The warmup of all warmups is under way: the cast is limbering up for Chariots of Fire with the help of old-fashioned treadmills, a vaulting horse and a hardwood gymnasium floor. Stretches, press-ups, jogging on the spot – it is all about the readiness to run. The set (designer Ben Stones) is understated, the costumes an attractively calculated mix of vintage stripes and whites. This is a revisiting of Mike Bartlett’s agile 2012 adaptation of Hugh Hudson and Colin Welland’s cinematic masterpiece (1981). Directed by Robert Hastie e (this show is the last he will direct at the helm of the Crucible; it has just been announced that he will move to the National Theatre as Indhu Rubasingham’s deputy artistic director), it is an exuberant production dominated by a single question: why run?
Harold Abrahams, a Jewish boy studying at Cambridge in the 1920s, faces pervasive antisemitism (“with a name like Abrahams, he won’t be in the chapel choir”) and is played by Adam Bregman with incisive charm. His ambition is to be “fast” and “to win”, but he leaves it to us to figure out precisely what winning might mean to him. To his university rival, Eric Liddell, son of a Scottish missionary, “why run” becomes a theological question, an article of faith. Michael Wallace plays him unaffectedly, like a grownup schoolboy in whom gaucheness equates with virtue.
Movement director Ben Wright has been resourceful in finding ways to run within the theatre and achieve suspense on the spot. This is at its most successful in the slow-motion races, where running seems almost to yield to dance. Although the pace between races sometimes needs tightening, this is a hugely enjoyable show. An excellent cast includes Richard Cant, who is priceless in his three roles, especially in sprinkling an unpleasant little garnish of Jacob Rees-Mogg to his sardonic entitlement as Lord Birkenhead. Lois Pearson is sympathetic and convincing as Jennie Liddell, Eric’s devoted sister; Leo Wan makes a singular Prince of Wales; and Bessy Ewa is gorgeously assured as Harold’s girlfriend, a D’Oyly Carte singer, basking in song. But it is Aubrey Montague, Harold Abrahams’s college friend, intelligently played by Tom Glenister, who gives the most persuasive answer to the play’s question.
