The Dresser

“And the littler you are, the larger the sorrow” remarks Norman, the eponymous dresser encapsulating the essential truth of Sir Ronald Harwood’s modern classic The Dresser. Whilst on-stage King Lear is being performed (just) against the audible backdrop of the blitz, the real tragedy is acted out back-stage with the demise and ultimate death of an ageing actor (“Sir”) bringing his own regrets and inadequacies, those of his mistress (“Her Ladyship”), and most poignantly his dresser, into sharp focus.

Sean Foley’s revival in the Duke of York’s Theatre is sharp, very funny and moving. Ken Stott is masterful as Sir – broken and sobbing, overwhelmed and disgusted by the effort of yet another appearance (his 228th as King Lear), he has to be cajoled, bullied and manhandled into costume and onto stage. Reece Shearsmith as his long-standing and long-suffering dresser is utterly compelling. His perfectly judged Norman is by turns caring, entertaining, bitter, acerbic and spiteful: raging against the dying of the light in the grandiose, self-interested, and seemingly ungrateful Sir, and terrified at the emptiness and insubstantiality of his own life without Sir at its centre.

Amongst a uniformly strong supporting cast, Her Ladyship (Harriet Thorpe) elicits particular amusement as a matronly Cordelia but also sympathy - tired of the realities of life as a “third rate actor” on provincial tours and weary of the pretence of glamour, and acutely aware of her own inadequacies.

Michael Taylor’s atmospheric revolving set effectively transports the actors and the audience between dressing rooms and the wings, and the worlds of off and on-stage. The storm scene in which we witness the cast and crew backstage expending enormous energy to create a tempest via timpani, wind-machine, and reverberating metal sheet, only to be met by the ingratitude of Lear/Sir returning from the stage (“WHERE…WAS…THE STORM?”) is a particular highlight.

Plays about the theatre often fail to rise above the arch and knowing, and the limits of their own sphere of reference. Not so this one, which is a tragedy in the truest sense. A triumph and a pleasure from start to finish.