the weight of all of these actions, you have to remind yourself of the consequences of all of them. A young woman who is, you know, very elevated in society, breaking an engagement and eloping with a different suitor. And this having not been done as part of a formal engagement and this being the ruin of her and her family and all who associate with her. You have to get what a big deal this is in order to understand why everyone is losing their minds about it in this show. Met with a Modern Sensibility. This may not be quite as dramatic as you are expecting. Tonally, I would call this show somewhere between Les Miserables and A Little Night Music because, you know, we have these grand emotions and we have this grand scale and they duel, but it's also all about these romances and a lot of it is about lust and sex, as many of the best musicals are. Let us be honest with ourselves now, as they promise in that song, when they tell you this is all in your program, they are not lying. It is here somewhere we have this lovely little map of all of the characters to whom we are introduced. And I will share with you now some of the adjectives outlined in those lyrics, but before I do, they give us very important establishing pieces of information. There is a war going on out there somewhere and Andre isn't here. All of this taking place alongside an ongoing war that, you know, catalyzes the events of the show. It's important contextually, but it doesn't immediately affect any of these characters because most of them lived a very privileged existence where they don't have to be concerned by it. That, along with the absence of Andre, is key information in terms of what happens in this plot. We meet his young betrothed Natasha, who is a countess. She has recently arrived in Moscow, along with her close friend and cousin Sonia, who the song tells us is good, as it tells us that Natasha is young and loves Andre with all of her heart. She is young and critically naive, and Andre, I'll remind you, isn't here. That's because he is at war. They are engaged, but she is waiting for him to get back. However, as it happens, there are some things feudal Russia and Love island have in common, because it is not impossible for Natasha, even though she claims in an early song, to love no one else, to have her head turned. And who better to turn it than Anatol, who, we find out in this introductory number, is hot and spends his money on women and wine. We find out more important details about him later on, but I'll tell you about those in due time. We also meet his sister Helene, who announces comically to the audience that she is a slut. She is married to Pierre, who is the first character that we meet, but it's a little longer before we really get to know him. I'll tell you about him in just a moment. We meet smaller supporting characters, including Anatol's friend Dolokhov. We meet Andre's family, his sister and his father, who is kind of a lunatic. We meet Maria, who is the godmother of Natasha, with whom she is staying while she is in Moscow, who is strict yet kind. I think that's everyone in the song Balaga. Balaga is just for fun. Balaga is a taxi driver who makes a cameo, and any relationships which aren't a immediately outlined to us in that opening number soon become apparent because there are old alliances and friendships and marital resentments that are very important for all of the events which will follow. Now let's talk about Pierre, who feels very much a product of his circumstances, both the place, the culture and the time that he is living in, he is philosophical and riddled with angst and a lack of purpose. He is trapped in this loveless marriage with Helene, who, I will remind you, is a slut. And it's not a offensive for me to say so, because that's how she introduces herself. But she flaunts her extramarital affairs in front of Pierre, while her brother, with whom she is too close, by the way, uncomfortably close with those. There's something, something. Something inappropriate is happening there. While her brother extorts money from Pierre. He doesn't extort, he just constantly asks him for money. Pierre is, for much of the musical, gripped by an existential crisis and one that he explores in the quintessential style of Dave Malloy. Let me tell you a little bit about Mr. Malloy's writing. Take a little classical composition, take a little Sondheim, take a little drink of whiskey, take a contemporary edge, mix it all together and you have this slightly bohemian, slightly nostalgic, slightly cultural mixture, which has an edge and which has a bite and which is wildly intellectually stimulating. It's very smart, but with a wink to the audience. At the same time, there is a knowingness to the way that he writes, and it's very understandable why this has so captured the intrigue of young audiences as well. There is something really compelling about it and contemporary about it. It does a lot of the same things that Hamilton does. The two of them were in development around the same time, and each tells historic stories, but infuses them with the vitality of contemporary, relatable emotions. We may not be able to understand implicitly Natasha's circumstances and the way of life, how it was at this time, and what all of these characters are facing, but we understand how they feel about them. Regard. Now, Dave Malloy's music is complex and rhapsodic and alternately heavy and intense and light and romantic. It seems to move between these emotional extremes, going through these periods of calm and then finding this mania and then this real sorrow. He brings despair and resentment to music very vividly and even more so with his lyrics. There is such a poetry to the way that he writes, but it also, like I said, it feels current, it feels contemporary. Now, I have plenty to say about the production, which is what we're going to talk about next, but I do feel that I need to include Dave Malloy in a little bit of the criticism about the show's ambiguous ending, and part of that may be the way it's realized in this production. Like I said, I haven't seen the show prior to this occasion. However, I found it ambiguous. I found it a little bit unclear as to what the defining message of the piece was. And throughout the Thing, Pierre is something of an ambiguous character. He comes to be of huge significance to the plot, but for much of the duration he isn't. He just drinks and complains and gives money to Anatole at frequent intervals and then occasionally sings about it, nearly kills a man and then comes back at the end to resolve the mess that we're in, after which a comet appears in the sky. The combination of which and the conversation he's just had with the young Natasha that offers her some sort of a resolution and comfort has made him an entirely changed man. And though it illuminates the sky and illuminates something new in his character and offers him some sense of revelation, I'm sad to say it leaves the audience somewhat in the dark. If there's something I'm meant to be taking from the end of Natasha, Pierre and the Great Comet of 1812, I'm not taking it. And I was really reaching in with both hands and trying to take whatever this could offer me. The other overall thing I have to say about this material, while I really enjoy it, is I think that it may be one of those shows, and this is no bad thing, that is hugely intellectually stimulating and it's a piece of art and it is brilliant and it is intelligent. But is it emotionally engaging and affecting? Did I feel things because of this show? Did this make me cry? Did this make me feel sorrow for these characters? Not so much. I felt pretty consistently emotionally detached from the whole thing. But that may also be a factor of this production by Timothy Sheeder, which is exactly what we're going to talk about next. So fans and followers of the Broadway production, which had audience members entering the space via this immersive auditorium and a lot of grandeur and cabaret table seating and this expansive, exciting set design that spilled out throughout the auditorium may be a little bit disappointed by the version at the Donmar Warehouse, which those of us who are familiar with the space were always expecting. It is a very, very small, non West End theatre. It's split over two levels, with seating around three sides of a very wide, not particularly deep stage, which also has two levels in its set design. The upper walkway being pretty infrequently used, but the entire auditorium not being particularly large, not offering much opportunity for flying scenery or track scenery. Worth saying as well that nowhere in this auditorium is There ever more than four rows in depth, I believe. Now, something they have added here is a multitude of light bulbs around all of the different seats which turn on and off at different intervals throughout the show. That's not used extensively. It could probably be used a little bit more. But it's very striking when it is used. Now, in place of the lavish red velvet curtains and grandeur of previous productions, we have something visually anachronistic in terms of its lighting and technical and set elements as well as the costuming. It looks a little more like a production of Rent. It looks a little bohemian, a little bit grungy, a little bit 90s, early 2000s with the character's costuming not unlike how I'm attired now. Combining historic and modern elements. And this I actually have an awful lot of time for. I think it speaks to the sensibility of the show and of this material that feels like this fusion between the classic and the contemporary. And if we were to make this lavish, if we were to costume it in a way that was period appropriate, it would only highlight the fact that they're not speaking Russian, nor are they behaving in a way that would have been familiar of that era. The most prominent feature of the set design is six large letters spelling out Moscow with light bulbs Only. The first O is missing from the back because it is lying flat on the stage where it's suspended via wires. And after the characters enter and sit on it, it eventually rises up to be this light suspended over their head. Not unlike a ring light actually. This tilts and lowers down. I was so hoping that it was weight bearing enough for someone to sit on it and be suspended up into the air. But that never really happened. And I think probably it's not health and safety approved. I think it would have been fun. Listen. And in photos beforehand, I thought that it might have been invoking the Hollywood sign But for early 19th century Moscow, which I thought was a hilarious concept. Having seen it in person. I think that's less the aesthetic that they're going for, but it's still something that I choose to associate with it. You could also interpret this circle of light bulbs above them as the sky that is referenced occasionally throughout the material. You could think of this light shining down on them as the light of scrutiny within society. That being an important factor in the plot. We also have a handful of band members on stage. We have a semi reflective surface along the back wall. There is a fireman's pole between the two levels that people enter down and then people Climb back up twice during the show, people attempt to scale up this fireman's pole by climbing it. That was. I was like, what in the mulan is happening right now? Clearly the easiest way to impress me on stage, to do some sort of a show of physical strength, because I would consider that impossible. But now that we've talked about the design of this production, let's talk a little bit about the way that this has been staged by Timothy Sheder. And we still have characters entering via the auditorium because the whole room is so intimate, we don't feel the weight of that quite as much. It doesn't have as much impact as when you do it in a larger theatre or in a Broadway theatre. For the most part, they enter via these two small aisles in the stalls because there's nowhere else for them to come from. And the way that he's conceived the opening number, which is an incredibly important one, is brilliant. They each sit around on this lowered down o. They stand up when they are introducing themselves in song, taking turns to announce their defining characteristics, and they then sing these, adding more to the song each time that a new character talks about themselves. There is also a gesture that is associated with each one. It's very visually compelling, but not every single number is. There are plenty of moments where performers are just left alone on stage simply to sing the material. And this feels like a production which half the time makes the choice simply to let the material sing, but in a staging that is aesthetically quite bleak, quite gray and toned down from previous productions. I don't know if that's the most compelling choice. I also wonder if Timothy Sheder, whose work I really enjoyed for the most part at Regent's Park Open Air Theatre, is a little used to the natural majesty of that outdoor environment. You can have more simple staging happening on the Regent's park stage because it's naturally and inherently breathtaking. You do that on a slightly ugly playing space, and I don't say that for a bad reason, like this can be ugly, and that can be an important part of its design choice. But you do that here on a largely plain and empty gray stage, and it's going to be a little less visually interesting. And we have a lot of musicalized monologues in this show that do not advance the plot. They just ruminate on things that have just happened in a very emotionally reflective way. They don't make huge revelations. We have a lot of moments where Pierre just sings about his angst in a way that is metaphorical. He sings about the possibility of death as he is frantically pacing around the space. But in numbers just like this, we need a little more visual intrigue, we need a little more variety, perhaps, in the lighting design. We need to utilize that upper level in some way. And there are moments where he offers us this. I just think they're a little too few and far between. There's a sequence of songs in the second act where we really seem to shift into the right gear from Balaga onwards, when Anatol and Dolokhov, who are conspiring together for Anatol to elope with Natasha, enlist the help of Balaga, a famously frantic and fast paced taxi driver, and they sing a song all about him. He's played by Cedric Neal, by the way. We then transition from this to Anatol's leaving party with his similarly seedy friends. The energy of this entire sequence and then the thrill and the tension of what we go into afterwards is brilliant, but for too much of the first act, it's just people singing on an empty stage and Natasha gets a giant bear and there's a little bit of weather and things occasionally fall from the ceiling. I just want more. I need for there to be more. This is epic proportions. This is War and Peace in a musical, for crying out loud. And I am sure that a production can both allow us to focus on the text and focus on the material while also being expressive and vivid and animated. It doesn't need to feel quite so much like vodka all of the time. Pierre's song, Dust and Ashes, sure. But when Natasha is singing about this love that she feels so committed to, for the moment at least give her five minutes, then. That ought to be idyllic and charmed and heavenly and not quite so heavy and grey. There are many creative choices, however, that I did really enjoy. We see the Memory of Andre, her idea of Andre represented via this soldier with a plastic face, who is dancing with a bride with a plastic face, feeling familiar of Russian culture, but also slightly haunting in a way, them having this quality about them that seem to unsettle Natasha a bit, even though the idea of that image ought to bring her comfort and joy. There's also the entire staging of Letters, which opens the show's second act, which is a really great Dave Malloy number that gives us this entirely anachronistic vibe, where they are talking about letter writing in 19th century Russia and the significance of this, and explaining this mode of communication with a quirky, pithy lyric and a funky melody. Shida has them all holding letters. He has Them scattered through the auditorium, explaining this to the audience, turning to the audience as they narrate, and then taking a turn at a microphone stand in order to recite the letters that are being written. There is also a dueling sequence early on in the show, which is staged with this ingenious theatrical abandon, as Dolokhov and Pierre both hang from the ceiling and leap out from this upper level trying to kill each other. And though I have told you about the show's director, let me also name some of the other creatives. Ellen Kane has done brilliant work here on the choreography. Evie Gurney is the costume designer. Leslie Travers designed the set, and the music is also fantastic, with Nicholas Skilbeck as musical supervisor and Sam Young as musical director. Some more names now, as I tell you about the cast of this UK premiere production, let's start by talking about Countess Natasha Rostova, played by Kamisa Dawnford May, who I think is this compellingly exciting rising star. Before this had even opened, it had been announced that she would be part of the hugely exciting cast who will be bringing Sondheim's Here We Are, Sondheim and David I've's musical Here We Are to the National Theatre for its European premiere. Prior to this, she has also been seen in Evita at the Leicester Curve, which I saw, and I thought she was a standout in the role of the mistress, and she is breathtaking in this show. She is so, so good as Natasha. She sounds gorgeous, singing this formidably challenging song, no One Else, which demands this expert ability to shift between different vocal registers, utilizing soprano and a little bit of a mixed belt as well. Her tone throughout the thing is gorgeous. And especially as we get into the second act and we can see her naivety and we can see her passion and her determination and her angry resentment towards anyone who would stand in her way, and her inability to. To see beyond the forest for the trees, really. She is so determined that she is in love and that that's the most important thing. There's a juvenile quality that she brings to Natasha in the first act, which goes much of the way towards explaining her Act 2 behavior. And she does also have this air of entitlement, even from her first introduction in that opening number, as she flicks her hair over her shoulder, you can see that even though she's not entirely grandiose, she does conceive of herself in a certain way. And she's living this charmed life. She's engaged to this man who she loves, and she's arrived in Moscow and everyone wants to be her and all of the men want to be in love with her. And soon enough she loses her way in all of this. But at the beginning, she is filled with confidence that nothing could possibly go wrong comparatively Meeker. Alongside her is her close friend and cousin, Sonia, who is played by the extraordinary Maimouna Memon, who is a performer I think I've been following longer than anyone else in this cast. I have been loving her work on stage for some time. One of my favorite performances that May Moona has given was in another Dave Malloy show. She was in Ghost Quartet at the Boulevard Theatre, which I also thought was brilliant and fascinating and layered. She has this incredible unique vocal tone which lends such compelling pathos to the material that she sings. And it feels both indie and classic at the same time. If you were to find an unusual way of combining like Regina Spector and Judy Garland, you might get Mae Moona. And it works so well on Dave Malloy material. She feels in many ways just as charming and naive as Natasha does at the beginning. But it's when Natasha is making unexpected romantic choices in the second act that Sonia becomes dismayed and has to react in the only way she feels is appropriate as a family member and a friend. And she intervenes and then sings this song of crisis and finds strength in her commitment to Natasha and the greater good and the most important thing that she can do for her as her friend. She sings a song called Sonia Alone, which is one of the standout moments of the show. Another is the song Dust and Ashes sung by Declan Bennett as Pierre. I do find Pierre a little bit of a mystifying character, and I think Declan does an awful lot with the material. He sings Dust and Ashes like it's Gethsemane 2.0. If you don't know, he played Jesus in a production of Jesus Christ Superstar at Regent's Park Open Air Theatre, directed by Timothy Sheeder. And a part of me does wonder if he's just a little too vibrant and youthful and charming to be portraying this grumpy, angst fueled man. I don't know in the first act that we ever necessarily get all the way there. That he feels quite as sorrowful as he ought to, that he feels quite as frustrated as he ought to. And though he telegraphs Pierre's transformation by the end of the piece very well, it's lost a little bit in the ambiguity of the material. Jamie Moscato was another standout here as Anatole, as the nefarious scoundrel Anatole. There's one very important moment when his sister reveals that he's already married, or when it's revealed in the text, he's already married. And his sister restates this to an audience member and sort of laughs at how staggering this is because he carries on acting as though he is an eligible bachelor. And this would have huge ramifications in society. This is a huge and important plot point. And the lyric kind of gets tossed aside a little bit in this production. I think that's one of the details that we ought to flag a lot more visibly, because the fact that he's already married means that his flirtation with Natasha is inappropriate from the off. Not only is she engaged, but he is not eligible to marry her whatsoever. And she doesn't know this. She only continues the attraction between the two of them because she believes that it's a viable romance, which at that point, for her, it wasn't. Not according to society, anyway. But Jamie's charm and charismatic physicality and rock star vocals come together so brilliantly in this role. One of my favorite performances I've seen from him on stage. There is just enough arrogant, laden over the top of this characterization. There is a pitiful quality beneath all of that as well. When he's asking Pierre for money, when he is hopelessly wondering where he can go at the end of all of this, the way in which he's able to charm Natasha is entirely believable. But at no point do we recognize him for anything other than what he truly is, which I think is important. Dan Crickler also does great work alongside him as his friend Dolokhov and Cat Simmons as his sister. Helene blends together this extraordinary sensuality and villainy as she slinks onto the stage in a series of increasingly outrageous outfits. These fur coats, these corsets. She plays this hedonistic temptress with such little reservation. I think she's wonderful in this, and it honestly is a pretty wonderful cast. It's an embarrassment of riches in many ways. Cedric Neal is brilliant for his brief number as Balaga. To have him in this company just to do one song is a huge coup. Chloe Sirocco and Eugene McCoy are also wonderful as Princess Mary and her mad father, Prince Bolkonski. And Annette MacLachlan takes names as Maria. I particularly enjoy everything she gets to do in the second act when she confronts Anatol about this attempted elopement, when he shows up at the house, when he manages to climb halfway up this fireman's pole before she comes out brandishing a shotgun and listen, that's the kind of fun that this show offers you. I am very excited to go and see it again. Now that I have fully understood the nature of this material. I still think that this production is kind of a seven. I like the aesthetic choices that it's making. I think the end for me is a moment of real importance. I need for us to be able to figure out more clearly what this production and what this material and what this director is trying to say in this moment. Because it's all staged in such a way that it's made to feel important. We just lack the sense of that. Or I lacked the sense of that. At least feel free to share with me in the comments section down below what you take away from this ending. For now, those are all of my thoughts about Natasha, Pierre and the Great Comet of 1812. I am heading back to go and see what I think is the final performance of this show's run at the Donmar Warehouse. It remains to be seen whether it's going to have any future life, this production, at least in the UK beyond this run. I am very intrigued to see what happens with this and I'm very excited to go back. If I have sufficient thoughts to make an update to this review, perhaps I will. Or perhaps I will share my thoughts elsewhere on social media. You can find me ickyjoetheatre on all of the other apps. In the meantime, thank you for listening to this review. I hope that you've enjoyed make sure to comment with your own thoughts down below and stay tuned for many more reviews coming in the new year. I hope that everyone is staying safe and that you have a stagey day for 10 more seconds. I'm Mickey Jo Theatre. Oh my God. Hey, thanks for watching. Have a Stagey Day. Subscribe.