In 1897 Edmond Rostand wrote his masterpiece Cyrano de Bergerac in elegant alexandrine verse, creating a work that celebrates language, eloquence and the sheer force of words. It is also a play deeply concerned with appearances, both social and physical, and with the uneasy distance between inner worth and outward perception. At its centre is Cyrano, a brilliant swordsman of extraordinary verbal gifts, who is self-conscious about his large nose. For both Cyrano and Roxane, the woman he loves, language is not merely expression but identity itself. Their tragedy lies in Cyrano’s belief that Roxane will never see past his appearance. When she expresses her love for the handsome but inarticulate Christian, Cyrano becomes the voice of his rival’s courtship, shaping words that allow another man to inhabit the very identity he himself cannot claim. In this production written by Simon Evans and Debris Stevenson, there is a clear attempt to engage with the work's central concerns of language and appearance, yet the relationship between theme and presentation is often strikingly out of joint. At moments, flashes of Rostand’s wit and linguistic mastery come through, but more often the language is drained of its lyricism and imagination, leaving scenes that feel curiously muted rather than alive. That disjunction is felt most sharply in much of the dialogue. A reliance on expletives for comic effect feels less like invention than a retreat from it. The use of the f-word, once capable of creating shock or laughter, now lands without impact, even when stretched into an acrostic sequence that feels strained rather than playful. In the same way, Roxane’s professed reverence for language is undermined when she misuses terms such as “disinterested” meaning "uninterested." Musical underscoring of emotional moments further unsettles the supposed thematic importance of language. Rather than allowing speech to carry the feeling, music is used to signal it, competing with the words instead of deepening them. What should be achieved through rhythm and phrasing is instead underlined from outside, diminishing the expressive force of the text. If the play is fundamentally about appearance, then the production’s visual world also becomes a crucial extension of that idea. Yet here too coherence is elusive. Roxane appears initially in nineteenth century dress, only to re-emerge in a black cocktail dress by the end. Stylised swordplay contrasts with soldiers entering in modern helmets carrying rifles. There is a shifting register of periods and styles, which rather than offering a considered exploration of appearance and identity, results in a production that feels unsure of its own surface, let alone its meaning. The gap between what the play is about and what it looks like is never productively explored, only inconsistently displayed. Against this uncertainty, the evening finds its anchor in a compelling central performance from Adrian Lester as Cyrano. He brings intelligence, warmth and emotional precision to the role, capturing both the exuberance of Cyrano’s wit and the vulnerability beneath his bravado. It is a performance that repeatedly steadies the production when its wider conception falters. Without him, the emotional coherence of this piece would be far harder to sustain.
Rated: ★★★
Reviewed by J.C.
Photo by Chloe Pritchard-Gordon
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