THE LINE OF BEAUTY

Almeida Theatre

★★★½

“Grandage’s direction captures the intoxicating glamour and moral decay of 1980s London”

Should we love people for their beauty, or are people made beautiful through being loved? That is one of the central questions of The Line of Beauty, Alan Hollinghurst’s Booker Prize-winning novel, now given its first stage adaptation at the Almeida.

After a seven-year publishing hiatus, Hollinghurst’s 2024 novel Our Evenings reminded readers of his deft treatment of class, race and sexuality in late 20th-century Britain. This adaptation of his 2004 masterpiece, directed by Michael Grandage and adapted by Jack Holden, feels timely again: a period piece that still captures the social anxieties and desires of the present.

The story follows Nick Guest (Jasper Talbot), a young Oxford graduate who moves into the London home of his friend Toby Fedden’s family between 1983 and 1987. The Feddens seem gracious hosts: Gerald (Charles Edwards), a newly minted Tory MP on the up in Thatcher’s Britain, and Rachel (Claudia Harrison), the moneyed, quietly controlling matriarch. Yet beneath their polished hospitality lies an unease—Nick’s sexuality is tolerated rather than embraced, and despite his education and charm, he remains forever an outsider.

The production’s strongest moments come in the first act, contrasting Nick’s initiation into the Feddens’ rarefied world with his tender, complex relationship with Leo (a wonderful Alistair Nwachukwu), his first boyfriend. The class and racial dynamics between them are finely drawn: to the Feddens, Nick is gauche and provincial; to Leo, he represents privilege and aspiration. Their dinner scene at Leo’s family home is the play’s emotional heart, Doreene Blackstock is superb as Leo’s devout Jamaican mother, layering issues of class, race, sexuality and faith with undeniable warmth.

Adam Cork’s sound design brilliantly anchors the production in its era. 80s pop anthems throb through the set, evoking the ecstasy and danger of the decade. Subtler choices are just as effective: a soft echo added to conversations in country estates conjures a chilling sense of distance and grandeur. Christopher Oram’s costumes complete the world—corduroy trousers, baggy shirts, and side ponytails secured with satin scrunchies perfectly capturing the aesthetic of the age.

The play can feel overstuffed. A vast array of characters and subplots race through a decade of shifting politics and private betrayals. Some secondary roles are barely glimpsed, though “Old Pete” (Matt Mella), Leo’s older ex-lover, leaves a lasting impression in just a few minutes on stage.

There are clunky moments: stylised scene transitions, on-the-nose symbolism (a line of cocaine mirroring the “line of beauty”), and some heavy-handed dialogue. And Talbot as Nick feels like a vessel for the audience to view this world rather than a hero: passive, and at times insipidly submissive, forever observing beauty rather than creating it. But Grandage’s direction captures the intoxicating glamour and moral decay of 1980s London, while Arty Froushan’s totally tragic Wani brings a raw vulnerability to the later scenes.

In the end, as the impact of the AIDS pandemic draws closer in and the hypocrisies of wealth and politics are laid bare, Nick’s exile feels inevitable. On the whole this adaptation of The Line of Beauty is a thoughtful, sensuous reflection on love, class and the price of belonging.