La Bete

Time Out“A rather constipated piece...” The play's verbiage, at first dazzling, quickly turns tedious due to a lack of plot development: it fizzes and flies around in hectic, spectacular but purposeless circles like a firework in a box. The dramatic vacuum is filled by Rylance's buffoon...

The Stage“Mark Rylance turns it into another instant must-see...” Never act with children or animals, but now a new category needs to be added - Rylance. He runs away with the evening. Lumley is elegantly wasted (in every sense) as the Princess. Anyone who loves great acting will want to see this...

Guardian“After an hour the soufflé deflates...” Rylance's latest incarnation is the real reason for going to see Hirson's 1991 play. Joanna Lumley, sweeps in as a judicial princess, only to find she hardly has a part. Frasier's David Hyde Pierce does an elegant job...

New Statesman“La Bête is skewed by the brilliance of Mark Rylance...” I couldn't help suspecting that La Bête has been hoisted by its own petard. In fact the play is self-referential to the point of self-regard. La Bête is not nearly as clever and captivating as it thinks it...

Financial Times“After a while, it begins to feel like a very long joke...” In spite of the ingenuity of the piece and in spite of a cast with impeccable comic credentials this show doesn’t fly. It is sustained largely by the brilliance of the performances. Rylance is in superb form. It ought to dig deep but it doesn’t..

this is london“Rollicking Mark Rylance spices up La Bete...” The moment he appears Rylance commands rapt attention. The play doesn’t sustain its initial bravura, though, and for all the inventiveness of Matthew Warchus’s production, it feels repetitious...

Whatsonstage.com“Appears trite and over-extended...” The evening becomes repetitive and, dare one say it, even rather boring. It never really lives up to its own billing as a heated debate about the place of art, integrity and popular passion in the commercial theatre...

The Independent“For about one hour, the show is enjoyable because it's so intriguing...” The play runs badly out of steam in the last 45 minutes, which seem to go on forever. But Rylance makes a virtuoso triumph of his uninterrupted 40-minute monologue, despite the lack of stage vivacity around him...

The Telegraph“Beginning brilliantly only to turn dismally flat...” This is high definition comic acting of an exceptional order, bursting with grotesque detail and energy, while also proving unexpectedly endearing. Initially promising, it becomes so self-regarding and ultimately arid...

The Times“Not yet reviewed”