Ragdoll ★★★ Jermyn Street Theatre | Oct 9 - Nov 15, 2025


In California in 1974, Patty Hearst, the heiress to a newspaper fortune, was kidnapped by the Symbionese Liberation Army. The story quickly made international headlines. When she appeared to join her captors and was filmed participating in a bank robbery, the media frenzy intensified. Her high-profile trial, in which she was defended by celebrity attorney F. Lee Bailey, became a global spectacle. Ragdoll recounts these events with thinly veiled fiction. While the names of the central figures are changed to Holly and Robert, many details remain, including how Hearst's sentence was commuted by Jimmy Carter and how she was later pardoned by Bill Clinton. The play reimagines events by introducing a fictional confrontation long after Holly’s release from prison. Robert, now accused of sexual misconduct, seeks Holly’s public support. Still resentful of how he treated her after her conviction, she hesitates. Their tense exchange is counterpointed by scenes from the past, with their younger selves depicting the period leading up to Holly's trial. Playwright Katherine Moar’s portrayal of both characters is notably unsympathetic, making it difficult to care deeply for either the naïve, self-absorbed young Holly or for the bitter, guarded older version. The same is true of the youthful Robert whose manipulative arrogance only evolves into a cynical striving for self-preservation. The characters remain opaque throughout. They age but do not grow, which limits the audience's emotional investment in either of them. The expensive but unusable sofa that dominates the set becomes an apt symbol of the skewed and superficial values embodied by both. While the quartet of actors playing them is convincing, the characters themselves remain unengaging. That said, Nathaniel Parker and Abigail Cruttenden give strong performances as the older Robert and Holly, while Ben Lamb and Katie Matsell are equally effective as their younger counterparts. Ragdoll offers a dark, rather distressing view of the American justice system, and celebrity culture, and it doesn't seem to offer much hope for human nature in general.

Rated: ★★★

Reviewed by J.C.
Photo by Alex Brenner

When, Where, Getting there:
Map & Location: 16B Jermyn St, London SW1Y 6ST, UK

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