THE PRICE

Marylebone Theatre

★★★★

“as a theatrical performance, it is priceless”

‘The price we have to pay’ is an often-used aphorism, not just in literary form, but in everyday conversation. Arthur Miller shortened it to just “The Price” for his 1967 two-act play. He could have maybe done with shortening the text a little as well, but this searing family drama is so packed full of themes, tensions, memories, grudges and secrets that the dialogue resembles the ramshackle, claustrophobic and cluttered attic in which the action is set. An attic filled with heirlooms and keepsakes; each with its own significance.

The mind of a man is “like a bric-a-brac shop”, Oscar Wilde once quoted, “all monsters and dust”. The first thing we see as we enter the auditorium is Jon Bausor’s astonishingly well-crafted set, which is at once a literal New York brownstone attic, and a metaphor. As the dust sheets are peeled away, the monsters appear. They haunt their protagonists over the next two and a half hours of real-time action that paints a very vivid picture of four disparate and desperate characters.

New York cop Victor Franz (Elliot Cowan) turns up at his late parents’ house where all the possessions are cramped into the attic that his father retreated to after the tragic death of his mother. He has a date with nonagenarian antique dealer Solomon (Henry Goodman) who has come to cast his Machiavellian eye over the goods with a view to slapping a price on the job lot. The first act focuses on the wrangling and haggling – not just between Victor and Solomon, but also with Victor’s wife Esther (Faye Castelow) who has her fair share of input and opinion. In act two, Solomon spends much of the time out of sight (but not out of mind) while the arrival of Victor’s estranged brother Walter (John Hopkins) really gets those dust motes flying through the air. More like a ricochet of bullets as family secrets are fired at each other. The characters actions and reactions shift like an accordion’s bellows, and we wonder at times how the whole concertina doesn’t get ripped apart completely.

Cowan’s Victor is a finely portrayed figure of lapsed principles, swamped by his own sense of mediocrity. Having dropped out of university to care for his father, his own disappointment is surpassed only by his wife’s. Esther is probably the least sympathetic character, but Castelow gives her exasperation justification that we ultimately warm to. Meanwhile, sleek and successful Walter returns after sixteen years. The concertina effect once again comes into full force as the brothers repeatedly move towards reconciliation, but in a short cruel and discordant breath they are then pulled apart once more.

The performances are spot on, each cast member skilfully grappling with Miller’s dialogue. The star turn is Goodman, who plays his part with relish. Bordering on caricature, there is something almost Biblical about the character that gives his name extra significance. Loaded with tenuous wisdom and comic relief, he is part arbitrator and agitator; untrusting and equally sly. There is a distinctive lack of resolution to the play, perhaps because there are too many reveals along the way. The brothers end up pretty much where they started but with more hindsight and insight. They have revealed long hidden truths about each other and their late parents and now know the price they have paid for their past sacrifices. Whether they can afford it is the one thing that still rents them apart.

Director Jonathan Munby’s staging complements the script, allowing the light and the shade to vacillate in time to Anna Watson’s subdued and atmospheric lighting. Max Pappenheim’s filmic score pulls tension back and forth like a dangerous undertow. Ultimately, all the bric-a-brac in the attic is sold, but the true, emotional legacy can never be shaken off, whatever the price. We have sat through a long evening and taken on a lot of emotional baggage. But as a theatrical performance, it is priceless.

THE PRICE

Marylebone Theatre

Reviewed on 23rd April 2026

by Jonathan Evans

Photography by Mark Senior

THE PRICE

★★★½

“not a comfortable watch, but it’s a quietly unsettling one that refuses to loosen its grip”

“Thank goodness I shall never be a woman”, said critic Harris Deans upon seeing the original production of The Old Ladies. I am a woman, so I couldn’t make the same exclamation, but as I left the theatre 90 years after he did, I did join him in thanking goodness that I would never be an old woman in 1935.

The Finborough Theatre never presents work that’s had a full run in London during the last 25 years, so they’re experts at mining up forgotten favourites and genuinely neglected works from the 19th and 20th centuries. The Old Ladies was written by playwright Rodney Ackland (who went on to work with Alfred Hitchcock), adapted from Hugh Walpole’s 1924 novel of the same name. Three aging women live in uncomfortable proximity to each other with nothing much to report on, and plenty of waiting to do – a combination that breeds nosiness and distrust.

The morbid atmosphere hung heavy in the auditorium before the lights even came up, thanks to the dark drapes flanking the stage filled with fussy furniture desperate to trip you up. Juliette Demoulin’s design keeps the drama contained by the domestic, pointing the finger at the systems that force these women into the same place. It doesn’t surprise me that Ackland envisaged adapting his work as an early film noir, as the sense of dread builds stealthily once the women begin to interact.

Initially, there is warmth and humour as the peculiarity and frankness of those in old age is made apparent, but the play quickly descends into a depressing and claustrophobic compression. May (Catherine Cusack) is nauseatingly frightful, and Lucy (Julia Watson) is pitiably optimistic given her son’s unexplained absence. Abigail Thaw’s Agatha is disconcertingly intense, and director Brigid Lamour’s decision to have her dozing in the background of scenes she didn’t feature in made the audience as nervous as poor Lucy. All three had me torn between wanting to shake them or to run a mile from them, so it’s safe to say the character portrayals were absurdly affecting. Carla Joy Evans’ costume design enhanced the three women’s attempts to hold on to lasting identities while still maintaining the monochromatic feel. Mark Dymock’s lighting was most notable for successfully making the actors look much older and more weary than they did at curtain call.

Max Pappenheim’s subtle sound design tracked the route from ordinariness to intensity, as we watched this story of poverty become something much more grim. The direction and performances collectively pace this turn from domestic tale to psychological drama carefully, leaving the audience in a twilight zone of uncertainty for much of the action, as they are left unsure which it truly is. The eeriness does pay off in the final scenes, but it feels like more of a relief than a satisfaction.

It’s rare that a play makes me so thankful I live in the present time period, given that many of them were written and set a long time ago, and suffer from the cursed rose tinted glasses of nostalgia. But this production is quite unyielding in its bleakness. It doesn’t take too much of a stretch to see The Old Ladies as a warning, as it points its finger harshly at the potential consequences of a limited life – be that economic or social limits – and warns us how grim old age can really get. It’s not a comfortable watch, but it’s a quietly unsettling one that refuses to loosen its grip.

Tag Archives: Max Pappenheim

THE PRICE

★★★★

Marylebone Theatre

THE PRICE

Marylebone Theatre

★★★★

“as a theatrical performance, it is priceless”