SPECULATIONS
Marylebone Theatre
★★★
“There is plenty of room for animated speculation in the bar after the show”
Speculation is currently a bit of a buzz word. We often hear, in news reports or press conferences, the request to the public not to speculate until a particular story or case has accrued more solid evidence. This is not a modern development, however. Before social media, these ‘speculations’ would take place in cafes or bars, and even investigative journalists’ living rooms. This is the premise behind Torben Betts’ political thriller that centres on Dorothy Kilgallen’s theories around the deaths of Marilyn Monroe, John F. Kennedy and Lee Harvey Oswald. The programme notes emphatically tell us that the columnist turned muckraker, Kilgallen (played by Janie Dee), was ‘not a speculator’. Yet over the next two hours, that is precisely what she comes across as. As the play progresses, Dee’s portrayal strips the certainty away from the character, exposing the harsh truth that conspiracy theories are, and have always been, an intrinsic aspect of humanity.
It opens with a threatening phone call from an unknown source, establishing a sense of unease and paranoia. Kilgallen is about to publish an exposé of the alleged distortion of the circumstances behind the three deaths. In her jittery state she is interrupted by the entrance of Flo Jackson, a young aspiring journalist sidelining as a childminder (or perhaps vice versa). She does little childminding, but Gloria Obianyo’s Flo is an engaging presence, despite the implausibility. Equipped with her own strongly held views – especially on civil rights – Flo is partially reduced to the role of sounding board for Kilgallen’s narrative. Director Trevor Nunn cleverly sets two plays within the play, smoothly facilitated by Lee Newby’s set which revolves and swings to reveal the locations. This filmic approach neatly transports us into flashback territory in which we witness, first hand, Kilgallen’s speculations in dramatic form.
Marilyn Monroe (Natalie Dunne) receives a visit from Robert F. Kennedy (Jolyon Coy) who rather desperately, and repeatedly, demands her to relinquish her incriminating diaries. “Over my dead body” retorts Marilyn with artless dramatic irony. Meanwhile, in the second scenario, Lee Harvey Oswald (Joseph Potter) is groomed by New Orleans crime boss Carlos Marcello (Ferdy Roberts) into becoming the required killing machine for his revenge on the Kennedy clan. Connections are forged between the two storylines, and there are interesting insights into the complicated underworld that rippled the US Senate’s organised crime committee, but these retrospective scenes seem to run on a loop with little added on each repeat.
The performances are all convincing, even if their lines are less so. There is no sense of danger as Bobby Kennedy becomes more desperate to silence Monroe; more in the vein of a teenage lover than a powerful Attorney General. Consequently, it doesn’t do justice to the real-life personas (incidentally Flo is the only fictional character in the piece), eroding the audience’s belief in the central character of Kilgallen. Lee Harvey Oswald and Carlos Marcello fare better, yet their scenes comprise a rather sedentary portrait that avoids thrills or intrigue.
The play seeks to examine the perils of delving to deeply into the lives of the powerful and the dangerous. And how the political and the criminal world overlap. This danger finds its way into Dorothy Kilgallen’s living room – quite literally with a brick through the window at one point. Yet the real sense of threat doesn’t follow suit. We don’t expect fresh answers – we never will know for sure – but the questions raised are not really illuminated under a new light. It is not without satisfaction, however, and there is plenty of room for animated speculation in the bar after the show.
SPECULATIONS
Marylebone Theatre
Reviewed on 4th November 2026
by Jonathan Evans
Photography by Helen Maybanks
