Review: Lazarus – Bowie’s parting gift

Theatre, Lazarus, Review
Michael C Hall as Newton and Sophia Anne Caruso as Girl  (photo by Johan Persson)

Performance Date: 1st January 2017

Venue: London’s King’s Cross Theatre

Approaching the first anniversary of the death of David Bowie, his home town plays host to his parting gift. The poignancy further heightened by the fact that the grief is still so raw for some of his fans. Sitting in the temporary, pop-up King’s Cross Theatre in London watching the cast of Lazarus receive their standing ovation, it takes more than a few moments to take stock of what had just happened on stage.

Directed by Belgian Ivo van Hove, and with a script collaborated between Bowie and Enda Walsh, Lazarus landed in London off the back of a sold out run in New York. The three main cast members Michael C Hall, Sophia Anne Caruso and Michael Esper, continued with the show across the Atlantic and are joined by a largely British ensemble. Sadly, the New York premiere was Bowie’s last public appearance and he was never able to see his creation light up the London stage.

An hour and 50 minutes duration with no interval, the show was intense from start to finish.

Lazarus, a sequel to the 1963 Walter Tevis novel The Man Who Fell to Earth, and the 1976 film of the same name starring Bowie himself, focuses on Thomas Jerome Newton, an alien who came to Earth to save his home planet from extinction. Fast forward to an undisclosed time in the future and Newton is trapped on Earth, immortal, stricken with agoraphobia and an increasing dependency on gin. He laments a lost love; a blue-haired girl named Mary-Lou, and is obsessed with either dying or returning home.

Michael C Hall is believable and authentic as the tortured, trapped alien Newton and is clearly so invested in the role that his characterisation is astonishing.  It’s clear when you think back to Hall’s previous roles in Six Feet Under, Dexter and Hedwig and the Angry Inch, that he does not shy away from provocative and emotionally exhausting roles. He completely embodies Newton and delivers a performance with no half measures. His grief is raw and it is painful to watch him unravel.

You can’t take your eyes off him as he staggers round the stage fighting the insanity that threatens to envelop him.  Even when Newton isn’t the focal point of the scene, he’s omnipresent, rolling around on the bed in despair or swigging gin from the nearby refrigerator.

Hall’s performance is complimented by Sophia Anne Caruso who is spellbinding as Girl, a figment of Newton’s imagination; she dances round him on the stage, light footed and childlike, haunting in her aberration.

Their performances carry an otherwise zany production with a narrative and strange sub-plot involving serial killer Valentine (another figment of Newton’s imagination), that is at times hard to follow, with no clear purpose, direction or endgame, not at all helped by a complete inability to distinguish fantasy from reality.

Lazarus takes the audience through Newton’s desperate and at times pitiful existence, the staging spartan, a bland beige room with a bed, fridge and television screen. Strobe heavy video montages play out on the huge screen adding to the intensity, they are loud and invasive making the audience jump at times. Newton is also quite clearly physically and mentally crippled by them.

Lazarus is no doubt a trip in to the mind of the man himself, but for a non-Bowie fan the imagery, sub-context and hidden meanings might just be a bridge too far.

The confusing plot isn’t helped by the songs, which didn’t seem to hold any direct relevance to the story, but instead seemed to act as a temporary interlude to the chaos unfolding on stage. It didn’t seem lost on the audience either; who remained in stony silence after each number where applause may more traditionally be expected.

Some may lament this ‘play with music’ approach over a more conventional musical structure, but few will be able to argue with the sheer quality of the music that does feature. With such Bowie classics as ‘Absolute Beginners’, ‘All The Young Dudes’ and ‘Changes’, if their implementation is questionable, then at least their execution is flawless, and delivered masterfully be the cast and band.

Special mention has to go to Sophia Anne Caruso for her performance of ‘Life on Mars’, which was nothing short of mesmerising. Already a force, Sophia has a very bright future ahead of her and her WhatsOnStage Awards nomination for “Best Supporting Actress in a Musical” will no doubt be one of many in continued recognition of her talent.

There is no doubting that Bowie was a genius and the world is so much worse off for his passing. Lazarus, Bowie’s final legacy, was much like him, ambiguous, intriguing and at times surreal but ultimately a fitting parting gift to his fans and the world alike.

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