
Since Nicholas Hytner, former artistic director of the National Theatre, is one of the finest, most detailed Shakespeare directors in the land, you could be forgiven for forgetting that he really knows how to put on a show — and then some. Given that his career spans everything from “One Man, Two Guvnors” to the original “Miss Saigon,” expectations in London were high that, armed with arguably the greatest musical comedy ever written, he might be onto a winner. Revise your expectations: His immersive, explosively joyous “Guys and Dolls” is a solid-gold knockout.
Hytner has always been strong on physical staging. Because he started out in opera, he has always known about crowd control and can shift the emotional temperature of a scene simply by how he commands groups of people on stage. After his runaway-hit, immersive productions of “Julius Caesar” and “A Midsummer Night’s Dream” at his own Bridge Theatre, he now takes that skill up umpteen notches moving not just the actors in “Guys and Dolls” but a third of the audience.
Related Stories

What Lionsgate’s Partnership Deal With Runway Means

The ‘Frasier’ Reboot Returns: Here's How to Watch the New Season Online
Presenting the show in-the-round across designer Bunny Christie’s five, cunningly versatile, interconnected hydraulic platforms, he then wraps the standing crowd around the stages that rise and fall beneath the gorgeous glow of huge neon advertising display signs of 1930s Times Square. From the get-go, there’s such a buzz in the auditorium that the audience is even dancing during the overture, thanks to the pizzazz and punch of Tom Brady’s wonderfully crisp, brass-and-sax-drenched 14-piece band.
Popular on Variety
All of this could have been a gimmick were the actual production not up to snuff. But with lighting designer Paule Constable controlling both everyone’s eyeline and the show’s shifting emotional moods, there’s an immediate sense of everything being in safe hands.
“Guys and Dolls” is famously made from short stories peopled by a choice collection of salty, snappy characters. To bring all that to life, Hytner has banished celebrity casting in favor of a marvelously diverse ensemble of triple-threat talent. That extends right through from the juicy small roles up to tall U.S. screen actor Andrew Richardson making his professional stage debut as a deliciously easeful Sky Masterson, singing and dancing as if to the manner born. He’s utterly plausible falling for rising star Celinde Schoenmaker, whose effortless soprano is an ideal match for her character, the Salvation Army’s perfectly self-satisfied Sarah Brown. The actor’s early poise makes her drunken abandonment during the zingingly choreographed Havana sequence — there are dancers amid the crowd as well as on the stage — all the more delightful.
As Nathan, a man permanently flying by the seat of his pants, Daniel Mays is simply ideal. His face not so much rumpled as crumpled, he generates affection in spades as he juggles desperation around his floating crap game, wisecracking in Mindy’s (wonderfully atmospheric) diner, pleading with the audience, and loving and running from the standout Miss Adelaide of Marisha Wallace.
The nearest the production gets to a known musical theater star, American-born Wallace, a sensation as Effie in London’s “Dreamgirls” and a completely iconoclastic Ado Annie in Daniel Fish’s London transfer of his re-thought “Oklahoma!,” ignites her every second on stage. Wonderfully open-hearted but with Swiss-watch timing, she’ a mistress of sass which makes her a slam-dunk for Adelaide’s Hotbox numbers, gloriously choreographed by Arlene Phillips with James Cousins. They rise to such heights that when Constable slams on lighting buttons at the end of the numbers, the audience simply erupts.
But the surprise is the tender truth that Wallace finds in Adelaide. Indeed, the true power that makes the whole show more than just a display of musical theatre fireworks is encapsulated by her duet with Nathan, “Sue Me.”
She and Mays, utterly convincing as a couple, know the song is an all-out war but also, thanks to Loesser’s superb writing, that it’s a love song of genuine desperation with both of them at the end of their tether. It’s a complete scene in a song with their emotions magnified by being sung, and Hytner has made them mine the lyrics for subtext. They play it to the hilt and although the scale of their emotions is hugely comic, it’s spellbindingly truthful. Wallace makes you believe she absolutely does yearn for a real home “with wallpaper and bookends” while a pleading Mays is furious with himself for falling into his predicament of being terrified of marriage but properly in love with her. The connection between them — and between them and the audience — is thrillingly complete.
That indivisibility between singing and acting is the show’s absolute hallmark. Tickets are already vanishing for the unusually long five-month run at the Bridge. If a similar space could be found to house the unique physical production, its future could be huge.
Read More About:
Jump to Comments‘Guys and Dolls’ Review: An Explosively Thrilling Production of a Masterpiece in London
The Bridge, London; 1015 seats (incl. 380 standing); £95 ($115) top. Opened, March 14, 2023. Reviewed March 11. Closes Sept. 2. Running time: 2 HOURS, 40 MIN.
More from Variety
Meryl Streep to Star in Series Adaptation of ‘The Corrections’ From Jonathan Franzen, CBS Studios
Generative AI Fueling ‘Exponential’ Rise in Celebrity NIL Rip-Offs: Exclusive Data
Does Streaming Hurt Theaters? This Survey Says It Helps
Most Popular
Luke Bryan Reacts to Beyoncé’s CMA Awards Snub: ‘If You’re Gonna Make Country Albums, Come Into Our World and Be Country With…
Donald Glover Cancels 2024 Childish Gambino Tour Dates After Hospitalization: ‘I Have Surgery Scheduled and Need Time Out to Heal’
‘Joker 2’ Ending: Was That a ‘Dark Knight’ Connection? Explaining What’s Next for Joaquin Phoenix’s Joker
‘Love Is Blind' Creator Reveals Why They Didn’t Follow Leo and Brittany After Pods, if They'll Be at Reunion (EXCLUSIVE)
Rosie O'Donnell on Becoming a 'Big Sister' to the Menendez Brothers, Believes They Could Be Released From Prison in the ‘Next 30 Days’
Coldplay’s Chris Martin Says Playing With Michael J. Fox at Glastonbury Was ‘So Trippy’: ‘Like Being 7 and Being in Heaven…
‘That ’90s Show’ Canceled After Two Seasons on Netflix, Kurtwood Smith Says: ‘We Will Shop the Show’
Why Critically Panned ‘Joker 2’ Could Still Be in the Awards Race for Lady Gaga and Joaquin Phoenix
Dakota Fanning Got Asked ‘Super-Inappropriate Questions’ as a Child Actor Like ‘How Could You Have Any Friends?’ and Can ‘You Avoid Being a Tabloid…
Charli XCX Reveals Features for ‘Brat’ Remix Album Include Ariana Grande, Julian Casablancas, Tinashe and More
Must Read
- Film
COVER | Sebastian Stan Tells All: Becoming Donald Trump and Starring in 2024’s Most Controversial Movie
By Andrew Wallenstein 2 weeks
- TV
Menendez Family Slams Netflix’s ‘Monsters’ as ‘Grotesque’ and ‘Riddled With Mistruths’: ‘The Character Assassination of Erik and Lyke Is Repulsive…
- TV
‘Yellowstone’ Season 5 Part 2 to Air on CBS After Paramount Network Debut
- TV
50 Cent Sets Diddy Abuse Allegations Docuseries at Netflix: ‘It’s a Complex Narrative Spanning Decades’ (EXCLUSIVE)
- Shopping
‘Deadpool & Wolverine’ Sets Digital and Blu-ray/DVD Release Dates
Sign Up for Variety Newsletters
By providing your information, you agree to our Terms of Use and our Privacy Policy.We use vendors that may also process your information to help provide our services. // This site is protected by reCAPTCHA Enterprise and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.Variety Confidential
ncG1vNJzZmiukae2psDYZ5qopV9nfXN%2FjqWcoKGkZL%2Bmwsierqxnl6rGtHnAp5tmnJ%2BhubR50Z6top2nYrmwusOopWammZi1sLjArGShsaSjsrN5waugnZ%2BVYsGpscCtqZ5lYWeAdoGUbG5tbF8%3D