Lukewarm Thriller That Leaves Me Cold Talented Cast Fail to Breathe Life Into Hanif Kureishi's Psychological Drama

Summary

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FIRST NIGHT When The Night Begins Hampstead

WHEN The Night begins is my idea of a theatrical nightmare. You sit trapped in the auditorium for 90 minutes without an interval. You are required to watch two highly talented actors, Catherine McCormack and Michael Pennington, valiantly and vainly trying to breathe a little life into a psychological thriller by Hanif Kureishi that has no more dramatic vitality than a beached whale and never thrills. When the handsome Miss McCormack, as the rich, emotionally disturbed young widow Jane, draws a huge knife from her handbag and holds it inches away from Michael Pennington, who plays a retired bus driver unbelievably called Cecil, the tension rises just a couple of degrees on the theatrical barometer to lukewarm.

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Extract

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Lukewarm Thriller That Leaves Me Cold Talented Cast Fail to Breathe Life Into Hanif Kureishi's Psychological Drama

Kureishi, famous for his novel The Buddha Of Suburbia and his films My Beautiful Laundrette and The Mother, is an uneven playwright, w...

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