Last night I saw Vanessa Redgrave in The Year of Magical Thinking at the Lyttleton. Miss Redgrave is on stage for an hour and 35 minutes with only a chair for props. The soliloquy is a staggering achievement in memory alone, and is based on the memoir of the distinguished American author, Joan Didion, at that period in her life when she lost her husband John Gregory Dunne - who I once did a book tour with - and soon after her daughter. The power of the piece comes from it being neither sentimental nor indulgent, on the contrary, it's the whimsical thoughts of an intelligent woman about, as she keeps reminding us, something we will all have to face at some time. It's not a fun evening, but if you admire great acting by someone at the top of their profession, you should be phoning the National today. Along with Judi Dench, Eileen Atkins and Maggie Smith, there isn't a nation on earth who has a better bunch of grand dames than England, and when one of them is at their best, as is the case with Miss Redgrave, one shouldn't miss it.
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Anybody who recently saw Attonement would endorse that this lady has a gift from God; in the space of just a few minutes of screen time, the whole story of the character is conveyed in brilliant shorthand;
(See Montgommery Clift in Judgement at Nuremberg or Nicholson in A Few Good Men or even Charlton Heston as Henry the 8th in The Prince and the Pauper for further illustrations.)
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