Review: LEWIS AND TOLKIEN at Taproot Theater

For two men who built grand worlds of myth and magic, Lewis and Tolkien is a strikingly intimate and deeply human story—not of great battles or epic journeys, but of friendship, regret, and the quiet ache of unspoken words. Now playing at the Taproot Theater, this play, adapted from Colin Duriez’s novel Tolkien and C.S. Lewis: The Gift of Friendship, is not a play about C.S. Lewis and J.R.R. Tolkien as authors, but as friends—friends who have hurt each other, who feel unseen, and who struggle, in the way that sometimes men do, to be truly vulnerable with one another.

This is an hour-and-a-half play with no intermission, featuring two, as they call themselves, “old codgers” talking in a pub. It’s not very story heavy. Director Karen Lund’s production fittingly has no frills; just the fireplace crackling behind the two protagonists as they catch up and sip varsity ales in their old stomping ground. Tolkien and Lewis used to be a part of a fantasy literary group, the Inklings, and have known each other for more than 30 years. At the start of this play, the two reunite after having not seen each other for some time, for reasons we learn later. At times they are chummy, at others they bicker. If you need high drama or spectacle, this is not the show for you. This show has a similar feel to My Dinner with Andre, in that it doesn’t follow a traditional narrative arc with a clear climax and resolution. Instead, it unfolds organically, capturing the natural flow of a conversation between two people. This, at times, is to its detriment, because sometimes people babble, digress, and say things that aren’t interesting. However, there are moments of remarkable honesty, tenderness, and even humor, particularly when the characters let their guard down long enough to confront what’s really at stake. 

At the heart of this production is Peter Cook’s exceptional portrayal of C.S. Lewis. Cook brings an honesty and presence to the role that makes Lewis feel fully realized—gentle yet sharp, wounded yet hopeful. His performance alone is worth the price of admission. Opposite him, Jeff Allen Pierce’s Tolkien has a tougher exterior. His performance, while consistent, sometimes feels less nuanced—whether by design or by necessity, it’s difficult to tell. If his reserved nature is meant to highlight the difficulty of male vulnerability, it works, but it also makes for a lopsided dynamic. Cook’s Lewis is alive in every moment, while Pierce’s Tolkien feels stuck in his head. This is consistent with each of their truisms on meaningful friendship: Tolkien’s is shared interests, and Lewis’ is vulnerability. That said, I wish Pierce would have played more with Tolkien’s feelings of bitterness and remorse. 

The play is strongest when it digs into the wounds these men carry—Tolkien’s jealousy over Lewis’ success (which he fails to mask behind poking holes in Lewis’ plotpoints), his disapproval of Lewis’ marriage to a divorced woman (Toklien is a Catholic, Lewis is a Protestant), and Lewis’ deep grief following his wife’s death. One particularly affecting moment sees Lewis describe grief as feeling so much like fear—the terror of loneliness, of being abandoned not just by death, but by the friends who don’t know how to sit in your sorrow with you. It’s the kind of line that sits with you after the final curtain.

There is a third character: Veronica (Chloe Michele), the pub’s barmaide. Her role is primarily to pop in, apologize for intruding, ask if they need a refill, and occasionally chime in to validate or challenge the author’s takes on things like allegory.  Unfortunately, the character feels like a forced attempt to inject some movement into an otherwise static play, and Michele’s performance suffers for it. Her performance is very chipper—too chipper—in the company of these two erudite curmudgeons.

While the play’s pacing could benefit from some trimming—it does not need to be 90 minutes—there’s an intimacy to its single setting, the Rabbit Room of Oxford’s The Eagle and Child Pub, that adds to its charm. This play succeeds in humanizing these two authors, giving an aftertaste of sweetness in this reunion of old friends. Lewis and Tolkien may not be the most thrilling show of the season, but at its best, it’s an affecting meditation on fellowship, loss, and the struggle to truly see—and be seen by—the people we love. 

Grade: B

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