A production about denial that seeks to prove the cost of beauty in a world built on appearances.Rating
Excellent!
The 2004 Booker Prize-winning novel by Alan Hollinghurst takes to the stage in this captivating adaptation by Jack Holden. The Line of Beauty, directed by Michael Grandage, fills the Almeida Theatre with a sold-out run, an achievement that immediately sparks curiosity about what resonance a novel from the early 2000s holds for audiences in 2025.
For those unfamiliar with the novel, the story unfolds in the height of Thatcherite Britain, an age defined by political hypocrisy and the emergence of the AIDS/HIV crisis. Nick Guest, played by Jasper Talbot, is an idealistic Oxford graduate who becomes a lodger with the wealthy Fedden family. The Feddens, a rather familiar Conservative household, comprised of Gerald (Charles Edwards), a freshly elected MP; Rachel (Claudia Harrison), an heiress to a business tycoon; Toby (Leo Suter), Nick’s Oxford collegemate and keen rower; and Cat (Ellie Bamber), the daughter in distress – you get the picture.
Nick’s sexuality is established in the first few lines as Cat lovingly cries out, ‘Are you a poof?’, just to make sure we are all on the same page. Here, Holden sets up the pillars of the story, built on secrecy, privilege, and moral decay. While Nick appears to explore his desires in earnest in the beginnings of the play, his pursuit of beauty and belonging entangles him in a path of indulgence and self-destruction. The façade of perfection around him begins to fracture.
Christopher Oram’s set design, taking on Holden’s playtext note, is elegantly minimal. He evokes the decade with select period details while leaving room for our imagination to do the work. This intentional restraint allows the text and performances to lead the way, and Holden succeeds admirably in keeping the sentiment of a 500-page novel within the limits of a two-and-a-half-hour production. The characters are lifted straight off the page, and the ensemble cast delivers a brilliant job of distinct and nuanced performances, while continuing to serve the collective world of the play. Notably, our lead man, Talbot gives a tender and complex depiction of a young graduate whose innocence gradually erodes. His chemistry with Alistair Nwachukwu’s Leo Charles in Act One feels palpable and fresh, a spark that goes amiss when Nick’s romantic life becomes more complicated in the second act.
Grandage’s production, I feel, inevitably invites debate: does it offer a fresh perspective on a pandemic that defined a generation, or does it merely revisit familiar ground? A slight cough here and a pallid complexion there, the AIDS crisis seeps through the cracks, but it never dominates the narrative enough for us to feel the effects.
Through characters who cannot, or will not, acknowledge Nick’s sexuality, we are made to confront the quiet cruelty of denying the raw human cost of a tragedy, as the upper classes ignore it. We are shown that AIDS is not biased in its victims, in the sense of class, but that the aftermath is a harsh segregation. While the Feddens and Guest have the privilege to grieve in private and continue on with their lives, Leo’s sister, played by Francesca Amewudah-Rivers, is left to face the devastation without support or recognition.
In the end, The Line of Beauty feels like an accusation about a society obsessed with appearances. The choice to emphasise the effects on a group of characters we do not feel affiliated with helps us understand this microcosm of ignorance to a devastation that swept across the world. Grandage’s delivery of this well-executed adaptation leaves us with an unsettling feeling, as these corrupt, self-important, bigoted characters are an exact replica of the ones that led the country to its death at the time; something that feels alarmingly familiar in the current political landscape.
Novel by Alan Hollinghurst
Adaptation Written by Jack Holden
Directed by Michael Grandage
Set & Costume Design by Christopher Oram
Lighting Design by Howard Hudson
Sound Design by Adam Cork
Casting by Sophie Holland CSA
Movement & Intimacy by Ben Wright
An Almeida Theatre Production
The Line of Beauty plays at the Almeida Theatre until Saturday 29 November
