Skip to main content
Donate to the 95 years appeal
The Night of The Iguana, Noel Coward Theatre, London
Production of a Tennessee Williams play doesn't live up to its promise
In disgrace: Clive Owen as Reverend Shannon [Brinkhoff Moegenburg]

HEAVILY influenced by a summer Tennessee Williams spent in Tahiti in 1940, The Night of The Iguana is an odd mixture of elements.

It’s like a jigsaw puzzle whose striking individual pieces are all present but, assembled as a whole, fails to live up to expectations.

Rae Smith’s tropical set — a Mexican hotel that’s little more than a few corrugated shacks overlooking the sea adjoining an imposing rock face — is the faintly allegorical setting for a diverse group of people who, breaking or ending their journeys, deliberate on and remonstrate about their lives.

The 95th Anniversary Appeal
Support the Morning Star
You have reached the free limit.
Subscribe to continue reading.
More from this author
IMPASSIONED: Phoebe Thomas and Matt Whitchurch / Pic: Ellie Kurttz
Theatre review / 25 May 2025
25 May 2025

SIMON PARSONS is taken by a thought provoking and intelligent play performed with great sensitivity

Terrors
Theatre review / 16 May 2025
16 May 2025

SIMON PARSONS is gripped by a psychological thriller that questions the the power of the state over vulnerable individuals

CLASS AND SEXUALITY: Sesley Hope and Synnove Karlsen in Laura Lomas’s The House Party / Pic: Ikin Yum
Theatre Review / 24 April 2025
24 April 2025

SIMON PARSONS applauds an imaginative and absorbing updating of Strindberg’s classic

Lizzie Watts and Andre Squire in Jane Upton’s (the) Woman
Theatre review / 19 February 2025
19 February 2025
SIMON PARSONS is discomfited by an unflichingly negative portrait of motherhood and its trials
Similar stories
moon
Theatre review / 27 June 2025
27 June 2025

MARY CONWAY revels in the Irish American language and dense melancholy of O’Neill’s last and little-known play

HOMOSEXUAL REPRESSION: Kingsley Ben-Adir as Brick and Seb Ca
Theatre Review / 19 December 2024
19 December 2024
‘There's outrage aplenty in this production but we never quite get to the dark night of the soul,’ writes WILL STONE
Jonno Davies immersive and powerhouse performance as Robbie
Cinema / 19 December 2024
19 December 2024
The Star's critic MARIA DUARTE reviews Better Man, How To Make Millions Before Grandma Dies, Mufasa: The Lion King, Dolphin Boy
Japan's Naomi Osaka returns a shot against Italy's Lucia Bro
Women’s Tennis / 25 September 2024
25 September 2024