This remarkable one-man show celebrates and excavates the life and career of Sir Alec Guinness. Of all that generation of British theatre knights who came of age in the 1930s and 40s, he was perhaps the most versatile – equally at home and successful on stage, film, or television, and in tragedy or comedy; and perhaps best-known for portraying characters at one remove from the mainstream or possessed with a reserve that reflected hidden damage or complexity – referred to by John Gielgud as ‘those odd little men.’ Above all he was a consummate technician, with a unique precise drawl of delivery and a master of physical disguise.
This is a demanding agenda for Zeb Soanes to take up, but he hits the target with panache. His first line captured the voice perfectly, and you could sense an almost audible sigh of relief from the audience as everyone knew from that moment that the evening was going to be in safe hands. With only a scattering of props and costumes, he relies on gesture and significant movement to take us through the main stages of Guinness’ career while giving weight to his difficult private life as well. But this is not merely an immaculate impersonation and embodiment of Alec Guinness himself; for just as important and credible are all the smaller roles that Soanes encompasses to provide the main character’s interlocutors. I counted well over thirty different voices and inflections that bring the interchanges to life, an achievement of which the Guinness of Kind Hearts and Coronets would have been proud. Some of these were famous actors such as Gielgud, Olivier and Edith Evans, all familiar voices; but there were equally impressive turns as George Lucas, David Lean and Omar Sharif and many others seamlessly introduced.
The leading skills of Mark Burgess’ play, first performed in 2010, are in interleaving the personal and the professional, and in knowing what to include and what to leave out. He strikes the right balance between exposition and enactment, giving long enough scenes for the actor to strut his stuff, while not dwelling too long on any one film, play or series. It would be easy to overburden us with detail, but the text manages to touch on all the key representative elements and then leave the working out of the detailed physical implications to Soanes. The central theme, illustrated with a defiant and aching eloquence by Soanes, is that Guinness never truly knew who he was – illegitimate, with no sense of his father, and a mother who alternately neglected and exploited him; unhappily bisexual; wanting fame, but uneasy with its consequences – all of these tensions and more made for an unhappy life but provided a glittering seam of rich ore for his work. Without the life, it is hard to imagine where characters such as Colonel Nicholson, Jock Sinclair, Professor Marcus and even Obi-Wan Kenobi would have come from. Above all, the opaque, closed-down reticence of George Smiley seems a distillation of a lifetime’s experience of the pull between concealment and self-assertion. It was appropriate that this was the play’s point of repose.
Director Selina Cadell keeps things simple and minimalist with the focus on the stories and the characters without distractions. Nevertheless, the contributions of set and lighting designers Lee Newby and Michael Fox are notable – there is a theatrical backcloth and screen, an actor’s trunk and a couple of pieces of furniture and that is it. But the tight spotlight or warm backstage ambience are enough to let our imaginations fill in the rest, and the sound scheme by Eliza Thompson ensures we receive suitable musical triggers as well. My only reservation is that, as so often, the interval was neither dramatically necessary nor desirable.
This is a special, deeply empathetic rendition, evoking a unique actor whose performances were all the greater for being forged out of personal pain and suffering. Those who are aficianados will find much to stimulate them anew, while those who know little or nothing of Guinness will be subtly and fully drawn in.
By Mark Burgess
Directed by Selina Cadell
Performer: Zeb Soanes
Until 2 May 2026
2 hrs with interval
Photo Credit: Danny Kaan