Janie and I rated this one in my log:
very good.
We also both remeber it quite well, 25 years later. That might have a fair bit to do with the superb cast: Mark Rylance, Harriet Walter, Imelda Staunton and Oliver Cotton. The production was directed by Matthew Warchus. We didn’t recogognise his name then but we certainly do now. Here is the Theatricalia entry for this one.
Yasmina Reza (as translated by Christopher Hampton) was all the rage in the English speaking world back then. This was our fourth go at one of hers – Art having been the piece that kicked off the Reza fashion…
…we’d even seen one of hers at The Almeida just 10 weeks earlier:
Anyway, apart from Art, with thought Life x 3 to be the most interesting and memorable of Reza’s works.
Again we went to a preview, so we were ahead of the critics. What did they think? Here’s Charles Spencer who seemed pretty impressed with it, at least as entertainment if not as profound drama:
Life Spencer Telegraph 11 Dec 2000 The Daily Telegraph (London, Greater London, England) Newspapers.com
Kate Bassett wrote an interesting profile-cum-review with some equivocation about this piece and Reza-ism generally:
Life Bassett Indy 10 Dec 2000 The Independent (London, Greater London, England) Newspapers.com
Our friend, Michael Billington, was not at all sure about this piece:
Life Billington Guardian 8 Dec 2000 The Guardian (London, Greater London, England) Newspapers.com
Nicholas de Jongh was impressed, while spotting something a bit Ayckbournish about the piece, which I remember thinking/saying myself at the time:
Life de Jongh Standard 8 Dec 2000 Evening Standard (London, Greater London, England) Newspapers.com