Betrayal, the sold-out London hit starring Tom Hiddleston, Zawe Ashton, and Charlie Cox comes to Broadway for a strictly limited engagement.
Direct from a standing-room-only hit run in London, Betrayal is the story of an illicit affair that unfolds in reverse—from the end of a marriage to the first forbidden spark. Starring Golden Globe and Olivier Award winner Tom Hiddleston (The Avengers), Zawe Ashton (Velvet Buzzsaw) and Charlie Cox (Daredevil) in their Broadway debuts, this stunning production features the daring vision of one of the UK's most acclaimed directors.
But your eyes are glued to the actors, who fill their Pinter pauses with fierce desire and longing - especially when standing several feet apart. Hiddleston supplies most of the play's danger with his forceful presence, while its heart comes from a deep-feeling Ashton. Meanwhile, Cox is a guy plenty of audience members would gladly leave their husbands for.
Despite the real power of Hiddleston's performance, that empathy gap strikes me as a flaw. We can't quite take Emma at her word (we've also heard her lie on other important matters), and so the scales of Lloyd's play end up tipped rather than balanced. It seems to be a play about a victim and two perpetrators - but I think it's a play about three people, all of whom we should empathize with, all of whom we should mistrust, all of whom are capable of great selfishness. Ashton has the hardest job: Emma's got that sense of mystery about her that sometimes happens when men, even very talented men, write women. The scenes between Robert and Jerry, though often tense and terse, feel lived, red-blooded, affectionate. Emma often seems ethereal - her motivations and actual desires somehow far away. (For a real bust-up of that trope, get into Bakewell's essay - there's no mystery woman there; instead there's a super-smart Cambridge grad who was expected to become a housewife and mother at 25.) The character is already the most opaque in the play, and Ashton's performance doesn't do much to elucidate her. Tall and willowy, with bare feet and a dancer's limbs, she tucks her hair behind her ears, tilts her head and half smiles. It's clear she likes Jerry's attention, but it's not clear where her own deep hungers lie. Lloyd has her leaning into the enigmatic aura Pinter gave Emma, and it renders Ashton less visceral and-and this is the real problem-less sympathetic than her male counterparts.
1980 | Broadway |
Broadway |
2000 | Broadway |
Roundabout Revival Broadway |
2013 | Broadway |
Broadway Revival Broadway |
2019 | West End |
London Revival at Harold Pinter Theatre West End |
2019 | Broadway |
Broadway Revival Broadway |
Year | Ceremony | Category | Nominee |
---|---|---|---|
2020 | Drama League Awards | Distinguished Performance Award | Tom Hiddleston |
2020 | Drama League Awards | Outstanding Revival of a Play | Betrayal |
2020 | Outer Critics Circle Awards | Outstanding Actor in a Play | Tom Hiddleston |
2020 | Outer Critics Circle Awards | Outstanding Director of a Play | Jamie Lloyd |
2020 | Outer Critics Circle Awards | Outstanding Revival of a Play | Betrayal |
2020 | Tony Awards | Best Direction of a Play | Jamie Lloyd |
2020 | Tony Awards | Best Performance by an Actor in a Leading Role in a Play | Tom Hiddleston |
2020 | Tony Awards | Best Revival of a Play | Betrayal |
2020 | Tony Awards | Best Scenic Design of a Play | Soutra Gilmour |
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