Cat On A Hot Tin Roof - Apollo

Well. There's some lovely accents on show here. Shame none of them hit anywhere near Mississippi.

Jack O'Connell almost heads there via Peckham and downtown Melbourne but he's got a delicious body and he shows it off so frequently that I'm happy to forgive him. I'm pleased to confirm that even from further back in the stalls I had no need of my binoculars. Oh my. I must say that normally I'd have been disappointed when he put on some clothes but he looked so fetching in his white silk pyjamas that I quite acquiesced. To be fair to him, he really does kick into gear from the second act and gives rather a wonderful performance.

Sienna Miller, God loves a trier however I don't know if she'd read the play before tonight but I very much doubt it. Having said that, I very much liked her sparkly frock. Liza Minnelli would like it back at the end of the run though. Some very gratuitous nudity from her though.

Lisa Palfrey as Big Mama was terrific too. Simple set. A couple of kids who clearly screwed up the audition for 'Annie' and ended up round the corner and some dedicated crutch acting from Jack to appreciate too. And crotch acting too while we're at it.

Has she? She's still in the programme. Well whoever is standing in for her was smashing.

Looks like we'll get an NT Live of the Cat!

Although remember the NT Live Frankensteins had loincloths, which they didn't on unfilmed nights, for exactly that reason...

Well hopefully the live capture will preserve the whole spirit of the production as it is being seen by audiences. If they have faith in their artistic decision to have nudity in the show in the first place then they should have the courage of their convictions for the NT Live. Loincloths be damned!

Based on past NTLive's with nudity (thinking Frankenstein here when B & JL had to wear a weird sort of y fronts), they won't be allowed to be naked as it reduces sales to certain countries.  The big schlong will be wrapped up one fears.

The Chekhov gun is a great rule of drama - like a superhero having a talent, he has to use somewhere along the way. Or with Dorothy's friend singing about only having a heart, they have to follow that through. In the original Half Sixpence, as I remember, they ignored this rule. Kipps went on about having money to burn and buying a banjo. well he had money to burn, but methinks the banjo was forgotten. Or, linking this idea to this production loosely, in the film boogie nights they witter on about Dirk Diggler's, er, talent. We would have felt cheated if there had been ne'er a glimpse. And a piano on stage has to get played.
And as for loinclothgate with Cat, I guess subtle camera angles will be the answer, sadly.

Not too much to add, I enjoyed it, a perfectly respectable production of a stellar play. The cast are good all around, Jack is stellar, truly fantastic. A nice afternoon

I saw this yesterday afternoon. On the whole I thought it was very good. Siena Miller, Jack O'Connell and Colm Meaney were very impressive. I'm not sure the nudity was really necessary but it didn't bother me. I did think the final act dragged on a bit, but that might have been because by that point my ability to maintain interest in the play was starting to be overwhelmed by the pain in my legs, caused by the medieval torture device which passes for a seat on the dress circle.

Is there are a universal A list anymore? Jack O'Connell is as A list as you can get for some people, and Sienna Miller also has her fans!

Also, I expect that many people booked on the strength of it being a Young Vic production.

To a lot of the Instagram-obsessed, Vogue-reading, Made in Chelsea-watching women in their 20s that frankly can afford theatre tickets, Sienna Miller is as A-list as they come.