ajhlovestheatre

MINORITY REPORT

by David Haig

based on a short story by Philip K Dick

Directed by Max Webster

Lyric Hammersmith Theatre, London – until 18 May 2024

https://lyric.co.uk/shows/minority-report/

Philip K Dick’s 1956 sci-fi novella has already spawned a Hollywood blockbuster starring Tom Cruise, and now actor-writer David Haig and hotshot director Max Bennett take on this futuristic thriller that pits human will and determinism against an authoritarian state in a co-production between Nottingham Playhouse, Birmingham Rep and the Lyric Hammersmith. Minority Report probably feels even more timely now with the ongoing threat of Artificial Intelligence meddling in our perceptions and day-to-day lives. Haig further updates this preposterous yet undeniably troubling tale by making the neuroscientist central character hoisted by their own petard when their own technology predicts the possibility of them committing a murder, into a woman.

Jodie McNee plays, brilliantly, Dr Julia Anderton, all smug self-assurance and with an affected upper crust accent as she addresses a conference of peers while caressing an actual human brain at the outset, before unravelling spectacularly as she goes on the run from the authorities. In a nice, telling touch, McNee’s own Liverpuddlian accent comes to the fore as Anderton’s panic and distress rises, as though everything this woman had suppressed about herself bursts through the urbane sheen of success she’s carefully cultivated, leaving her raw, open and terrified.

It says much for the strength and authority of McNee’s tremendous performance that she isn’t lost amongst the bells and whistles of Bennett’s über-flashy production. In depicting the London of 2050, Bennett and his crack design team (video by Tal Rosner, set by Jon Bausor, lighting by Jessica Hung Han Yun, illusions by Richard Pinner, sound by Nicola T Chang) have hurled everything at the wall….. A taxi hurtles through city streets, platforms rise and fall, searching spotlights sear as they rove, whole rooms appear then disappear in the blink of an eye, avatars pop up in unexpected places….. Visually and aurally, the staging is a sensation. Webster has proved before, most notably with Life of Pi, and the Donmar versions of Macbeth and Henry V, that he is a director most comfortable and adept at utilising multimedia in his productions but never at the expense of the theatricality, and that reaches an apotheosis here.

Bennett’s work is augmented by movement direction by Lucy Hind that is so elaborate and striking that you almost wish they’d gone the whole hog and given us Minority Report – The Musical. Certainly, this is as exciting an attempt to stage the apparently unstageable as you’ll find in any current London theatre, except for the Phoenix and Palace (homes, respectively, to Stranger Things and Harry Potter). Where the show comes unstuck slightly is in the latter half lurch into melodrama as a gun-wielding Anderton seeks to avenge her sisters death: it feels overwrought and messes up the pace of the evening. For all the hi-tech ingenuity of the staging and the commitment of the cast, the story doesn’t always grip as much as it should: in condensing the whole saga into ninety minutes, a certain amount of clarity has been lost, and we’re sometimes left dazzled but not always entirely sure as to what’s going on.

Not all the supporting performances are as strong as they might be, but Nick Fletcher excels as Anderton’s bewildered husband, and Tanvir Virmani is unsettling and amusing as her virtual AI-generated confidante. Even if ultimately Minority Report convinces primarily as a flashy thriller held together by a stunning production and an accomplished central turn, the tensions between human choice and the sinister machinations of technology that is supremely intelligent but ignores the possibilities for rethinking and rehabilitation, are persuasively conveyed. It’s not a great play but it’s an enjoyable, frequently discombobulating one.