TARTUFFE REMIXED

Marylebone Theatre

★★★★★

“an evening of powerful, enriching theatre”

The extended family have gathered for a wedding. Pastor Blake (Mark Rylance) arrives to save a household that was managing perfectly well without him.

Usifu Jalloh’s Oga is the pious patriarch and a generous host. His daughter Adanna (Sara Mokonen) is engaged to Sinclair (Ivandro Da Cruz Leite), a nice young man who is in love with her. In an Iago-like move, Pastor Blake plants a seed of doubt in Oga’s mind about Sinclair’s faithfulness both to God and to Adanna. Oga responds by promising his daughter to the pastor instead. However, Pastor Blake has designs not just on Oga’s second wife Elmire (Nakeba Buchanan), but also on the family money.

Adaptor and director Darren Raymond writes in rhyming couplets, laced with spoken word and punctuated by Duramaney Kamara’s sound design and score. The rewriting of Molière’s script in Tartuffe Remixed reveals that Pastor Blake’s power is verbal. He weaponises his education and authority to make the family doubt one another.

This is a study in how the patriarchy weakens the tribe by imposing the paterfamilias’s blind spots on others, instead of combining everyone’s strengths. Oga loves his daughter Adanna. Yet he hands her on as though her life is merely his game of pass the parcel.

Molière’s original farce breaks through into this production when the groom’s father Delroy (Craig Blake) attempts to unveil the pastor’s fraud. This doesn’t go according to plan.

Morenike Onajobi’s Kemi is Adanna’s oldest friend. She’s been onto Pastor Blake from the beginning but hasn’t the status to intervene. Suzette Llewellyn’s Grandma and Blanche Williams’s Great-Grandma are convincing Afro-Caribbean elders. Christopher Mbaki’s D-Miz brings a noisy charm.

Raymond is Artistic Director of Intermission Youth. Most of this cast came up through it, with two of the charity’s graduates joining the company in rotation through the run. Rylance is a founding trustee. This superb show is what that investment produces.

ULTZ gives Oga a mansion worth stealing (though on the night I saw it, a light flickered distractingly, and I could not tell whether that was deliberate). The wedding clothes by Shola Ajayi (with Maybelle Laye as associate costume designer) were perfect, not straying beyond the stylish, tasteful side of flamboyant.

Molière was denied a church burial by the institution he satirised. By the end of this show, you can see why. Although entirely predictable, the denouement is the most moving ten minutes of theatre I have seen this year. The family returns to their faith, without any corrupt and corrupting mediator. The women have untangled the knotty problem, re-jigging the tribal power structure. In the end, the extended family submits not just to their Creator but to the higher purposes of strength, unity and peace within the tribe.

Full marks, all round. This is an evening of powerful, enriching theatre that restores one’s faith in humanity.

TARTUFFE REMIXED

Marylebone Theatre

Reviewed on 11th September 2026

by Elizabeth Botsford

Photography by Mark Senior

TARTUFFE REMIXED

★★½

“troubled by needless montage sequences and audience participation that add little to proceedings”

In a time in which news coverage surrounding ‘alternative facts’ and ‘fake news’, Moliere’s Le Misanthrope holds an obvious appeal. The desire of a single person to speak truth in an age in which lies are dominant burns as brightly as when written. Revived here at the Camden People’s Theatre, the transference of the play to a modern newsroom both aids and restricts the play’s appeal.

Relocated to the modern day, we follow Alceste, a popular news anchor. He despises the flattery in society, and prefers to speak bluntly. However, he is in love Celeste, who uses her fame to spread as much gossip as possible. Alceste’s journey to win his love and correct the society around him will see him very much swimming against the tide.

The script itself is well adapted, performed through rhyming couplets that lend the dialogue a natural rhythm. Interestingly, the company are performing the show alternatively across the run in both English and French. It is striking to see how relevant Moliere proves to be to today’s world, with links to the Donald Trumps’ and the Loose Women of the world coming all too easily.

Alongside playing Alceste, star David Furlong also directs the play. He is complimented by a fascinating video design that links the play to social media. While generally smooth, it is a shame that the production can lack pace, and is troubled by needless montage sequences and audience participation that add little to proceedings. Also, while generally well performed, the running time does in extended periods struggle for laughs.

Surrounding Furlong is a strong ensemble cast. Anoushka Rava captures the vapid nature of her character. Many highlights come from Leo Elso’s Oronte, a sensitive soul that takes every chance to indulge in his artistry. Furlong himself, while undertaking a tremendous task in starring and directing this production, doesn’t seem to really hate enough. It may be due to his nature that even in his most hatefully intended rants, he still comes across as quite pleasant.

While interesting to see, Moliere’s text does in this performance really cry out for unleashing. You leave wanting more precision, raised stakes and the changed setting works better for some aspects than others. Overall then, a fascinating bi-language project from Exchange Theatre that while holding much promise, at this stage doesn’t quite hit the height of its ambitions.

Reviewed by Callum McCartney

Photography by Anais Le Pape

Tag Archives: Moliere

TARTUFFE REMIXED

★★★★★

Marylebone Theatre

TARTUFFE REMIXED

Marylebone Theatre

★★★★★

“an evening of powerful, enriching theatre”