THE TRANSATLANTIC MAGAZINE
THE TRANSATLANTIC MAGAZINE
A new play by Eric Roth based on Carl Foreman’s screenplay
Harold Pinter Theatre, Panton Street, London SW1Y 4DN until March 6, 2026
This is based on Fred Zinnemann’s four-time Oscar winning 1952 Western starring Gary Cooper and Grace Kelly and you might think, how on earth can you put something so cinematic, whose iconic climax is a nail-biting cross town shootout, on a West End stage? Well, director Thea Sharrock has found a way.
Written originally as an allegory of McCarthyism, its screenwriter, Carl Foreman, was soon blacklisted and like many other creatives fled to England. John Wayne, who had turned down the lead, blasted it as un-American for its critical portrait of the community and later boasted about being proud of driving Foreman out of the country. Times were tense.
The plot, which occurs in real time (and here a large clock is suspended over the stage counting down the 1 hour 45 minutes till the arrival of the fateful train), centers on Will Kane (Billy Crudup), the Marshal of Hadeywill, a town in the old New Mexico territory. Kane’s sense of duty is tested when he must decide to either face a gang of killers alone (after the townsfolk desert him), or leave town with his new wife Amy (Denise Gough), to start a quiet life as a shopkeeper. The story sets the cowardice of the many against the courage of the few.
The producers here include legendary Hollywood agent (and Tom Cruise’s business partner) Paula Wagner and TV legend Tom Werner (of an independent production company Carsey Werner). They have cleverly hired one of our most inventive directors Thea Sharrock to oversee the transformation, and one of Hollywood’s most acclaimed screenwriters, Eric Roth (Forrest Gump, Dune), to write the adaptation. He fleshes out the film’s necessary silences (it’s a Western after all) with more of the arguments about the need for collective action and the consequences of not doing so in a way that still speaks to us today.
Sharrock marshals [sic] a large ensemble cast in a gripping, tightly wrought, production. Crudup, so brilliant in The Morning Show, is a Broadway veteran now who gets Tony nominated for almost everything he does. Here he brings a grace and gravitas to the lead role, not to mention physical audacity in an extended brawl scene with his athletic young deputy Harvey Pell. Billy Howle as Pell manages to briefly divert the piece, but in a good way, underscoring the young man’s confusion and disappointment. Again, Howle, so great in Look Back in Anger at the Almeida, proves his star quality.
Irish actress Denise Gough, known for her intensity, seemed surprising casting at first in the slight Grace Kelly part but she of course elevates it. As Amy, she sticks firmly to her Quaker belief in non-violence despite the painful consequences and Gough beautifully illustrates this dilemma.
Sharrock deftly uses music and movement (Lizzi Gee’s dance moves) to give some respite from the tension of the ticking clock and offers us moments to reflect. Chris Egan’s use of music includes songs by Ry Cooder, The Chicks, Marty Robbins and three Bruce Springsteen numbers including the great ‘I’m On Fire’, which Gough delivers hauntingly, nailing us to the spot. Some might think it’s longing to be a musical but these songs function in a different way here. Of course, in the original film Frankie Laine’s ‘Do Not Forsake Me’ won an Oscar and begun trend in the ‘50s for ‘pop’ themes for Westerns.
Another standout is Rosa Salazar as Helen Ramirez the quietly powerful Mexican businesswoman who secretly owns the saloon and finds common cause with Amy, a great portrait of female empowerment in the male dominated Old West.
The other star of this production is Tim Hatley’s elegantly beautiful set design of high slatted walls. These are perfectly lit by Neil Austin with golden hues to evoke the moods and times of day and the blazing New Mexico sun insistently seeping in.
This is a daring project and while it may lack the tension of the movie, it’s a literate, emotive, re-imagining of a classic.
