Review Roundup: DADDY By Jeremy O Harris at The Almeida Theatre

Read the reviews for the UK Premiere of Jeremy O Harris' play "Daddy" A Melodrama at The Almeida Theatre.

Claes Bang, Terique Jarrett, Jenny Rainsford, Sharlene Whyte and T'Shan Williams join Rebecca Bernice Amissah, Keisha Atwell, Ioanna Kimbook and John McCrea who were originally cast in the play before its postponement at the start of the COVID-19 pandemic.

The production opens at the Almeida on Wednesday 6 April, with previews from Saturday 26 March, and runs until Saturday 30 April.

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Charlie Wilks, BroadwayWorld: There are some gorgeous moments in Harris' play, which pack an impactful punch, and force you to pay attention to the action unfolding. However, the second half lacks clarity in the intention, and the clunky narrative composition results in unclear storytelling. Coming in at just under three hours, it feels like we've ran out of plot and are dragging our feet to get to the end. It's frustrating, because the first act takes us on a real journey, it's a perfectly created piece of theatre; however, the final moments leave you feeling underwhelmed.

Gabrielle Schwarz, Apollo Magazine: The art world is an easy target for satire, but that doesn't make the jokes at its expense any less delicious. (See also: Bang's star-making turn in Ruben Östland's 2017 film The Square.) Yet for all the laughs, the tone of this play is far from straightforwardly ironic. Rather, as the subtitle informs us, this is a melodrama: a heightened realm where matters of the heart and soul are treated with the utmost sincerity.

Patrick Marmion, The Daily Mail: The only character who comes close to creating interest is Sharlene Whyte as Franklin's God-lovin' preacher woman Mom, who Andre attempts to buy off with a Birkin bag. Matt Saunders' set of a poolside terrace certainly looks amazing, in a glass cloister hung with Abstract Expressionist art. But the play feels like a hoax, aimed at what producers must hope will be gullible audiences. Director Danya Taymor and her team will doubtless find such criticism predictable; but they should also ask if it has some substance.

Nick Curtis, Evening Standard: There's a riveting, exposing performance from relative newcomer Terique Jarrett as the artist Franklin, and an insouciantly creepy turn from Claes Bang, the Danish star of the BBC's Dracula, as his sugar daddy, Andre. Franklin starts off calling Andre "sir" then progresses to calling him "daddy". Trust me, it gets weirder from there. Director Danya Taymor takes us on a gleeful killing spree of sacred cows and sensitivities, until the end when Harris veers into indulgence. Even the pool becomes an overworked metaphor as a place of birth, baptism or drowning.

Arifa Akbar, The Guardian: The mood is impish and knowing with cool disco beats, sudden spotlights, and a hammy rendition of George Michael's Father Figure. But for all the theatrics, there is enough sophistication in the writing and in Danya Taymor's direction for these elements to work to thrilling effect.

Sam Marlowe, iNews: Harris, who made his own spectacular splash with his controversial US hit debut Slave Play and co-produces HBO's Euphoria, delivers a drama dripping with impish provocation, in which the politics of artistic patronage, objectification, race and sex are swirled with fabulous, eye-popping imagery, quasi-religious symbols and dreamlike surrealism. Danya Taymor's production, ravishingly designed by Matt Saunders, is as bright and bold as a Lichtenstein canvas, inviting us to gaze, gorging our eyes on (often naked) bodies and spectacle. It is, though, a brilliantly multi-edged seduction, squirm-inducing, hilarious, sometimes joltingly sad or cruel.

Isobel Lewis, The Independent: A disclaimer: if yoTu have a ticket for Daddy, I'd recommend closing this review now. Plenty has already been written about the play by buzzy playwright Jeremy O Harris. But Daddy is a masterpiece that doesn't so much pull the rug from under you as yank it, then stick around to laugh at you lying on the floor, dazed and bewildered. Trust me: this is a show enhanced by a lack of expectations.

Andrzej Lukowski, Time Out London: Having kept the story in motion with such thrillingly strange vigour, neither Harris nor Taymor manage to nail a killer ending to '"Daddy"', which wraps up with a protracted further exploration of the fact Franklin has daddy issues that drags, fussily restating and underscoring points we already got. The play's arch self-awareness is one of its strengths, but at the end it feels like Harris is so desperate to be sure nobody has missed what he's talking about that he brings '"Daddy"' to a grinding halt when it might have worked better speeding mischievously into the sunset on a more ambiguous note. Still, a bit of heavy-handedness in a debut play can be forgiven when there's so much invention elsewhere - '"Daddy"' may not be perfect, but it is remarkable.

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